I was going to open a new thread to warn people about Windows 8 (Win8) but then I saw yours.
It has to be the biggest blunder that Microsoft has made since Vista. I happened to have got a fairly early version but not a pre-release. Actually I think its bigger.
OpenCPN does work on it but...
First I found you have to completely relearn how to do anything from starting the File Explorer to how to shut it down. But you eventually learn and think its not too bad.
But then you try to connect your
GPS and
serial to USB adapters and find they don't work. You then desperately search for new drivers only to find, THEY DON'T EXIST. So I had to buy new
serial to USB adapters and also a new GPS BU-353S4 the old ones don't work. BTW some of this is also true if you have Win7 64, the adapters work but not the old BU-353 GPS.
Also, because it has IE version 10, you will find that all lot of sites don't completely support it like this CruisersForum doesn't allow you to upload with IE 10. My bank program doesn't work completely either. I have to use Firefox for these things.
I tried to to fall back to Win7 but that is not possible without a complete reinstall of all your
software. I may do it anyway.
So be warned, is you go to Windows 8 check everything before you go sailing to be sure it works.