Sony doesn't use DX on their consoles, derp.

OT: The sad thing here is MS limiting what PCs can do, oh well :/

I disagree.  The changes made to the OS aren't just for the benefit of tablets or mobile phones.  The changes to the task manager, to Windows Explorer, offer no benefit to mobile devices. 

I don't disagree that as a UI the Windows 8 desktop has a functional disconnect between the Metro UI and the Explorer UI, nor will I argue that Microsoft doesn't have a long way to go before that chasm is bridged.  But I disagree that Windows 8 is necessarily slow.  Does Windows 8 require relearning, absolutely.  I have been using the Explorer UI since Windows 95 was in beta.  I helped mold that UI over the years into what it has eventually become.  So, yes I'm fully aware of the challenge the Metro UI creates and the relearning it forces upon users.  However, once uderstood, Windows 8 doesn't represent a significant challenge for users.  The problem is that the UI has changed and that users want backward compatibility in the UI.  Not that the UI nor the operating system doesn't work.

That being said, there was nothing significantly wrong with Windows Vista.  The problem with Windows Vista had to do with the memory requirements, memory requirements which didn't change with Windows 7.  The only thing that changed between Windows Vista and Windows 8 is the fact that memory became cheaper and more plentiful, Windows device drivers became updated for the new driver model, and hardware performance increased.  To emphasize this, the Aero Ui of Windows Vista went from being a component of Windows Vista Ultimate to a standard component in Windows 7.  The reason it wasn't a standard component was because of the limitations of both memory and GPU capabilities at the time.  Capabilities which somehow disappeared between the time that Windows Vista and Windows 7 were released.

The major problem with Windows Vista beside the failure of the technology meet the needs of the OS was the fact that the OS consumed 100% of the memory.  As I've stated elsewhere, this was because the original intent was to include a SQL-based file system called WinFS.  Like SQL Server, the OS consumed 100% of memory to ensure the OS had sufficient resources for the file system server.  In turn, the OS would relenquish memory as applications needed it.  This was a fundemental change to what people were used to.  Between Vista and Windows 7 there were few performance differences. 

For people who actually used Windows Vista through SP2, and whose hardware was supported by the OS and worked well with the OS, it worked just as well as Windows 7.  Me, personally, I liked Windows Vista better than Windows 7.   Your suggestion that it was the same as Windows ME isn't even an accurate one.

Windows ME was an attempt to bridge the the DOS-based Windows 9x with Windows NT.  It failed because there were fundemental flaws in the OS itself.  It was a consumer ONLY OS.  You couldn't network it, and businesses couldn't license it.  It offered poor support for Windows games and even poorer support for MS-DOS games.  It required those upgrading to buy completely new system utilities.  And the worst part about it was given time, the OS functionaly got worse.  It offered none of the self-repairing benefits of NTFS, it lacked both full forward and backward compatibility, and given the Windows 2000 was released approximately the same time it Windows 2000 Professional represented a better, more stable OS option. 

Windows Vista, by comparision had none of the challenges Windows ME did.  The majority of applications compatible with Windows XP were compatible with Windows Vista.  The majority of hardware intended for Windows XP was compatible with Windows Vista.  Besides anti-virus utilities, which hadn't been backward compatible with prior versions of Windows since Windows 98 or Windows 2000, and older software and hardware designed for previous versions of Windows but still compatible with Windows XP.  With the exception of Nvidia graphic cards, Windows Vista was a solid, stable OS from day one until the release of Windows 7.

Windows 8 doesn't have the same challenges that Windows ME did.  Windows 8 is solid, stable.  Yes, the OS requires users to relearn but it works.  To exemplify this fact, Windows ME was Windows 4.9.  There was no version that ever continued the 4.0 kernel.  It was abandoned.  Windows XP was built upon the Windows 2000 (Windows 5.0) kernel, and Windows 7 (Windows 6.1) and 8 (Windows 6.2) are both built upon the Windows Vista (Windows 6.0) kernel.  Even Windows 8.1 (Windows 6.3) is built upon the same kernel.  So, in terms of an OS no, Windows Vista isn't a failure and neither is Windows 8.  Microsoft if anything has double-down with Windows 8.1 and hasn't abandoned any aspect of Windows 8. 

