[PontGuy]

About a month ago we had a lightning ground strike at our house- ran up the cable and toasted everything on my network- cable modem, router, desktop, even the printer. Pretty crazy because the power supplies were all still good, but nothing worked anymore. It got some other stuff too- sprinker system controllers etc.

The computer was really toast. My nephew is a computer tech and has a bunch of odd parts that we tried swapping out and the only things still good were the power supply and the disk drive (luckily!)

So in a mad scramble to replace everything I bought a new HP computer with Windows 8. More or less a mid-level box with an Intel I-core 3.4 GHz processor, 8 GB RAM, 1.5 TB drive and the usual stuff. Also picked up a good EVGA NVIDA video card and better power supply to go with it. And installed my old drive as a secondary so I could get to my pictures and other files.

Windows 8 is driving me nuts. For those that have not seen the new Windows 8 it "looks" like 2 operating systems combined: one system that looks a lot like Windows 7 and the new operating system that is used for tablets and phones. The tablet software looks great but it is really too crude for a desktop machine. And the regular Windows operating system seems to be a lot more quirky than Windows 7, or even Vista.

I updated the windows drivers, installed Adobe reader, MS Office and a few other basic programs, then downloaded and installed Windows Essentials to get the e-mail and photo gallery programs. All of the Windows Essentials programs are unstable- lock up, etc. I've been on the Microsoft Community website working with the guys there for weeks now and its still not resolved. And my nephew is just scratching his head- no real experience with Windows 8 yet and out of ideas. I also had an interesting time with the new video card- the drivers would not load off the disc provided but I was successful in getting them from the EVA website. Seems to be working fine now. I haven't even tried loading ACAD or any of my more demanding software yet.

Any ideas why Windows Essentials will not work right? Getting these to work is pretty critical to the way we use the computer.

Here is a like to my Microsoft Community thread: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/w...5-736e754ff9b1

[wytnyt]

no offense but just get win 7

[KS circutguy]

Have you tried to have Intel's sight scan you're PC yet for newer drivers Windows won't ever find?
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/
Also, I always recommend you get the video updates directly from the manufacturer, not from the CD that came with the video card.{CD or DVD is usually outdated.
Windows 8 works well for me, kind of a learning curve though.
Great sight for tips on it;
http://winsupersite.com/windows/windows-8-0

[GT182]

I agree with Wytnyt. Go back to Windows 7.

And I was told at CompUSA this afternoon that all computers that previously had Windows 7 were upgraded to 8 when it was released by MicroSoft. That you can actually downgrade back to 7. So that must have been done in all stores selling computers when 8 was released.

[PontGuy]

You guys can follow my progress on the link that I provided. Still not fixed after using a Microsoft-provided "deep clean program" and reload. Then I spent the day disabling everything and found with a bare system that the Essentials programs seem to work OK. Must be some sort of crazy conflict, but I am not running anything unusual on the machine... yet.

Yeah, right now Windows 7 is the way to go- at least until they get all the bugs out of Windows 8. Even though it looks like Windows 7 it obviously is not, and I seem to be one of the lucky ones with some sort of conflict.

I am not quite ready to give up, pull the engine and build another one. May get to that point though.

[KS circutguy]

I have the same printer and the same problem with the windows update, forget about the windows printer driver it just loops.Use the factory Cannon driver and leave it be.
?
Are you running BOTH security Essentials and Norton?
IMO,I'd ****can Norton...

[PontGuy]

Good to know about the printer driver, can knock that off the list.

Even with everything else disabled and unloaded Essentials Photo Album eventually locked up again last night.

Not running Security Essentials unless it somehow slipped in and loaded in the background with the Windows Essentials download. But I'll add that to the check list. I don't see any programs or drivers for it. As unstable as Windows Essentials is I think I'll stick with Norton unless the Microsoft guys recommend otherwise.

Also been back and forth with HP tech support- the guys there seem to know less than I do though I admit they did give me a few ideas to chase.

Sometimes I miss the old .dos operating system. Crude, but I understood everything about it back in the day. Sort of like our old cars.

Got to run to the airport- I'll pick back up on this when I return in a few days.

[GT182]

When you get rid of Windows Essentials, just go to the MS website and download MS Security Essentials and install it. You should be good to go after doing that.

[PontGuy]

MS Security Essentials is evidently not compatible with Windows 8 since the new OS comes with an "improved" version of security. Interesting reading on this topic here: http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/p...0-f3b2ff70b910

My HP came pre-loaded with Norton which started up on trial basis when I first booted the machine. Since I have used Norton in the past I didn't question it. But there might be something going on between Norton and the new Windows 8 security system that is causing my problems. Something else to check out when I get back home.

[andyg]

Windows 8 comes with MSSE under the old title of Windows Defender. It should not cause any complications running along side Norton, but I would just use defender and let it be if you are a "smart" web user.

[cuz68]

I have been runing it and xp for about 2-3 years, My brother pluged in something in the back of my pc it stays pluged in all the time.

[PontGuy]

Just let everyone know I uninstalled Norton and a window immediately came up to enable Defender virus protection which comes as part of the Win 8 operating system. That was about a week ago now, all of the rest of the drivers are enabled and I've installed a bunch of other software since. Absolutely no problems.

Thanks guys, I actually got better advice here than anywhere else.

Lesson learned, if you get a Windows 8 computer and it comes with Norton, uninstall it and enable Defender!

I don't know what would happen if you try to upgrade a computer that has Norton installed to Windows 8. Probably the same problems.

[KS circutguy]

Are you running BOTH security Essentials and Norton?
IMO,I'd ****can Norton...

You're welcome

[PontGuy]

Here's another problem with Windows 8, but already well-known based on posts on the Microsoft forums.

If you prefer a different browser than Internet Explorer (I like Firefox) and select it as your default, then the "new" tile version of IE will no longer work. Clicking on it sends you to the desktop version of IE. OK with me since the tile version of IE 10 is too clunky for a real computer. But, Firefox and other non-Microsoft browsers require a different version of Flash to be stable. And when I downloaded the correct version of Flash to make Firefox work then IE Explorer disabled Flash support.

So it seems now you have a choice- either the integrated IE 10 that is now part of the OS or another browser. But you can't have both.

I'm sticking with Firefox for now and hoping Microsoft doesn't do some sort of update to screw it up.