Windows 8.1 Build 9471 leaks - apps get redesigned and new frills are added

+920

Sadly, People hub in Windows 8.1 seems to be about as frequently touched as People hub on Windows Phone... that is to say, not much. :(
 
It's a shame, because it could be so much more than it is (on both platforms).

how is it possible that people don't buy this..?

Because Microsoft isn't the top dog and people aren't as aware of it. All they know is "windows 8 sucks" Microsoft's issue is they're no longer the big kid on the block. Microsoft might have been the strongest guy in town, but they just moved into a city where everybody is doing steroids. They can't keep their same strategy and expect 90% market share. You can't charge $90 for an OS when other equally featured AND more established OS' are cheaper. They might sell, but they won't succeed.

I'll pay 90 bucks for ANY OS I think will get support and runs 99 percent of my daily computing needs and do it well.  Linux is free but it runs not much and you'll pay a decent coin for Apple hardware.
The only people talking back about W8 are those who either never left XP or simply cannot learn. That goes for these talking heads looking to stir up drama rather than face reality that they are among those that have not upgraded their abilities since Windows 98.  I read a story about this "technical" guy who claims could not find the Windows 8 desktop for more than 10 minutes. TEN MINUTES!  Can't rely on those people. Use it for yourself and open up to new.

THIS JAZMAC!!!

Hey im on your side. I like windows 8. But it cuts into an OEMs margins, and the average user (remember we techies are like 1% of the market) are perfectly happy with android and iOS, Microsoft can't get away with charging $90 for an OS. Not until its image has been repaired and W8 is doing better, for both tablets AND notebooks.

You just contradicted your own argument :)
1% of the market will either pay (cso we don't mind paying 90 for something we use everyday)
Or a large part of that 1% just steal it from Bit Torrent.
 
Soccor mum doesn't know Windows costs money, it just comes on her new PC.
I disagree anyway. Microsoft will still dominate desktop, but tablets will be more variable.
Its mindshare they are weak in for tablets. I think Windows is fabulous on tablets, but soccer mum just wants a white tablet regardless of OS. Consumer just presume they all work the same (and to a certain extent thats true) which means price, looks, brands all mean much more than the OS.  MS need to make a big push for educating users that you are investing in an Ecosystem, and that MS's offering of Xbox, Skydrive, Outlook.COM, 365, Windows, Windows Phone etc when all combined with one account is a thing of beauty. _It IS_ fabulous, I took the time to move from Google back to MS myself and I am really enjoying the benefits (it took time to move from Gmail, Evernote, Dropbox etc) but it was well worth the effort. But soccer mum? She wants a white one. Its not the 90 quid, she'll never know.

My point is this, you pay 90 bucks for an os and its a ONE TIME FEE. It includes OS updates and security updates almost indefinitely. MS pays developers for those updates and you pay not one more penny. Windows XP is almost 15 years old and still getting security updates.  Microsoft pays the freight for that OS update and it doesn't cost you a single penny.  OSX, as good as it is, ENDS support in just a few years and there is no running the latest apps or OS on your hardware. You are frozen in time. 
And even the best user friendly version of Linux, aka Ubuntu, require you to get intimate with the command line. You can avoid that for just so long. And its FREE but has less than 1% of the desktop.  Google is trying to confuse the people with their BS browser OS on a laptop.  That's going nowhere but I digress. 
But the bottom line is, 90 bucks is the cost to enter the ecosystem. It runs on almost everything, even on Macs. You pay nothing more and Microsoft gets nothing more from you for the rest of you life. And the bloggers still whine. Outwardly because of the price and the tiles. Inwardly and the reality is, they don't know squat and they cannot be found out. They are the reason Geek Squad exists and these one click clear your hard drives flourish. It is because THEY cant learn. We can and why we run Windows 8.1. 

Yeah, it's always the "techy" guys who can not get used to win8 and say it's a disaster... Blablabla.

WHat are you talking about??

Really, which other OS? Last I checked there's about 1.5 billion PCs running windows out there.. don't see anyone getting close anytime soon..

@paulheu yes, but tablets are about to outsell notebooks. Also, that soccer mom might not know it, but the OEM sure can. Would you rather sell an android tablet that is guaranteed to sell better because android has more market share and exposure in the tablet world, AND pocket $90, or reduce your margins to sell an effectively equivalent product, basically bringing your margins down for no reason?