A significant majority of the changes made to the system offer no tangible benefits to (non-tablet, touchscreen PC, etc users).  Did they give PC users a bone or two?  Sure.  

The problem is that the Metro UI is such a chasm between the previous Windows framework that it made absolutely no sense to force it into the same room with the previous Windows UI.  It's Microsoft's response to Apple.   The problem is it was  done in a typical Microsoft fashion.  There is now, 100 ways to skin a cat between the Metro UI and the standard Windows UI.

This is another problem with Microsoft's logic.  A lot of people (And I would venture most) simply want an operating system that is relatively easy to use (Microsoft already has this formula down pat, which is a big reason why they shouldn't have unnecessarily forced it upon PC users), doesn't hinder system performance and improves on all of those performance things that normal people don't see.  Microsoft needs to start refining Windows performance far more than it's gloss.   They should have released a mobile version / PC version until they identified how to relate  the two ecosystems better, or at least had a better sense for where the industry is headed.

I don't care about necessarily the specifics but Vista from an end-user perspective had plenty of the same challenges  that ME or any other failure of an OS had.  It didn't work for them, at least not well.  Whether it was a lack of drivers, or things simply "not working", the results for an end user are the same.  

Windows 8 could have been 'okay' without a half-assed, hodge podge marriage with Tablets/Touchscreens. It's essentially that simple.  It simply doesn't work well for either environment. (A PC user or a Tablet one). In my opinion, Microsoft more than ever needs to focus on performance and making things 'work' rather than trying to re-invent the wheel on the PC side.  Microsoft's gravy is UI familiarity at this point and any idea that tries to rapidly divert from that is simply a bad idea from a business standpoint.  Windows 8 was a rapid diversion and gives the user the feel of a cheap experience.  

And how do you propose you improve a UI that has been matured and evolved for over 15 years?  Do you realize that the Explorer UI is one of the longest living graphical UI in the history of computing?  Not to mention the most successful one.  Only the Mac OS UI has survived longer. 

You won't get any arguments out of me that there is a chasm between the Metro UI and the Explorer UI, but the same could easily be said about Windows 3.1 and Windows 95.  When Microsoft introduced the Explorer UI the fact that there were six ways to Sunday to solve a problem became a hiccup for many.  They were used to doing things one way in Windows 3.x in the Program Manager UI and the fact that you didn't do things the same way in Windows 95 was a big challenge for people to overcome.  But while Windows 95's Explorer UI was more complex and more difficult to learn, people acclimated to it.

At some point Microsoft has to make the switch.  I think personally think the Start Panel is a smart idea.  I get what Microsoft is trying to accomplish.  That is, to move away from the desktop and file system, and connect users directly to their applications.  I don't feel they've failed in that endeavor, the problem is simply that they haven't resolved all the other functions. 

The challenge is bridging that chasm.  The fact that I can install and uninstall an application from the Metro UI is awesome.  I don't need to go exploring the Control Panel on how to do that.  I right click, select Uninstall, and I'm off to the races.  Simplifications like this are what the Metro UI needs to do.  I don't dismiss the chasms that exist between how you do things in the Explorer UI and how you do things in the Metro UI.  I don't think Microsoft needs to throw the baby out with the bath water, however.  Despite what you say, the UI does work as a desktop UI.  If you wrap your head around the simple concept that the Windows 8 Start Panel is just a glorified Start Menu that's the dominante focus, then it's rather easy to use and understand. 

