Thank you to those of you who responded to my questions about Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 and JAWS for my new PC. Your input is very helpful!
Chris Murphy -----Original Message----- From: JAWS-Users-List [mailto:jaws-users-list-boun...@jaws-users.com] On Behalf Of valiant8086 Sent: Sunday, April 26, 2015 11:06 AM To: jaws-users-list@jaws-users.com Subject: Re: [JAWS-Users] Getting new computer. Seeking input regarding setup and potential JAWS issues. Hi. You're able to run jaws 15 on windows 8.1. You'll just need an available authorization for your registration key. If you need to check that, go to http://fsactivate.com and there should be a link there to check remaining activations. It will want either your serial number or your registration key. Find one of those and put it in. If it tells you that you have either 1 or 0 activations remaining you have the option of requesting a refresh of the activation count on that same site. That is free, it just takes a day or so for someone at fs to get around to the request. Armed with a fresh activation, you'll be able to install and activate jaws on the new computer even if it is windows 8.1. You may even have upgrades remaining that allow to run jaws 16 without paying anything. To check this, on the current computer go to the jaws help menu and choose about. It should tell you how many upgrades your SMA has. If it is more than 0 you can run jaws 16. That is of course, assuming you check that on a copy of jaws15 which is activated to your activation code. If you can, then on the new computer you might as well grab the latest copy of JAWS16 and just install that instead of sticking with 15. It is to your best interest to maintain the jaws SMA. If you have a home license you can do that for 120 dollars every two years, which compared to how things were a few years ago, is not too awfully terrible. as to the start screen, to get windows 8.1 to have a start menu instead of a start screen you require a third party application. The most popular one is classic shell. When installing that, I recommend that you have it do only the start menu, don't have it mess with windows explorer or any of the other options. Those are all for features you'll probably do just fine using as they are. Another user on this thread mentioned that windows 10 has the option to use the start menu again, and this is correct. Just wanted to try and avoid any confusion on that. Only windows 8 and windows 8.1 are using just the start screen. Once you get used to windows 8.1 you will probably like it a lot. It is a very fast OS, pretty dog gone efficient, secure and stable. I have been using its built in windows defender, which unlike windows 7's windows defender, is an actual antimalware application quite like Microsoft's own Security Essentials program. Windows 8.1 boots really fast and generally runs well on even pretty lousy computers that you would expect to only see windows xp run well on. I have it on a cheap tablet computer and a rather expensive laptop and they both are doing pretty fine. The biggest downsides are the start screen and the windows task manager. If you like the task manager in windows 7 you will probably be disappointed with the one in 8.1. I make do with a mixture of the windows 8.1 task manager and another program from microsoft called Process Explorer, which for you geeky types is part of the sysinternals suite, and free in other words. Btw, the windows 8.1 task manager is pretty nice, all things considered. My problem with it, which is just my own oppinion, is that it takes longer to open than the windows 7 task manager did, and it is more difficult to use when you have no speech than the windows 7 task manager. That said it is even possible to get the windows 7 task manager to work on a windows 8.1 computer but last I tried that, there were certain tasks it couldn't kill that the regular windows 8.1 task manager had no trouble with. Also, the start screen for me is not too much of an issue either. I solve the problem by not using it *grin*. I put shortcuts in my task bar and on my desktop to most of the stuff I need, and I use windows explorer to get to what ever I can't get to from the desktop, the task bar, or the start screen's search box. Of course I do use the search feature of the start screen, and so that makes a liar out of me. On my expensive computer I have just the start screen. On my tablet, I have installed Classic Shell. The biggest complaint about classic shell on that tablet is that it doesn't always put input focus on the edit box to search for items when I use my windows key, so weird things happen when I immediately start typing to filter down to what I want. Btw, in case you do get windows 8.1, you'll probably notice you can't really find a search box on the start screen at all. Not to worry, just type what you want it to filter for anywhere on the start screen and it'll give you a list of results, even though you weren't typing in an edit box. hth Cheers, Sent with Thunderbird 31.3.0 portable On 4/26/2015 11:04 AM, Chris Murphy wrote: > Hi Everyone, > > > > I'll be getting a new PC in the near future. Currently, I am using > Windows 7, JAWS 15.0.5056, 64 bit. > > > > I think I'll have the choice of getting it with Windows 7 or Windows 8.1. > I'm inclining toward getting Windows 7 since that is what I'm > accustomed to using, but I'd appreciate any recommendations. I'm sure > that many of you have had experience dealing with this same decision. > > > > I'm wondering if there are significant JAWS issues for Windows 8.1. > I've heard that the format of the initial information of the display > for Windows > 8.1 is very different from Windows 7 unless you modify the view. > > > > I've also heard that in Windows 8.1, there is a way of having the > usual Start Menu listing the desktop applications so that it resembles > Windows 7 but I'm not sure about that. I would want to have that view > as the default if I need to get Windows 8.1. > > > > My sighted husband and I will be working on setting up the new system > together. I'm not clear about the logistics of establishing my JAWS > authorization for the new system, but I expect we'll we in touch with > Freedom Scientific for that and some other details. > > > > I very much appreciate any suggestions or recommendations people may have. > If anyone has cautionary comments or concerns or information about > potential complications that I should be aware of, I'll be very > interested to hear those too. I admit I'd much prefer to get Windows > 7 rather than Windows 8.1 unless I hear recommendations to the contrary. > > > > > > Thanks very much! > > Chris Murphy > > > > > > For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: > http://www.jaws-users.com/help/ For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/ For answers to frequently asked questions about this list visit: http://www.jaws-users.com/help/
