Win 8.1 versus Win 7 Professional

Wings of Gold

Wings of Gold

Charter Member
I have just purchased a new computer, and elected to have Win 7 Professional installed rather than Win 8.1. My sales person strongly concurred - saying that a very large number of her game oriented customers were making that choice. I am used to using Win 7 Home Edition, but I can still change the order. I am interested in pros and con's in this regard - as well as any sites that you can refer me to. Bill
 
I've attempted to respond to your question several of times, and each time I've deleted my response.

I have not seen any comparisons on the two operating systems, but have ready many posts in favor and disfavor of both. My personal conclusion is that many people have a fear factor of moving to a new operating system until they see a lot of positive reviews.

Saying that, I can only draw from personal experience. Although not an IT person, I was responsible for many computer issues in our office prior to my retirement and worked with Win NT4 and the migration to Win 7 Professional. At home my wife runs Win 7 Home Edition on her laptop, and my current computer has Win 8.1 - updated from Win 8.0.

I am very pleased with Win 8.1 and found it little different from Win 7.0 Professional except for some added features and new front end (Start Menu). It appears to be more stable than its predecessors and has the usual issues with any new operating system.

Saying that, I have had my ups and downs. There were several applications and older hardware that I could not get to function with Win 8.0, primarily because they were not designed for the 64 bit system despite claims of backward compatibility. The biggest issue I encountered were the video drivers - when I migrated from 8.0 to 8.1, I had inadvertently installed older drivers that gave me a BSOD on occasion. That has since been fixed.

Don't know if that helps, but that's my perspective.
 
There has been a lot of talk about this over the months, and I always say the same: namely that I'm running both FSX and FS9 under Windows 8.1 without any Windows-related issues at all.
Having said that, I don't use the default installation folders.
"{drive}:\FSX\" and "{drive}:\FS2004\" work fine for me.

Do you stay with Windows 7, go with Windows 8.1 or wait for Windows X?
You'll have to decide at some point.

Dave
 
I´m using win 8.1 Pro here without issues too. (P3D and FSX runs perfect in this OS.) But i really recomend to wait the release of Windows 10 witch should be available in 2015 1'Q. (If you decide to go that way)

BUT, be adivised: A lot of ADDONS (Even with the simulator working ok) DON´T work in Win8. For example, a lot of Flight1 addons don´t work in this OS mainly because of their old DRM system.
 
I had a brief TRY with Windows8 and no issues at all, UNTIL I started adding my payware addons to the mix. I have a very large number of payware addons, and it might be simpler to list the items I didn't have a problem with.

Issues ranged from being unable to even get through installation, unsuccesfull activation, gauges not working or worse, not showing at all, scenery objects missing, undercarriage missing from aircraft........:dizzy:

I'm now happily back to Win7:adoration:
 
Wings of Gold said:
I have just purchased a new computer, and elected to have Win 7 Professional installed rather than Win 8.1. My sales person strongly concurred - saying that a very large number of her game oriented customers were making that choice. I am used to using Win 7 Home Edition, but I can still change the order. I am interested in pros and con's in this regard - as well as any sites that you can refer me to. Bill
Click to expand...

As someone who works in IT for a living, I can only concur with your choice. the only thing different that I would do is get Windows 7 64 bit Enterprise. Since you're buying a new build, the extra cost is not so high as you should be getting the OEM version of it, which is quite a bit cheaper than retail.

BUT: we have been testing Windows 10 (the technical preview), and that is promising indeed! So you might want to consider that in a few months. I know I will!!

EDIT: forgot something! Windows 8.1 is IMHO a complete nightmare. Even the own admin tools for Windows Server 2008R2 and Exchange 2007/2010 are difficult to install on Windows 8.x machines. So it is not for tecchies nor for gamers...

Dumonceau
 
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Been testing Windows 10 so far so good...many of the great features I loved about XP and Win 7 Pro...so I would say Windows 7 Pro or Enterprise OEM version because there will be an upgrade path to Windows 10.
 
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