This is what Windows 8 should have been. The reputation is already destroyed and if Windows 8.1 is as much an improvement as I hope, it will take some time to change people's minds.

I can see it now When windows 8.2 comes out " This is what Windows 8.1 should have been". Rinse and repeat every year.

Easy. Because Windows 7 is great, and unless you need a new PC, there's little reason to splash $100+ for a new version of Windows that favors an interface you don't have (touchscreen).

It favors BOTH touch and non-touchscreen. My office manager, a totally average computer user (who doesn't even know Ctrl+C = copy and Ctrl+V = paste), recently switched to Windows 8 from Windows 7. It is a touchscreen laptop, but we extended the display onto a standalone monitor. So, we keep the laptop closed and untouched for the most part, except when turning it on. Basically, we treat the laptop just like a standalone CPU.
 
With such setup, she has been using Windows 8 exactly the way she was using her Windows 7 previously, with a big monitor, a keyboard, and a wireless mouse. It has been almost 2 months, and I have never heard any complaints from here so far.

Noice! Windows 8.1 down and windows phone 8.1 to go!!

I want a surface pro. Why won't MS release it in my country?

because fuck our countries! looks like they will never release it here in Egypt too :(

When looking at how you treat women, I'm not surprised you're always last. 

+1

What about Cleopatra, she did alright for herself... Until she killed herself that is.

We only got it in the United Kingdom 2 months ago!... Don't worry, it'll get to you eventually.

Not necessarily - US law blocks the sale of technology products by US companies to countries that support terrorism (and a few other things as well).  They can define things rather loosely at times which means some countries will never directly get the products. Post an ad on craigslist selling a computer or tablet and see how many bogus replies you wil get from some person whose son/daughter, niece/nephew, etc., etc., is stationed in some specific country asking that you ship your item to them directly in the that country for some additional financial offer. Only a naive person thinks those are real requests - they are about circumventing US law..

Er no, here is the Microsoft Egypt store.
http://www.microsoft.com/en-eg/default.aspx
Absolutely nothing to do with your political rant. As it wasn't for the UK. Its just the normal process of setting up the channel for the sale and support of goods. (And guaging whether there is demand to make it worth their while)
I suspect Egypt is a very tiny market for an item such as Surface. I wouldn't bet on it ever getting to Egypt, unless they partner with a local retailer like they did in the UK via John Lewis stores.
 

And yet the dimwit PM responsible for the disaster of Mail ... er... Outlook in 8.1 still hasn't prioritized the single most important feature in any mail application -- not loading every damn image in an e-mail automatically.
A user would have to be an utter moron to use that application, because of it. Its irresponsible for MIcrosoft to even release it that way. (And, frankly, they probably need to have a good hard look at the appropriateness of the individual responsible continuing to work on the product.)

Did you know there's an option to change that right in the Mail's settings? But I guess it's easier to whine about it. 

Well don't I look like an ass.
Although its a bit non-intuitive that its in the account settings, not the mail application settings. (As witnessed by the large number of complaints about it, none if which seem to have anyone found that.)

You just seem angry lol. Over something so so minor

It's only minor on the face of it. This feature being implemented in all clients reduces spam by providing no mechanism for spammers to validate that an email address exists by simply have the user open the email. You will notice in most spam emails, they will include images, and it is very much for this service. Usually those links will include your email address in them so that when your browser/email client requests the image, they implicitly mark the existence of the email address _and_ that someone is actually viewing the emails at it (a much bigger deal than mere existence for spammers because that alone is something that can be sold). Now, in addition to images, they will also apply the same tagging to any links in the email as well, but if you're clicking on their links in spam, then you have other issues. Companies will also use the exact same tactic to determine how many people are viewing their emails in order to determine the best approach (e.g., phrasing) to get people to open their emails. This is generally not a sketchy affair, but it is something that blocking external references by default allows one to opt into rather than being able to avoid.

calm down

>Well don't I look like an ass.
yes

I like it automatically loading pictures, it really annoys me when they don't... After all it is 2013, with 125meg internet readily available, why not have them automatically load...

Love what they did with the Mail app. Finally, it gets the sleek look it deserves. Can't wait!

