Windows 8 and RME Fireface 400

[DominikJW]

So here's the deal. I'm currently running a Dell XPS m1530 c2d laptop with 32bit Windows Vista. The Fireface 400 is connected via Manhattan expresscard firewire interface and works solid. I'm thinking about upgrading the OS to Win 8 64bit, mainly to increase performance (got 4g of RAM) plus it's damn cheap until january 31st (around 40 bucks, dowload version).

I'm having some concerns about compatibility of hardware drivers - mostly the expresscard FW interface and Fireface of course.

Any of you guys have any experience?

 

[HCL]

All the people that complained about Vista a few years back have their work cut out for them with 8.

Don't do it.

 

[sprack]

My 9652 works perfectly in Win8. RME does solid work on their driver validation. Checked the RME forums to see if anyone is having issues?

 

[DominikJW]

Well, I obviously googled shit thoroughly and as I recon most of the issues relate to firewire and its drivers (fw chipset, not the RME). But in the end I guess, I won't know for sure until I install it and try to run...

 

[Sloan]

Clone your hard drive as it is right now, then do an install of Win8, if it doesn't work out then clone your copy back on your main drive, bam...back to normal in like 30 min.

my choice for free cloning:
http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.aspx

 

[Mashreef]

i wouldnt go for windows 8
im just happy with my win 7 64bit

 

[SethTheGreat]

I wouldn't personally be too concerned about drivers with windows 8 since I'm pretty sure RME has that all worked out already, but I read a couple articles/forums reporting crappier overall DAW performance on Win8. I've decided to stay with 7 64 bit for now.

 

[phisk]

Win8 & Fireface 400 over here and no problems.

 

[DominikJW]

Alright, I did the purchase, installation went pretty smooth (great tech support by MS btw) and everything is running flawlessly for now. The compatibility is even better since in Vista I had to disable the wifi card becouse of the IRQ interruptions, and now the problem is gone. Reaper is running, plugins are running, I'm happy

Only thing that's buggering me is the new Start Menu, guess I'll just have to get used to it.

 

[phisk]

Give it a try:

http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/ or try

http://www.classicshell.net/

there are several more start buttons to choose from, just google them all

i've chosen start 8

 

[t-rave]

Just learn how to use the new start menu , once you get used to it and use a few key commands ( windows key to switch to desktop, win+x to access device management and prefs) it becomes second nature.

even though metro is kind of unnecessary for a desktop it doesn't seem to hamper performance. Windows 8 seems to be the snappiest, lightest windows yet.