On the performance front, Windows 8 offers equal or better performance compared to Windows 7.  Boot and Start up times are significantly improved over Windows 7.  So the ability to get to the UI to use it or to shut it down and move on to something else improved.  File copying performance and application performance in Windows 8 is better than Windows 7.  The only point where Windows 7 offer a perceptionally insignificant performance difference is games.  The difference is so minor though that it's on the order of 10ths of a percent.  Not enough to squabble about and something that will improve in time.

And Windows Vista's problems, as mentioned by another user were centered significantly around graphic drivers.  Windows Vista changed up how graphic drivers worked in Windows Vista.  In Windows XP they were a certain type of driver, I forget the name, but in Windows Vista they became the standard.  But on top of that, Microsoft took access to the hardware away from the hardware developer.  The majority of BSODs was the result of device driver manufacturers.  So, to eliminate that as a source of problems, Microsoft created the concept of mini-drivers.  Technically this was done a long time ago, but mini-drivers have an OS component that Microsoft writes, and a device specific component that the OEM writes.  That component that the OEM writes changed between Windows XP and Windows Vista, and the access to the hardware became restrained.  Not all OEMs read the DDK, to put it bluntly, and tried to do things according to the old model.  That didn't work.

The actual problems with the OS were minor and solved after the second service pack.  The fact that Microsoft didn't abandon any of the essential changes to the OS, only added a few to them, speaks volumes about the stability of the OS.  As mentioned before, even the Aero UI which had been an advanced option available in only certain versions of the OS and for those with GPUs capable of supporting it, became a standard feature in Windows 7 with absolutely no major changes.  The only thing about Vista, which wasn't even included in the release product, that was never carried over, was the WinFS.  That's the ONLY thing about Windows Vista that didn't survive in Windows 7, and it didn't even make it to Windows Vista.  So in what way was it a failure?  Perception?  That's it.

I used Windows Vista, I lived with it, I even installed it and had it working on 10 year old hardware.  The myths about Vista are greater than the realities and the myths about Windows 8 are greater than their realities.  The average consumer does not want an OS.  They want a simple UI that they can interact with the technology.  This is true today as it has been for decades.  Even in home computers.  The popularity of the Mac OS stemmed from the fact that the UI took users away from the inner workings of the OS.  Same with Windows XP.  Why Windows XP worked, why it was so successful, was the fact that unlike Windows 9x, it took wrenched the last ties to DOS from the users hands.    Windows 8 is an extension of the evolution of the UI. 

Consumers want devices that work, they don't want system level access to the core OS files.  They don't want to know what files exist on their system, they don't want to have to know which ones are theirs and which ones are system files.  The average consumer wants a device that works and allows them to do the things they want to do as quickly and as easily as possible.  Windows 8 is an attempt to fulfill that desire.  Even Bill Gates, if you read any of his books, had the vision and foresight back in the 1990's to see that people would be moving away from the desktop PC and toward devices.  One day, you will not own a PC.  You will own a small hand-held device that you can walk into a room with, have the display automatically switch to the TV screen and you'll start playing games on.  Or you'll set it near a keyboard and monitor where you'll be able to use it like a PC.  In the very near future you'll have Kilo-Core processors in a hand-held device.  Not in 10 years or 20 years, but within the next ten years you'll start seeing 1,000 cores in a hand-held device running with less power requirements than today's quad-core devices.

And Microsoft can't simply buckle down on PCs.  They have to, with an OS as their fundemental and core product, offer an answer to both Apple and Google.  I don't fault them for trying to create a unified UI.  They have, in the past, tried to unify various devices under the Explorer UI and it has failed.  Not because a unified UI isn't something Microsoft should aim for, but because the Explorer UI isn't what consumers ultimately want in a device UI.  They want simplicity.  The vast majority of people, never want to touch or know about the under pinnings of the OS.  They want their device to work.  Microsoft knows this.  So no, I don't see Microsoft abandoning the Metro UI on Windows 8.  It will evolve, just like the Explorer UI has.