I want t o be able to pin WiFi and Bluetooth tiles to the start screen. And they should be functional. You shouldn't have to go to a second screen to select Bluetooth devices

Does it fix the wifi connection issue.

Whoa. Why can't the WP alarm app look that pretty?

Because the Windows 8 team is run by professions who know what they're doing and do it quick; unlike the dimwits that run the Windows Phone department.

Ahaha fucken oath it seems that way

I feel like Windows 8 is slowly losing many of its unique capabilities.
Now all apps have the search bar built in and the people app seems to have discarded semantic zoom for a jumplist.
This is just retarded.

This is what happens when people complain because they can't accept new things

SO True!!!

Actually it's exactly the same thing that happened pre-Mango when the physical capacitor search button would be the search function for each app then it was changed for Bing.

I hated that change.  which they kept it for each app, long press for bing.
 

That's right, I really hate the search app, it's useless and annoying, I really want the other way of searching and looking into your stuff and in every specific app, not all and noone at the same time!

I wish the search button on wp8 was for searching in whatever you have open, never in my life am I ever going to press it to search the web. I just load the browser for that. However in disappointed by the new search in w8, ever since the launch I've been convincing people to upgrade based on 'if you don't know where something is, just search for it, wherever you are', now most of that functionality is gone or reduced.

Now if only they would enable the mail app to work with POP3 accounts, I might actually use it. Still living in Outlook (2013).

Dude, seriously, why are you still using POP3 instead of IMAP in 2013?

Set up your POP email accounts on Outlook.com and have them linked to your Microsoft account. I've done so with all my accounts. Easier to manage.

I really want to see the Game Hub work like is does on WP.  I should have all of the downloaded games in it.  Then you can just pin that plus the few you play daily.  Right now I have 20 games pinend because I do not want to go to the app screen to find it. 
Either that or folders would help as well.

Amen - I was thinking the same thing, we need all the downloaded games in the games hub

Its faster to type the first few letter of the game anyway. You shouldn't need to pin 29 games just to swipe over and search for the game you want to play. Type my son.

Very true; learning to rely/use the search in Windows 8 is really the key to loving it.  Search is really good.
However, I still want all of my games in a hub; it just makes sense that way.

I wonder why the live tiles of Food App & Travel app don't show other items (recipes/locations) other than the default. as in the Travel app, it only displays Bryce Canyon; it only shows many other locations when the app is opened, this is not the case in Windows 8. and according to what i see in this video, that hasn't changed...

What about the Calendar app?  Does it finally support CalDAV so we can sync our Google Calendars?  Does People support CardDAV?

I want more tiles on the start screen. Make the 'Start' smaller and give me more space for tiles. :D

Just make the tiles all very tiny hah :) But I do agree should be able to set the "zoom/view distance" for the tiles that would be slick.

who's the editor that bought the Acer Aspire S7? the ultrabook in the picture of this story.  i want to buy one now that Acer has refreshed it, the original can now be had way under $1,000.  But the WiFi connection issues have scared me away, but i've noticed at least one other ultrabook that has serious wifi issues (Sony Vaio Pro 13) so I'm hoping this is an issue that will be fixed in Windows 8.1?  Can anyone chime in/

I just got the Sony Vaio Pro 13 touch. No wifi issues here. I think the people having issues with wifi, the problem is the antenna connector is loose. One guy opened it up and found his was looose.

This looks fantastic, its about time for me to get a new laptop anyways.... Looking to spend around 700$ .... Any suggestions?

surface pro? :D

Surface pro won't replace a laptop, the touchpad isn't very responsive. Won't work for any form of gaming unless you attach an external mouse/keyboard (Not touch or type cover)

I'm not a massive gamer, but the type cover is perfectly acceptable for playing GTA San Andreas, and if you connect your Xbox controller its even better,

Acer Aspire M with a touch screen

If I could get the Surface Pro with the touch cover for 650.00 I'll be on it like white on rice

So.. can we finally hide the start button on this build?

Cosmetics, cosmetics. Everything Microsoft seems to know how to do is cosmetics these days...Shame. I can imagine the presentation..."I present to you, Windows 8.1....your 7.8 equivalent for Windows!
(by the way, we're scrapping this and releasing Windows 9 next year)"  

So, the Pictures hub is still nerfed?