I’ve been using the RTM enterprise version Windows 8 on my work laptop and workstation for about a week now and these are some of my initial impressions of it.

The Good

Some of my better experiences…

It’s fast. It’s as fast, if not faster, than Windows 7. On a Dell Precision T3400 and ThinkPad x220, the experience is snappy.

It’s beautiful. Minimalist metro style, live titles, square edges in metro and desktop mode, and sleek background artwork will really catch your eye.

Keyboard shortcuts. There is basically a Winkey shortcut for almost everything. The Windows 8 secrets book has a full list in the appendix or you can visit Paul Thurrott’s Super Site for Windows for a quick guide on Windows key shortcuts.

Search. Press the Winkey and start typing. Find stuff. Enough said.

My kids could use it. I spent about 30 minutes last night reviewing metro interface with my 9-year-old. After explaining the screen gestures, she was able to download and play a couple of free metro games.

The Bad

These may be nit-picky, but I demand perfection…

No search with the Windows store.  You have to use Start Search and filter on the store to see results. This is kind of annoying.

No Hyper-V client support for my workstation. You need SLAT or second level address translation support on your processor for client side Hyper-V. This is an optional requirement for server so why not on the client. I will gladly forgo VM memory optimizations to ditch VMware workstation.  You can check if your processor is SLAT compatible by following this helpful blog post on How-to Geek.

Metro is designed for a touch experience. Not an earth shattering realization, but Continue reading Windows 8 in Review: The Good, the Bad, and What You Need to Know →