There are only two UIs that Microsoft has ever abandoned.  Microsoft Bob, which was created as an overlay of the Windows 3.x Program Manager UI, and the Nashville UI, which was the integration of IE and the Explorer UI.  Initially advanced with IE 4, and included with Windows 98, it was later removed with OSR1 or 2.  However, remnants of it still exist in Windows today.  The "Desktop.ini" files for example, once held greater power by allowing you to include custom components (ActiveX objects) or provide a unique layout.  

Again, I won't argue that Windows 8 should have baked a little longer to bridge those chasms, but I disagree that the core intent, and design are flawed.  They are not.  There are some functionality gaps which Microsoft will have to bridge, and some developers will have to bridge, but the direction Microsoft intends to go is relatively clear and its the direction that the majority of consumers want in computing devices today, simplicity.  They don't want to be tech nerds to use their devices, they just want to click on an icon/tile and have whatever it is work.  They want access and control of their files, not access to and the ability to work with the OS or application files, in fact the never want to see or touch them.

You want that because, well for whatever reason you want that.  For me, as someone who has worked on mainframes, mini-frames, servers and PCs, with Unix, CP/M, TRS-DOS, MS-DOS, Linux, Mac-OS, as well as many mobile devices and their associated OSes and having to support the systems and users of those OSes, I can assure you I want simplicity.  As someone who has written pages upon pages of user documentation, installation instructions, and support instructions, I want simplicity.  As someone who has automated systems, eliminating hundreds of steps down into a handlful of steps, I want simplicity.  As a system administrator to 80,000 users across a wide geographic region, I want simplicity.

What do you want and why?

I want them to make it so when I press the start button or the shortcut key on the keyboard, that the start page doesn't take over my entire screen. I've already understood that it's a full screen start menu since the preview days, and I immediately went "WTF?" The open applications are not immediately visible to me unless I do the following things: move my fucking mouse to the left side like the hidden taskbar style which I don't ever hide because I want to see what's running at all times, or, I try to drag it out with the touch screen which works like shit on all sides because they designed it to be a pain in the ass, alt-tab, or windows-tab.

Shutting down my computer used to take 2 quick clicks on the bottom left, now I have to move my shit all the way to the upper right, then go all the way down again, then click 2 times,  or right click on the new start button and go through more steps, or ctrl-alt-del that shit which all take longer, they apparently forgot that people TURN THEIR FUCKING PCs OFF unlike tablets or smartphones because it draws way more power to be faster!

There is no folder option on the start screen, which means I have to unpin all sorts of shit after I install new things or it becomes a cluster fuck of pure shitness, instead they want me to put things in categories and scroll through all sorts of bullshit to get to where I want to, who in their fucking mind decided that it was a good design for a mostly non-touch environment are not the people I ever want to work with because they are fucking idiots.

All they had to do was add more functions to the start menu(and an option to make the menu bigger if the user has a touch monitor or laptop) and make it look pretty while having the speed of Windows 8, because I do like the speed of Windows 8, but that Windows 8 UI start screen is an abomination of user-friendliness and a cluster fuck with no folder options because they are trying to be innovative and failed hard. Why do you think OSX Mountain Lion doesn't look like iOS? It's because when Steve Jobs was still alive, he wasn't fucking stupid insane.

I get what MS is trying to do with the whole integration thing, and the problems are currently: a.) It's very anti-consumer in it's current state and b.) they are doing it wrong.

BTW Vista's problem was it's bloated-ness and the kernel handled drivers like shit, the only reason I had it was for the EVR, it otherwise ran like pure shit, they royally fucked that one in a completely different way. 2000 is great though, that was the game changer after 98. XP was just an extension to 2000.

You're not fully embracing the paradigm shift that is Windows 8.  The Start Panel is to Windows 8 as the Desktop is to Windows 95-Windows 7.  The desktop in Windows 8 is essentially a legacy.  There for two reasons, one because the ability to do full-fledged desktop apps within the Metro UI just isn't possible without new controls, and for backward compatibility with pretty much every Windows app.  In the future that goes away.

