New PC

With help from a wonderful friend.. here is what I just ordered from eCollege:

Intel Core i7-4770 3.5Ghz 8MB Cache Quad-Core | Cooler Master Seidon 120V Liquid CPU Water Cooling System 120mm | GIGABYTE GA-Z87X-UD3H (Intel Z87, HDMI, 3xPCI-E, 6xSATA, 4xDDR3) | 8GB (4GBx2) PC3 10666 DDR3 1333Mhz Memory Lifetime Warranty | 1TB Western Digital Black 7200RPM 64MB Cache SATA3 6Gbps | 64GB Sandisk SDSSDP-064G-G25 SATA3 SSD | 24X LG SATA Dual Layer DVD /-RW/CDRW w/LG Software | 2GB GeForce GTX 770 GDDR5 PCI-E Dual-DVI/HDMI (Major Brand) | Microsoft Windows 8.1 64bit | Corsair Black Carbide Series 500R (4 5.25, 6 3.5) 4 Fans, Audio/USB 3.0 | 750watt Corsair CMPSU-750TX V2 80 PLUS CERTIFIED | Onboard LAN included | Wireless B/G/N Dual Band PCI-Ex Adapter 600Mbps | ASUS Xonar DX 7.1 PCI-ex | Internal All in 1 Card Reader | Wires and Cables ran behind case and tied up for maximum airflow | 3 Year Parts and Labor Warranty
and a ASUS VE247H Black 23.6" Full HD HDMI LED BackLight LCD Monitor from Newegg.
Had to step up and away from XP sometime

So, you're going to take the plunge for Windows 8.1, eh!? I wondered which way you would go! I'm always here to help if you need it... Keep that good old XP computer though. I've taken mine off line, but I'm sure not going to part with it.

I'm drooling on my keyboard here!

I figured I would go all the way in... everything is ordered. Won't be able to hook it up until Carol gets done with all the taxes. in April.. but at least I will have it. Well maybe I will hook it up on my desk and play with it until I can put it on the internet... oh wait.. I could connect with my wifi.... ahhhhh

Wow !!!! Congrats on your new machine, Winfrey !!!!

Thank you Mad.. thank heavens I have computer smart friends.

WoW, Congrats, Winfrey on your new computer.


It will be a sure Rush when you open the box, and smell that brand new smell that is so "Great"

Have Fun , and

Thanks Dar, I am looking forward to it...

Yes. You are MUCH braver than me, Winfrey .... Opting for Win8 !!!!

Well, you will have to hook it up to the internet as soon as you turn it on because you have to activate your copy of Windows 8.1 within 3 days. How's THAT for an excuse to just connect to the wireless and have at it!

I gave her all the pluses and minuses between Windows 7 and Windows 8!

Oh....Winfrey....I would of got windows 7.....I don't think you will like windows 8..

Maybe you can change it..

Darleen, many people like Windows 8 - I'm one of them. The UI isn't my favorite and there are many things they could and should have done differently, but that's just my opinion. I like it for all the speed, stability and improvements "under the hood." I don't think you can tell Winfrey she won't like it - she did all the research and decided to go for it. She told me she wanted to be ready for Windows 9 and that's probably a good strategy.

Like I said, I provided all the pros and cons!

Drac....Are you saying if I have windows 7...I can't upgrade to windows 9?

No, I didn't say that at all... sure you can go from Windows 7 to Windows 9 - or whatever they will be calling it. But learning the new OS will ease your way into the next one. It sort of keeps the learning curve down to a minimum. Basically, it's whatever people are comfortable with. I recommend to most people coming from XP to go to Windows 7 as it's less of a change. Going from XP to Windows 7 is still jumping ahead 2 operating systems. For those who are willing to take on the changes, then Windows 8.1 is a good choice.

Oh....Thanks, Drac

I edited with a couple of additional things...

One more ?

You mentioned jumping ahead of two OS systems? What are they? From windows XP to 7?

I actually have experience with Windows 7 as my sister in law, brother, Carol and my friends out here all have win 7 on their computer... and I am the computer helper so I was thrown into it last year... I know 8.1 will be different... but then again .... so am I....

Winfrey...

Have FUN

Yup... going from XP to Windows 7 is jumping up 2 operating systems. Going from XP to Windows 8.1 is jumping up 3 operating systems.

Somehow, Winfrey, I have a feeling you can handle it with no problem at all!

Your new computer looks terrific, Winfrey. Enjoy it to the max.

Thanks Marian. :-)

Good for you, Winfrey.

And bravo for getting Win 8.

I certainly love my W8.

Chief

Thanks Chief.....and it's good to know we have someone that we can turn to and ask what????????. I even got a link with pictures..... I like pictures.

That will be the day.

Chief

I've said... any and all questions are welcome! Chief and I have solved several things so far!

I like pictures too and sometimes send some of my own taken with the cool new screenshot feature in Windows 8.

We sure did.

Always something to ajust.

Chief

Congratulations Winfrey! I too am am drooling! I think it's great you are able to get such a nice system. I know you will really enjoy it.

