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Chief among the many gripes that people have with Microsoft’s upcoming Windows 8 operating system are: that it includes the tile-based Windows 8 UI (aka “Metro”); that it’s the Windows 8 UI, and not the classic desktop, that greets you when you fire up your PC; and that there is no way to disable this behavior. Up until Microsoft released Windows 8 to manufacturing, a lot of people were still hoping that it would add to the OS a way to bypass/disable the tile-based interface. Unfortunately, the software giant was not in any mood to appease them. That said, there isn’t anything to prevent a third party from giving these people their wish.
RetroUI from Thinix is a software that Windows purists can now turn to if they want to use Windows 8 but just can’t stand the tile-based interface that the OS spits out once the user gets past the initial “Lock Screen.” With RetroUI, it’s not only possible to bypass Windows 8’s Metro interface and go straight to the classic desktop from either the Login screen or the Lock Screen, but you can also use it to disable all other Metro UI features. However, it’s only free for the first 7 days and you’ll have to pay $4.95 for a three-PC “individual” license after that.
Here’s what Thinix has to say about the software’s capabilities on the official RetroUI website: “Thinix RetroUI allows users to bypass the Windows 8 Metro User Interface (Metro UI) and automatically return to a classic Windows desktop* after login. Users can then return to the Metro desktop or use any Metro UI function. Optionally, Thinix RetroUI can be configured to eliminate/lock-out all Metro UI features. In this mode, users are sent to a classic Windows desktop at Login, and the new Metro features; Charms Bar, Hot Corners, and Metro Switcher - are completely disabled and inaccessible.”
Seeing a serious business opportunity in disabling Metro UI features in Windows 8 PCs owned by businesses and other large organizations, Thinix has announced separate pricing for them.
Comments are closed on this article
warptek2010
September 08, 2012 at 10:05am
Not being able to disable this feature out of the box speaks volumes about the company and their seemingly new coercive/authoritarian philosophy. It was never like this when Gates ran this company. I just wonder how long until MicroEmpire takes legal action against these 3rd party companies, as you all must know - Metro is there for a reason... to make the company gazzillions more in revenue and Metro is a misnomer... it should be aptly called Portal because that is exactly what it is - a portal to the Microsoft store and it's business partners.
livebriand
September 07, 2012 at 8:53pm
Start8 has been working pretty well for me so far. I can disable the hot corners (on the desktop) and all. The only issue is that it doesn't auto-launch on a cold boot (only if I log out and log in again - I don't have a password set, so it logs in by default).
Digital-Storm
September 07, 2012 at 7:54pm
Windows 7 would be a far superior choice imo. Why fix what wasn't broken.
Craig-g
September 07, 2012 at 7:20pm
I put Win8 CP on my non-techie wifes computer to see how she handled Metro. Pretty well actually. After a few days she had pinned most of her programs to the taskbar. She lets her computer sleep instead of turning it off and when it wakes it goes to the desktop. She pretty much never sees metro.
I've got access to the RTM through work and I've now upgraded all our machines to it. The improvements on the desktop side are nice enough to want to upgrade. But keep in mind I also never had a problem with Vista, even on my game machine from day 1 of release, so I'm probably crazy.
I tried stardocks start8, it seems to be the best of the metro bypassers so far.
John Pombrio
September 07, 2012 at 6:52pm
There are a bunch of these out now. A free version called SkipMetroSuite by WinAero:
http://winaero.com/comment.php?comment.news.103
will skip over Metro and you can selectively remove the hot corners. It does the same as RetroUI and is free.
A more comprehensive suite of tools is the bringing back of the Win7 Orb along with disabling of Metro boot and hot corners. It works great and right now is free during its Beta version.
http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/
whitneymr
September 09, 2012 at 8:23pm
I've been using Stardocks Fences and WindowBlinds for a long time. All of their stuff has been bug free and top notch.
don2041
September 07, 2012 at 7:54pm
Be warned if you download the WinAero version be prepared to battle adds downloading a bunch of other shit you don,t want. Stardocks Start8 is much better
John Pombrio
September 08, 2012 at 9:38am
I have used the SkipMetroSuite several times and there has been ZERO additions, popups, or ads. Please verify your posts before trashing a excellent program like this.
Please use the link I provided, I don't know where you got a version that has adware attached but it is NOT part of the authors page...
http://winaero.com/comment.php?comment.news.103
don2041
September 07, 2012 at 6:39pm
I would like to see how many people use programs like this and send the stats to Microsoft so they can start giving the customer what THEY want and not what MS dictates. All they had to do was put this option in, in the first place and Win 8 would not get near as much negative feedback!!!
Scatter
September 08, 2012 at 11:19am
You watch a month or two after Windows 8 comes out Microsoft will deem them as 'security hazards' and block them with a patch.
Xenite
September 07, 2012 at 5:53pm
Assuming they still have it working with Win8, Winstep would be a MUCH better choice.
