G55 Windows 8 release preview

[electric0ant]

hi, has anyone tried windows 8 release review on their G55?
so far i have found that windows installs its won wifi drivers and installing the ones from the disk causes blue screen issues.
i still have an unknown device: pci communications device.

and the keyboard package seems to be intermittent, (lights and volume controls). sometimes it won;t work, but after rebooting again it will work.

[PC_744]

I did a horrible mistake by trying to install that Windows 8. I was trying to dual-boot it with my system that came with the G55, however I didn't install on the 2nd disk it did the installation on the main disk. 😄

Well, luckily I have my recovery disk next to me so nothing happened. I advice you to go back to the original system as it's not officially supported yet.

[electric0ant]

lol, hope you didn't lose any data.

i used a second hard drive for the win8 so i just popped my win7 ssd back in. from what people are saying win8 is pretty stable, but i know laptops will be more tricky as has more custom drivers for keyboards etc and ultilities

[djdouglas]

I would recommend steering clear of Windows 8 Pre Release and possibly even the actual release until there are sufficient updates and validated drivers available. I loaded the consumer preview and upgraded from Windows 7 when it was first released and I was pleased with the results. At the time I was running it on my G74. When I bought my G75 I loaded a clean copy of the consumer preview onto it and was satisfied. I used Laplink to move all of my programs and data files over. I had no problems minus a few glitches with the VIA audio drivers. Even the touchpad worked fine.

Then Microsoft announced the Windows 8 Pre Release. Of course they wouldnt offer an upgrade for those of us running the consumer preview so that we could maintain our programs which is very much like Microsoft so I had to do a clean install. Immediately there were problems. I could not get certain drivers to install such as Intel Management, Touchpad, the Nvidia drivers initially didnt want to install. It could not find a compatible graphics card, etc. I was finally able to forge my way through the disaster and get all of my files and programs back onto the system. Which is a good reason why you should always back up your stuff. Even if its just buying an external drive and copying your entire hard drive over.

After all of this within about a week my system began freezing. Usually while running firefox and listening to live streams or watching videos. I finally got to the point to where I needed to reinstall again.

I finally wound up installing Windows 7 back on. I purchased 2 new hard drives, striped them and reinstalled. Everything (but the touchpad, might actually be a bad part) is working, including the VIA audio drivers. I am finally for the first time running smooth on my G75.

I dont recommend WIndows 8 Pre Release at this time unless you have nothing to lose.