I'm glad I edited that post to add "important" in

I was always useless at those games... Though to be fair the Metro equivalents are pretty good actually, Microsoft Mahjong is quite good. I bet you could copy the .exe's over of the older Win32 programs and run them on Windows 8, not tried it though.

Anyhow I do hope you can start getting along with Win8 on your new laptop, just do that customisation to get it the way you want, and I am sure you won't look back.

Edited by Pipexer (Thu 16-Jan-14 18:21:56)

FreeCell is not included in the Windows 8 operating system. However, the Microsoft Solitaire Collection can be downloaded for free from the Windows Store, which includes FreeCell plus 4 other solitaire games. Unlike the original FreeCell, this version allows unlimited undo.

The Solitaire Collection isn't too bad. It can now be used without an Xbox login as well.

That reminds me of another thing people need to know - Win 8 by default wants an online login to get to the Start screen, but it is easy to change it to a local login.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

That reminds me of another thing people need to know - Win 8 by default wants an online login to get to the Start screen, but it is easy to change it to a local login.

Some apps like Mail seem to require an online login even when it is not obvious why. For instance, the Mail app refuses to operate without a Microsoft account logged in, even if one just wants to use the Mail app with Gmail.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

That reminds me of another thing people need to know - Win 8 by default wants an online login to get to the Start screen, but it is easy to change it to a local login.

Please Sir, how?

You keep catching me out .

I objected to it on my first machine, (that got taken back to that renowned store at Cheadle Royal), and changed it to local login within five minutes once I decided to find out if it was possible.

On this machine I couldn't be bothered for other reasons, and have stayed with the online login. You have to log into the "user" on the machine in either case. I haven't bothered either seeing if that can be avoided in the way it can on earlier Wins, as I decided perhaps after all I should have password protection, if nothing else.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

I haven't bothered either seeing if that can be avoided in the way it can on earlier Wins, as I decided perhaps after all I should have password protection, if nothing else.

Yup, local accounts can still be password-less.

Thanks .

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

You keep catching me out .

I objected to it on my first machine, (that got taken back to that renowned store at Cheadle Royal), and changed it to local login within five minutes once I decided to find out if it was possible.

On this machine I couldn't be bothered for other reasons, and have stayed with the online login. You have to log into the "user" on the machine in either case. I haven't bothered either seeing if that can be avoided in the way it can on earlier Wins, as I decided perhaps after all I should have password protection, if nothing else.

Actually, in 8.1 you don't need to create an online account at first set up, you can click "create an account" and then click "ignore this step" (right at the bottom) and then it will let you create a local account from the word go, I will fully admit that this isn't necessarily clear on how to bypass creating an online account (I do get the feeling Microsoft want to encourage everyone to have a LiveID - so that they can start competing with Google and Apple with cloud services), but nevertheless the option is there and you should have been able to find it. In Windows 8 it is even clearer "Use a local account" (or something along those lines).

If you've already created a on-line account is it possible to change it either so it uses a local account or, perhaps better, needs no login at all?