Sharon

Thanks SharonB

Well I received my new computer. I must say... WOW... lots of cables... books... disc's.... never had a separate sound card before. So I did the most sensible thing....I called Drac. Thank the heavens for this woman!!! I sent her pictures of the front and back of the computer and some thingies I had questions about. We went through my questions and I went back to putting together this new toy. I also got a new monitor, an Asus 24 inch... I turned the machine on and oh my... going from my nice little 17 inch NEC monitor to this, I felt like I was at the movies. For those of you who might not have read I decided to go with windows 8.1. Coming from XP this is quite a change. But to my surprise during my initial look at the start screen I saw a tile labeled "desktop"... I clicked that and was taken to a desktop view, something I was definitely more accustomed to. With the help of links Drac sent to me I started to set up icons for what I wanted on the desktop and Start page. I am going to like the Start page. I can set it up for myself and carol with the proper icons for easy usage. I am glad I put Windows 8.1 on my new system. Now I have to do some transferring of files .. games... hmmm need to get GOG and STEAM onto my new computer.... lots to do.
I do want to give a big SHOUT OUT to Drac.... I LOVE this woman!!!!!!! She has the patience of a saint.... Thank you... thank you.... thank you Drac... you are The Woman!!!!
For those who want to take a peak.. here is a link to my new computer and monitor. It is not in its final resting place because Carol is still doing taxes and does not want me messing with the old one.. but it is handy because the new one is on my desk and the XP is right behind it so I can look up things and turn around and do them on the Win.8. and no the speakers you see are not the ones that will eventually be connected to the computer.. just temp ones. When you get to the pictures click on the word more and arrow to get another of the monitor.
I took the link off and replace it two posts down... go there and look
I put a link on photobucket that one works...

Oh, no! The link takes me to MY photos on Google+??? I want more pictures!

Winfrey, I love to live vicariously through other people getting new computers! We both had a heck of a time figuring out what three little round gold thingies with a green status light were in one of the PCI slots in the back. Then in an "aha moment," I figured out it was her wifi card without the little antennas screwed in. At eCollegePC, they show a card with two antennas, so I guess they put in a better one.

We've definitely been burning up the phone lines and the message system on Facebook! But I'm dying to see the new setup pictures. Especially that huge case!

Do you have the pictures posted anywhere else, Winfrey?
When I'm signed in to Google, all I get is a prompt to 'upgrade' to Google Circles.
(Uh...no.)
When I'm not signed in, I get a notice that the link is invalid.
Darn!
I wanted to get a look at your new PC!

Gil.

For those who could not view the photo's I put them on Photobucket...

monitor

computer

close up of tower

side view of tower

Wow, just wow!

Ditto!

Oh and Drac... talked to our friend GreyFuss... the buttons on the right.. the far one is for the fan...and the other to the left of it is to turn off the light...

That's right... Greyfuss got a similar Carbide case, but in white. Well, good! Now you know...

Very nice rig

Whoa! Super!

Gil.

Congrats, Winfrey....

You have a "Super System"....I am so Happy for you ,and Carol.... Enjoy..

AND she's very glad she got Windows 8.1!

Everything lookin' just fabulous, Winfrey !!

winfrey I have a question.I notice that your monitor shows a "normal" looking desktop screen.I didn't think win8.1 was like that.How did you get that screen? Does it boot up to that or did you have to do some fancy maneuvering to get it like that? I was staying away from win8.1 because I didnt want to jump through hoops to get that screen.

I agree, Geo....

I dislike the clouds.. Very hard to get around with that type of screen....I also would like to know how <Winfrey has the regular screen in windows 8

That display on the monitor doesn't look like windows 8 at all...

Geo, I found this on the subject to change back .. Here

Good morning all... yes I love my new computer... I am in the mist of learning new things but it is WAY easier than I thought! It could be easier yet it I just stayed with the desktop look.. but I now like the start page and am playing with making the tiles my own. This way I can set up a column for Carol and she can just go to the places she wants without looking.
Dar... the start screen is not clouds... that is a separate ability and for those who want to access stuff from anywhere on any machine it is a wonderful application.
Geo and Darleen with windows 8.1 there is a tile on the start page called desktop when you click on that it takes you to the desktop view of things. This was wonderful for me cause it gave me something I was used to to look at. You can also program windows 8.1 to open directly to the desktop if you do not like the start page. The start page does take getting used to and you have to learn how to remove and make your own tiles but with the help of Drac and some links to "How to with pictures" I am starting to like the start page and LOVE WIN 8.1. I was one that did not want to try 8.1 and now I am very happy that I did!

And the comments above indicate how much misinformation there is out there about Windows 8.1. You want the desktop? Press the Windows key... no fancy maneuvering. Dar, it looks EXACTLY like a Windows 8.1 screen... it's just not the Start page.