I don't find the category organization that difficult to work with.  The major challenge are applications that create a bunch of shortcuts.  Visual Studio 2012 is a great example of this.  However, it sounds like if Microsoft augmented the UI so that either with a alternative mouse button click (Previous/Next thumb buttons), cycling through the categories of applications might offer a more workable solution.  You don't need to scroll, just move your mouse to the edge of the screen and it automatically scrolls. 

Win+I takes you quickly to the point where you can shutdown.

You apparently have used any previous version of Windows in a touch enviornment.  Windows 8 was created based on their experience with touch interfaces and trying to integrate the Explorer UI.  It hasn't worked.  Windows Mobile was a CE-based Explorer UI, smartphones based on iOS and Android proved far more popular and resulted in a rapid loss of marketshared because the UI wasn't user friendly.  Microsoft offered a tablet OS back in 2001 with Windows XP for Tablet PCs.  When the iPad came out, the market for Tablet PC-based computers dried up. 

Windows 8 isn't "anti-consumer".  You don't know what "anti-consumer" is if you believe that.  What do you believe "anti-consumer" means? 

Windows Vista isn't any more or less bloated than Windows 7.  Both OSes have EXACTLY the same system requirements.  The only major difference between Windows Vista and Windows 7 is that Windows Vista managed memory differently and as I said this was intended to be inpreporation for WinFS, which was never released.  The way it works with drivers is absolutely no different than the way Windows 7 does.  None what so ever.  The only difference between Windows Vista and Windows 7 as far as drivers go is that OEMs acclimated to the way device drivers were written with Windows Vista by the time Windows 7 came out.   

Hey you asked, and I told you, you can take it or leave it. Metro UI is not a step forward nor backward, it went side ways so don't even try to make it sound like it's something worth embracing because I know what shit is when I see one. When the Zune failed, they should have already realised something was wrong, but they never got the message, so stop sounding like a shill and just take it for what it is because the adaption rate speaks louder than anything that you can come up with and they can only try to force it on people at this point which is exactly what they have been doing.

And really? where did I mention Windows 7 in that paragraph when I was talking about bloated or drivers? Where did I mention Windows 7 at all? So full of shit dood. I'm calling you out right now, do you work for Microsoft? If you do, then I'm actually fine with that, because no sane customer can advocate it that much, not even Dis does that, but if you are getting paid by MS, then it's all good because I actually know quiet a few people that work there in the main building.

The reason why I brought up Windows 7 is for the simple fact that Windows 7 uses the same exact Device Driver model as Windows Vista.  They're not bloated drivers, as you suggested.  Why do you think they're called mini-drivers?  They actually represent less code that OEMs have to write, not more. 

Zune's adoption rate had nothing to do with the UI, the UI was by and large one of it's best features.  The Zune failed because Apple was moving at a hare's pace compared to Microsoft's.  With the exception of the design and UI on the Zune HD, Microsoft was behind Apple in every other aspect.  By the time the Zune HD came out, the iPhone had already established itself handily while Microsoft was still fumbling around with Windows Phone 6.5.  Microsoft didn't have an answer to Apple, that's the reason why the Zune HD failed.  So don't go and try pinning its failure on the UI. 

I personally can see where Windows 8 has taken steps forward, steps back, and where it has parallels to Windows 7. That said, I can also see where both the industry as a whole and Microsoft are headed. Eventually, the age of the PC will end.  Not because there won't be people that still use PCs, but because the majority of people will use small, portable devices instead.  If not Gen 9, then likely Gen 10, your home gaming console will be a mobile device, for example.  It'll still do everything a Gen 8 console will do, likely even more, but it'll also be mobile.

