Windows 8 to go ?

[Alis_Klar]

What do people think of windows to go?

Up until now the BYOD response was running a thin client on the device but now on any Windows 7 certified PC you can boot into a school provisioned and administered Windows 8 instance from USB stick. This feature is only available on Windows 8 Enterprise so enabling BitLocker is an option too.

This will only work on high end usb sticks which are certified for use with win8 to go (See Windows To Go - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ) but compare this to the cost of issueing laptops and it starts to look an attractive alternative.

This is good for data protection as the Windows to Go environment does not give access to local storage on the hardware you booted from and does not allow file transfer locally (not sure about other usb sticks but presumably this could be dealt with by policies as with school provisioned laptops)

[LeMarchand]

Haven't played with this yet, though I intend to.

For some reason when I've mentioned it to staff and pointed out that this would be a great way for them to have a dedicated machine in their class and then just a stick they could take home to work on their own computers they were horrified...

[sted]

the high end sticks thing i havnt found i tried it with the 1st stick i could find that was big enough and it worked (this was pre release win8 so rtm may be different)

[Theblacksheep]

This will only work on high end usb sticks which are certified for use with win8 to go (See Windows To Go - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ) but compare this to the cost of issueing laptops and it starts to look an attractive alternative.

See this thread for getting it working on normal USB sticks

Windows To Go Info and Creating a Windows To Go on a removable USB drive

[Arthur]

The only disappointing thing about Windows To Go is the licensing...

There are licensing requirements for Windows To Go; it is not just as simple as getting a copy of Windows 8 Enterprise and Bob’s your uncle. Here are the licensing requirements:



The mentioned CSL is a new companion subscription license. A companion device is a device such as a Windows 8 tablet that is the user’s secondary device, and where the PC is the primary device.

[Alis_Klar]

What if there is no PC's with Windows 8 permanently installed (so were not cloning an instance)? Bloody MS licensing confusion monster strikes again!

[SYNACK]

I think that W2G could be massively handy, its just a case of how affordable the hardware and licencing turns out to be. It might sort out the teachers who 'can't bring their laptop every day because it is too heavy' this in spite of bringing many kgs of handbag each day.

[CyberNerd]

Just like bootable USB Linux, which has been around since as long as I can remember USB being around.
Nice of MS to have caught up on that one. Apparently they read ISO9660 too!

[SYNACK]

Just like bootable USB Linux, which has been around since as long as I can remember USB being around.
Nice of MS to have caught up on that one. Apparently they read ISO9660 too!

Exactly, but useful

I mean too the large amount of those that use MS stuff and formats every day

[CyberNerd]

it is nice to see them drag up some old technology to keep up.
MS are so far behind the curve now I wonder why anyone bothers with them.
I suppose the answer is in the sales figures, everyone is moving to android and apple.

[SYNACK]

it is nice to see them drag up some old technology to keep up.
MS are so far behind the curve now I wonder why anyone bothers with them.
I suppose the answer is in the sales figures, everyone is moving to android and apple.

True, it's been doable with third party tools, ubcd4win (xp era) and in deployment WinPE for ages, they are only just turning it into a product now. They are not loosing everyone, just more than they used to. The curve is also relative, they are just rehashing most stuff from their own history. They were doing web video and mobile OSs a decade before android an the iPoo existed, they were just too far ahead of the curve at that stage. They need to learn to be a chunk more 'in the moment' instead of two decades in the future or five years behind (experience and userbase wise) in certain fields.

[Theblacksheep]

I suppose the answer is in the sales figures, everyone is moving to android and apple.

Android has 5% of the total market, iwhatever has 20% and about 70% various windows platforms.

The sales figures you hint at mask what is really going on, most androids are phones, most apples are phones.... areas where MS have had no penetration. So people bother because they still dominate the market, 'everyone' is not moving to android and apple.

[CyberNerd]

Android has 5% of the total market, iwhatever has 20% and about 70% various windows platforms.

A smartphone is a computer in pretty much every definition you could cite.
Once Microsoft had a domination here and now they don't. The amount of smartphones must easily eclipse the amount of desktop computers nowadays - in a class of 30 that I was in today, only about 4 kids were not connected to the wi-fi using their phones to search for sites in French. Any using windows phone? No. Why? there are no apps. Exactly the same reason people use Windows over Apple and Linux in the past - because it had apps. Now with RT entering the market watch the dominance decline.

[SYNACK]

A smartphone is a computer in pretty much every definition you could cite.
Once Microsoft had a domination here and now they don't. The amount of smartphones must easily eclipse the amount of desktop computers nowadays - in a class of 30 that I was in today, only about 4 kids were not connected to the wi-fi using their phones to search for sites in French. Any using windows phone? No. Why? there are no apps. Exactly the same reason people use Windows over Apple and Linux in the past - because it had apps. Now with RT entering the market watch the dominance decline.

Funny, we don't have that level of affluence here or at least affordability.

On the smartphone issue about I know five people not including myself with them who are happy enough with them, two were android users

[Theblacksheep]

A smartphone is a computer in pretty much every definition you could cite.
Once Microsoft had a domination here and now they don't. The amount of smartphones must easily eclipse the amount of desktop computers nowadays - in a class of 30 that I was in today, only about 4 kids were not connected to the wi-fi using their phones to search for sites in French. Any using windows phone? No. Why? there are no apps. Exactly the same reason people use Windows over Apple and Linux in the past - because it had apps. Now with RT entering the market watch the dominance decline.

Almost every definition, except the most important one: Can you type a word document up on it without throwing it against the wall.

Phones completely fail in this respect. I quite like my SG2, but anything other than a search is painful, my ipad 2 is useless, the transformer I had for a few months could do it just about, but os/software still wasn't quite there....

Comes down to the tools for the job again.

Anyway WTG = handy addition.