Biting, NO, Bit the Bullet

I have been struggling for a very long time about when or whether I should buy my next PC. I did NOT want to rush into Windows 8. Then along came Windows 8.1, and I gave a little. W8.1 supposedly fixed a lot of the issues that were complained about in W8. I will find out soon enough.

And then there was my concern for my PCDOC customers and students I am teaching. Some, now many many of you, have purchased or will soon purchase, new PCs,

Then there is my stubbornness about making Windows XP last. I have been (publicly) determined to have my XP systems last well beyond the end of support for XP in April of 2014. So my current status is that I have 2 machines that are running Windows XP. One of these has been my workhorse, but for the last 2 months it has been slowly dying on me, and I knew it wouldn't last forever. So it would be more correct to say I have one and a half XP machines!

The new machine I bought is a Dell Inspiron 15R. It has Windows 8 (not 8.1 - yet). It has a 1TB disk drive, 8GB of RAM, and a touch screen. It has an Intel Core i5-4200U CPU. This should last for a few years. Initially I will use it to document (in class handout form) a Windows 8 supplement to my growing library of student materials (now XP, Vista, and W7).

Once I am comfortable with W8 I will upgrade to Windows 8.1 - a free upgrade. At that point I will feel current. I have been falling behind.

After just an hour or so on my new machine I am playing music that lives on my W7 machine. I am also quite surprised at how easy it is to switch back and forth between the fancy W8 desktop and the traditional Windows desktop. I have added 2 photos below, one of each desktop window.

Much more to come - obviously, as I gain experience, but so far, so good!

  Traditional Windows Desktop displayed

New Windows 8 Desktop