Preparing to Commit

Now we've got a tech support system reference system setup, but as I noted in the opening post, we still want a development system. My Vista system needs to upgrade at least to Windows 7 since WinQual became SysDev and a new Product Mapping Tool that requires Windows 7, so it is a candidate.

The current drives are full of years of accumulated bits, and not all of it can be blamed on any pack-rat like tendencies I may have. Despite compacting and freeing what I could of old service releases, the Windows folder used 35 of the 80 GB I had allocated to Windows, thinking that would be enough. This makes me very skeptical of the 20 GB hard disk space requirement for Windows 8. In any case, the partition doesn't have 20 GB free, plus I'd like to swap back if this is a failed experiment so I opt to go with a new drive.

I also did some research into the multi-screen capability of Windows 8. The first things I ran across mislead me to believe it didn't work very well. Further research corrected this vision and pointed out a few features that sounded very promising:

• The Start screen can be used on either monitor
• You can run Windows Store Apps on one monitor (same monitor as Start screen) and the Desktop on another.
• You can run a 1/3 split Windows Store App and the Desktop on the same monitor.
• The Desktop task bar can be on all displays and has options for controlling what buttons are on the taskbar.

I am most interested in the last point. I often move my browser or email program to one monitor and it will be nice to see it's taskbar button on the same screen so I won't have to move my mouse as far to interact with it. The other points give me hope that I can mostly keep with my normal workflow while interacting with the Start screen and any Windows Store Apps I may run.