Should I Upgrade to Windows 8?

The simple answer to this question is that you need to decide for yourself, but if you've reached this blog post then I doubt you're looking for a yes or no answer, but more likely a bit of guidance as to whether or not it's a good idea.

Here are two opposing facts you may not know about, which will really get you thinking along the path of upgrading and whether or not you're ready to take the next step.

EARLY ADOPTION
As with anything, the more people that use it, the more likely a problem is going to surface. This is a good thing. It might not sound like it, I mean, who wants buggy software anyway? But that's not the point. The difference here is between glitches that have been spotted, and those that are waiting to be found. At least those that have already been spotted can be rectified and mass distributed to all those 'instances' of the software with an Internet connection. And this is where hot fixes and service packs come in.

Now consider this. Whilst I can't give you an exact figure, lets say for examples sake Windows 7 have 100,000 hot fixes and 1 service pack (a service pack is a large collection of hot fixes). Windows 8 has 100 hot fixes and no service packs. This means 100,000+ bugs have been found in Windows 7, but only 100 bugs have been found in Windows 8. Based on this, which operating system is more buggy?

The answer? There is no answer. Or at least not one that can be gleamed from that bit of information, however the most likely case is going to be that Windows 8 is more buggy because those hot fixes don't signify a level of how many problems you're likely to run into, rather, they signify just how many bugs have been fixed. There could be only 100,000 bugs EVER to appear in windows 7. That could be it, all bugs at all in existence have been fixed. This is extremely unlikely, but bare with me here. Now lets say both Windows 7 and Windows 8 have 100,000 bugs each. 100,000 of those have been fixed in Windows 7 but only 100 have been fixed in Windows 8.

It's about now the penny should have dropped in that 9,900 bugs or vulnerabilities in this theoretical comparison have yet to be found, and so now ask yourself which of the two systems are more buggy?

This is where the term 'early adopter' comes in. An early adopter is someone who is happy to take on a piece of software knowing the risk they are likely to face. It's a step above beta testing which in an ideal world is where all bugs should be ironed out, but in something as huge as an operating system, waiting on a release date until all bugs have been patched is just not going to happen. And it's these early adopters that stumble across bugs and send error reports to Microsoft that alert MS of the problems people have encountered, so at to be able to provide a new hot fix.

So where does this place in terms of whether or not you should upgrade? Well, if you're happy to be an early adopter - maybe you're running a second machine, or consider yourself a bit of an experimentalist who's happy to take risks - then maybe it's time to consider playing around with the new OS sooner rather than later.

If however you're planning on rolling the operating system across an environment where it's critical that everything works as expected (for example, a production or industrial environment) then you may want to hold off until a few more hot fixes or a service pack has been released.

BUDGET
With Internet Explorer 9, Microsoft began their mission to bring everyone up to date. The reason behind this? Progression was being stumped by users who were afraid to move away from what they knew and appreciated (Internet Explorer 6) and so continued to use it regardless (and probably oblivious) of the fact support had ended for this browser a long time ago, meaning hot fixes like the ones discussed above were no longer being distributed.

This also stumped development and technological progression because the browsers people were sticking to simply just didn't work with the platforms used to generate better, more secure, more fancy and stable websites.

Queue Windows 8. Microsoft is, again, trying to push people to upgrade their environments, this time by applying a highly appealing upgrade price. To illustrate this, you can go into PC World (a UK based chain if you're reading this from outside of the UK) today and purchase Windows 7 Home Premium upgrade for £99.95 (£83.49 from the website). At it's launch it would have been much more. In comparison, you can buy the Windows 8 Professional upgrade (that's right, Professional) for £49.99. But here you're really paying for the physical medium. For an even sweeter deal, check out Microsoft's website (link below) to download the software and burn it to a DVD yourself for £24.99! Another sweetener, though I'd imagine this one is likely to apply to much fewer people, if you did just so happen to buy a PC after the 2nd June 2012, it costs just £14.99 to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro.

Upgrade to Windows 8 http://windows.microsoft.com/en-GB/windows/buy?ocid=GA8_O_WOL_DIS_ShopHP_FPP_Light
Upgrade for a newly purchased Windows 7 PC: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-gb/windows/upgrade-offer

The catch however is that if you're going to do this, you need to do it now, or at least, very soon. The standard upgrade offer is valid until the 31st January 2013, whilst the Newly purchased Windows 7 offer is valid until February 28th 2013.

SUMMARY
So that's pretty much it. I didn't want to go into detail about all the nitty gritty corners of Windows 8 and what it's capable of because, well, that's the whole purpose of 8Tricks, so check out my other blog posts to find out more about it's hidden gems, but to summarise, the decision on whether to upgrade really depends on whether you feel ready to try something new or whether you want to hold back until more people have taken a bite of the bullet. This of course does reflect the price you pay - Microsoft are actively rewarding early adopters with a very tempting discount. This is their cheapest OS yet, and I would imagine once the early upgrade offer is over, Windows 8 Professional won't be cheap, and that may hinder you from upgrading anytime soon after.