Like I said, the focus of the Metro UI is on the applications, not on the blank piece of real estate on your screen commonly referred to as the desktop.  You want to focus on the desktop as a place for you to go to or get to, in Windows 8.x it isn't.  In Windows 8.x the center point of the UI is the Start Panel. I don't disagree that the ease of use isn't entirely there. It isn't perfect, but again my opinion is that the Metro UI works and just needs to be improved. Yours is that it doesn't work because of where Windows 8 doesn't offer parallels to previous versions of the OS in terms of ease of use. The logical conclusion is then that if Microsoft bridged those gaps in usability, the chasms you spoke of, would be bridged and Windows 8.x would be just as sound as Windows 7 or earlier. 

But somehow, I get the feeling that isn't the case.  You hate Windows 8 because of the Metro UI.  You don't see the Start Panel as one (Metro) UI and the Desktop as a separate (Explorer) UI, you see the Start Panel as a function/feature of the UI, in general.  They are not.  Windows 8 is a bridge between the Explorer UI (where Microsoft has been for more than 10 years) and the Metro UI (where Microsoft is headed).  The day will come, when access to the file system is an advanced feature, not a common feature.  The day will come when you won't care about the under pinnings, you'll only care about the applications.  The reason Microsoft is headed that way isn't because Microsoft is full of geek or nerd-hating shirts, it's because that's where consumers are headed. 

I work with people and their computers every day.  I'm asked how I can look at a set of programs running on a device I've never seen before and know which ones should be there and which ones shouldn't.  The average consumer doesn't want to know what I know to make their computer work.  They don't want to have to know how, six ways from Sunday to fix their computer, or to access it.  They just want it to work. 

Why was Windows XP so popular?  Do you know?  It wasn't because "it just worked", it was because Windows XP was the first consumer OS (not enterprise) from Microsoft that took away MS-DOS completely.  Many of the issues with Windows Me and Windows 9x all boiled down to MS-DOS being the core OS underneath.  Microsoft knew this, that's why Windows Me existed.  Windows Me tried to hide the layer between the Explorer UI and MS-DOS.  However, it was shackled with all the problems of a DOS-based OS.  Subsequently, Windows XP, despite the lack of MS-DOS compatibility, became one of the most popular OSes ever offered by Microsoft, preciesly because it took away MS-DOS.

Even Windows XP and every OS since has tried to shield users from the core OS.  Windows XP even built in the capability to automatically restore core OS files if users did deleted them. A feature that still exists today.  Microsoft isn't doing this because it wants to take away your access to the OS, it's doing this because consumers want stability.  They want an OS to work and they want an OS to be robust.  They don't want to be nerds, or geeks.  They don't want to have to know what files are what and where they belong.  They don't want to know what processes are or their relationship to services and applications or even what services and processes are.  They just want that when they power up the device it works, and that when they go to use their application it works.

So regardless of whether or not it's mouse-based or finger/gesture-based, that's why the Metro UI and the Start Panel exist.  To further separate users from the underpinnings of the OS, to give them access to exactly what they want in a device.

You mentioned that in Windows 8, in order to shut down, you have to go to the charm menu, click the Settings charm, click the Power icon, and then click what Power option you want (Shut down in your example).  But you never mentioned what you have to do to access your applications.  See, every time you use an application in Windows 7 you either have to click the Start button and then click the application, OR you have to click the Start Button, click All Programs, click the sub-group or application group folder, then possibly click on the application icon.  And you probably do that repeatedly throughout the day.  In Windows 8 no matter what, an application is, at the most three clicks away, but on average two.  One to access the Start Panel, one to click the App icon.  If the application isn't on the Start Panel, then three clicks are necessary to access the Start Panel, click the All Programs icon, and then click the application icon.

So you bemoan the fact that you're forced to take extra steps to shutdown your computer, but the fact that Windows 8 saves steps to access your applications you disregard.

Finally.  No, I'm not a shill for nor am I an employee of Microsoft.  I don't sell Microsoft products nor do I make any money whether Microsoft is successful or not.  Nor am I paid by Microsoft.  The correctness of my opinion, has nothing to do with my personal opinion of Microsoft.  It has everything to do with knowing where the company began, where it has gone, seeing the changing tide of consumer expectations, and seeing where it wants to go.