Upgrading an Acer Iconia Tablet to Windows 8

With the release of windows 8, I decided to see if it would improve the performance of my sluggish Acer Iconia Tablet running windows 7. While the tablet worked OK, its performance has been mediocre to say the least. The Iconia tab running windows 7 was really not tablet friendly. While Acer had a nice “tablet” app for windows 7, it was far from what one would expect for a tablet. Using windows 7 directly was awkward and clumsy.

The install:
I went online and purchased windows 8 directly from Microsoft at their promotional rate. Prior to the actual purchase, an upgrade wizard was downloaded to the tablet and it analyzed the software for compatibility. The results stated 22 out of 28 applications and drivers were compatible. It also told me that the touch pad was not windows 8 compliant. The touch screen would work as well as it did with windows 7, but some of the functionality may be limited. While I was not happy with that piece of information, I was impressed that the wizard let me know in advance. Among the applications that was supported was my installation of Office 2010 home edition. The bluetooth driver needed to be uninstalled before the upgrade, which the wizard informed me in advance and assisted with the uninstall. It also told me that I would have to re-install the ATI (AMD) graphics driver and software. At this point I should note that the Iconia W500 comes with a 32 gig solid state drive. What the upgrade wizard failed to mention until the very last screen is that you need 16 gig of free space on the C drive to perform the install. This required removing all installed software including my copy of office 2010. While annoying, I thought I would just add back the software after the install. After freeing the space, the actual installation proceeded without any issues. It took about 45 minutes give or take for the upgrade to complete. After the installation completed and the system rebooted. I found myself on what looked like an actual tablet (older style tablet) The scrolling desktop was filled with large square or rectangle easy to push buttons. Some of the buttons were scrolling news feeds, weather and sports. One of the buttons, took me straight to my old familiar “windows” desktop. It took a while to get used to the navigation (I am still learning I admit) but after a while I was adding and removing buttons from the start. I downloaded the new Netflix app from the “app store” and began to assess the actual install.

What Worked:
After the install, With the exception of my old desktop wallpaper, all of my personal settings and files were intact. The lan card connected to my network with ease, the bluetooth functioned without reconfiguration on both my mouse and keyboard. Boot time on windows 8 on the Iconia tablet compared to the windows 7 originally on it is fast. I would say it is 35-40% faster than with windows 7. I was honestly surprised and impressed. The touch navigation worked fine, the menus are easy to use (there is a learning curve) I found them responsive and very touch friendly. The audio performed flawlessly. Internet explorer which can be accessed from a button on the start screen. It launched much quicker than IE on windows 7 on this machine. I downloaded the graphics driver and the webcam software and installed both. The install was clean and both worked perfectly after a reboot.

What didn’t work:
My biggest “gotcha” after the install was the fact that I could NOT re-install Office 2010. I received a message that stated the installer was not compatible with windows 8 and referred me to a KB article on Microsoft. The article told me the workaround was to restore the tablet to windows 7, install office and upgrade! Duh! I had to uninstall office to free sufficient room to install windows 8. Further the technote stated, if I wanted to buy a new copy of office 2010, the new installer would work. This is classic Microsoft in my opinion. I have a legitimate copy of office but because I was forced to uninstall, I cannot re-install unless I purchase it again. The other thing that did not work, is the new Netflix app on my Verizon FIOS network. I receive errors that the router is not configured correctly. On my Comcast account at my office however, the app work flawlessly. I have not had time to speak with Netflix support to troubleshoot the issue.

Overall opinion:
Despite the infuriating situation with office 2010, I am really impressed with the improved performance of the Acer Iconia tablet running on windows 8. I finally feel, I actually possess a windows true “tablet” I still have software to add back, and honestly if you were upgrading on a computer that had sufficient drive space where you would not have to uninstall office, the issue with it, would not have occurred. The app store is very limited, and the real issue is how many developers will come on board developing apps when android and IOS have so much more development.

UPDATE:

After the upgrade to windows 8, there was only 7 gig of free drive space on the SD drive. After the first couple windows 8 updates the free space was down to 4 gig. After examining the C drive I realized the upgrade made a complete backup of the window 7 operating system in a folder called “windows.old” after a quick google search, the folder can be removed manually by deleting it, or using the drive cleanup tool. After removing the old system files, I now had 11 gig of free drive space. I used the drive cleanup tool. The windows 8 cleanup tool is similar to the windows 7 tool, however, there is now a button that says “clean up system files”. Selecting that button will then give you the option of selecting “Previous Windows Installation(s)”.

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