There are plenty of legitimate reasons that people don't like it, but that is not one of them. You can use Windows 8.1 exactly like a Windows 7 computer. One of the things I didn't like about Windows 8 was the rather jarring experience of switching between the desktop and the Start page because the background were not alike. In 8.1, you now have an option to use the same background and the transition is nice and smooth. On the desktop, you can select from among hundreds of desktop themes with beautiful pictures changing as often as you want. In 8.1 they also made it much easier to get to "all programs." Just click on a small down arrow on the bottom of the screen and there you can find EVERYTHING on your computer nicely organized and listed alphabetically. Search is a dream in 8.1 too. Task manager? Much improved. Boot up? On a plain old hard drive, it's 8 seconds.

Windows 8 was not a thoroughly "cooked" operating system with many flaws; Windows 8.1 went a long way towards fixing some of them; and this next major update to 8.1 in April is supposed to give even more nods to us desktop users. My son works in IT for a huge marketing company and he told me after initially rejecting Windows 8, they are now going for 8.1. They purchased 3 different tablets and after testing each one out for their needs, the are deploying the Surface Pro for one entire section.

I use ***StartIsBack*** to make Windows 8 look more like Windows 7. It's not free, but it's low price (though it's gone up in price since I bought it). They keep it up to date, so there's a version for 8.1 as well as a version for 8 (in case you bought the original Windows 8 and haven't updated). I originally wanted the Windows-looking Start button, which is/was available as a separate download. But then decided I liked the clover better anyway.

For a free one, I'd recommend ***Classic Shell***. It doesn't look quite as pretty as StartIsBack, however it has a lot more options. It allows you to tweak your Windows Explorer to be like the one in Windows 7 or XP. It has the option to show the full path in the address bar instead of the "breadcrumbs" display without having to click on the address bar each and every time.

If anyone has managed to play Still Life in Windows 8 or 8.1, I'd like to know how they did it. The only person I know who managed to do it had a pre-release version of Windows 8. Post Mortem seems to have the same problem. Windows 8 and 8.1 have fewer compatibility settings than earlier versions of Windows. The Windows NT and Windows 2000 compatibility modes that got some games working in Windows 7 are gone from Windows 8, and any game that needed them won't work.

I use Start8 which is $4.99 I think. I do find it kind of handy when I want to do something and don't want to leave the desktop. Classic Shell is also a great alternative, but I found it a little daunting - probably because there are so many options!

Did you ever give this a shot?

Windows components installed on demand

Two Windows components will be installed on demand in Windows 8.1: DirectPlay and NTVDM. These components are listed within Optional Components under the “Legacy Components” node. These components are installed locally as part of the operating system, and compressed as optional components. When an app references or calls one of these components (usually at first launch of the app), installation is triggered automatically. Users will be notified that the component will be installed, and they must confirm the action in order to proceed. Elevation is required for this to succeed if the user is not an administrator. After the initial installation, the user does not need to perform any other actions to use the component again.

After installing Windows 8.1 and reinstalling Still Life, DirectPlay installed automatically. However there was no change in the behavior of the game. It still gave me the black screen on startup -- unless I used Win 95 compatibility, in which case it would freeze as soon as Victoria tries to talk to the guy at the door.

If I go in Control Panel --> Legacy Components
DirectPlay is listed and checked.
NTVDM is not listed.
From what I can tell from Google searches, 64-bit Windows 8.1 does not include NTVDM as an option.

Still Life plays fine on 64-bit Windows 7 (same computer has a triple boot), and the GOG version automatically sets compatibility mode to Windows NT.

I can assume that you installed DirectX 9 at some point, so I'm stumped, it played fine for me. The only other thing I can think of is the video driver, and finding an older driver that runs on Windows 8 will be a problem.

Microsoft has really made a mess of things lately.

Yes. I've installed and played several games from GOG on it -- from older ones like Atlantis 2 (Beyond Atlantis) to newer ones like Memoria.


On the 64-bit version of Windows 8 updated to 8.1?
Did NTVDM install on yours? If it did, that could be the difference.


Yes it will, though in my case I can boot to my Windows 7 partition where Still Life plays just fine. I could check the date of the drivers, but I doubt they'd be that different since I set up the dual boot at around the same time.


No kidding. They were premature to think everyone wants a tablet OS. And why would they remove the Windows NT and 2000 compatibility? Do you know if NT/2000 compatibility was included in the Windows 8 preview version?

Couldn't agree more - the more they tried to stuff this down everyone's throat's the more push back they got. I don't understand why they didn't just give us an option to boot to desktop or the Start page the first time. I'm trying to remember if Windows 8 had those compatibilities... but I'm drawing a blank.

The compatibility options are the same on Windows 8 and 8.1.
I definitely checked that, since I was hoping getting 8.1 would fix the problem with Still Life.

Sorry, I meant the preview version of Windows 8... but that would be requiring my rememberer to work more than a year and a half back!

It is a Windows 8.1 Pro install (no updates from 8.0) - NTVDM is not installed.



I don't believe it was -

Um... Hey Drac - You don't happen to have a copy of the game do you?

No, I sure don't.. sorry.

This is a good time to get it.
Currently on sale for only $2.99 at GOG ($7.00 off).
http://www.gog.com/game/still_life