Is Microsoft ignoring the desktop again?

[Stoffel]

I'm with you, I really don't like the new Start Menu (full screen or not) compared to the Win 8.1 Start Screen. I'm sure I'll get used to it but the preview I played around with just did not feel too fluid for me. Especially when I wanted to find an application that wasn't on my list.

 

Maybe I missed an option, but being able to sort by date installed and dropping down into all apps on win 8.1 was much easier than what the vertically scrolling list at the side seemed to offer.

 

We have to keep in mind that the new start menu is a work in progress that they started from scratch not to long ago.

That being said, I totally agree with you

It would make a lot more sense if the all apps list would appear over the tile section of the menu, that space is at least bigger. Specially when you use the menu full screen

[Skiver Veteran]

We have to keep in mind that the new start menu is a work in progress that they started from scratch not to long ago.

That being said, I totally agree with you

It would make a lot more sense if the all apps list would appear over the tile section of the menu, that space is at least bigger. Specially when you use the menu full screen

 

Oh I know, I've tried not to judge it too harshly - otherwise I'd be moaning about how slow it seemed to be.

 

The thing I don't get, is why they had to change away from the option of Smart Screen OR Start Menu, it just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

[George P Global Moderator]

I'm making a guess here but I think the start menu is only half done, we're a good 5 months away from RTM and 9926 is really a beta 2 build. They haven't locked down features and the UI yet, so I don't even think of this as a RC build yet. And as far as the dialogs go, they need to go, plain and simple. Lots of them have been the same for 10 or more years, and the control panel became a mess. What should have been one central location for every setting you want didn't. They started working on putting some things like that but never did. I hope they can add everything into the new settings app, even advanced options that would otherwise spit out a old dialog window.

 

And things like taskbar settings and folder settings and a few others, all need to be inside the settings app, NOT off on their own. You can leave the links as they are but it should take you to that area of the settings app.

[George P Global Moderator]

Oh I know, I've tried not to judge it too harshly - otherwise I'd be moaning about how slow it seemed to be.

 

The thing I don't get, is why they had to change away from the option of Smart Screen OR Start Menu, it just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

They're going for something more consistent on hybrid devices, I'm still expecting a pure tablet start screen UI but probably for phone and tablet devices only. The major issue with 8 is that the two UIs are too different and people would get lost on the start screen side.

 

Best way to fix that is to have a tablet mode that matches well with desktop mode and doesn't confuse users.

 

Just add the right mix of user settings so you can get it to be more like the original screen if you want and everyone covered.

[PGHammer]

PhotoShop has been upgraded to support touch in one of the major upgrades last fall/early winter, along with several of their other CC apps, Lr has not been upgraded with the new touch support, but is expected in the next update, so yes, for the majority of you PhotoShop stuff you can in fact use a tablet today, and that's with the the full PhotoShop CC version. Lr is even more suited for tablets and once they add the touch support to it you can so all the Lr work on a tablet just fine.

 

as for iTunes, I see no reason why you can't use it or alternatives fully on a tablet, I also don't see why you would use it instead of better alternatives, on windows. but even so you can use it fully on a tablet.

iTunes is standard in iOS - so you can certainly use it on a tablet, or even a phone.  In fact, the iOS App Store is part of iTunes - not a separate store as in OS X or Windows.

 

Further, you can use iTunes on Windows to sync, repair, or restore your iDevices as easy as - if not easier than - you can with a Mac (or Hack).  (Before I accidentally broke off the tip of my notebook's AC adapter, I did a "factory restore" of an iPad with iTunes on Windows 10 Technical Preview - which is the sole OS on my notebook.)

[Defcon]

There are a LOT of less technical users who were taught by generations of software to use the menu hierarchy. Every Windows had a File/Edit/View style menu, with submenus. That was what original start menu was based on in Windows 95, and it was a huge help to people because after learning the simple structure they could find anything.

 

Fast forward a few year - Start menu can become a mess because every single program installs a hundred useless entries. Sinofsky issues a dictate that the desktop is a 2nd class citizen and everything must be done for tablets. Windows 8 is 'touch first'. Thus we get Start Screen with very little discoverability, and Search as the main way to find anything.

 

They still haven't solved this problem in 10. The hybrid Start Menu is still going to be too complex for people who depend on finding things and not searching. This is why simple things work and and you have to be very careful with change.

[+Zagadka Subscriber²]

Fast forward a few year - Start menu can become a mess because every single program installs a hundred useless entries.

 

Well, that is the problem with the Start Menu. No one has a solution to that, and the "less technical users" you refer to almost inevitably have 70 folders on the Start Menu. As a result, also almost inevitably, they have 20-30 icons on their desktop (not including random Word files and pictures) and 15 items on their Quick Bar.

 

They generally only consciously use 2-3 programs regularly (some people, one - the web browser, which is also their e-mail client since they use gmail and their media player since they use Netflix and YouTube). Anything else, they will open directly from clicking on a file they idiotically download to the desktop and never delete.

 

I have not seen anyone come up with a solution for these poor people, Start Screen or otherwise. It will always exist as a problem as long as programs keep installing themselves everywhere, which will always happen. The closest thing is the "Recently Used" or "Frequently Used" app lists on the later versions of the Start Menu. People can barely manage to move icons around on their phones.

 

In order for "Search" to work, people have to know the name of the application they want to launch.

 

Microsoft has been slowly moving from the File/Edit/View menu system to the Ribbon system or removed it all together. Office has ditched it. Web browsers have ditched it. Explorer doesn't use it.

[George P Global Moderator]

They could probably do something about the menu not allowing those folders to be made, just search/index the app as it installs and only add the exe for the app, not all that other stuff.

 

I do agree though, for those that want to, they should allow for "folders" in the menu. At least in the all apps section of it. Or, since they're doing this already with the new groups/categories we see, "Places", Recent" "Most used". If users can set/make those as they want in the new menu that's be great IMO. 

 

Personally since 7 brought taskbar pinning I haven't used the menu to start apps much if at all. That's probably not going to change with 10, other than bringing it up to look at my pinned tiles for some quick info.

[+Zagadka Subscriber²]

Well, they manage to make a fairly accurate list of programs in the Uninstall dialog. There is some trash there like Visual C++ runtimes, but it is a more concise list of what is installed than most other options.

[Defcon]

It is trivial for Windows to discover what executables are present and should be shown to the user. The OS already knows this - for 'open with', uninstall, registered file types etc.

 

It is also possible to separate entries for each install into 3 sections - the app, uninstaller, and extra stuff. Even the uninstaller need not be shown.

 

Imagine if you installed programs, Windows automatically categorized them based on a software catalog (like Android can do) and classify them into 'frequently used', 'recently installed', Utils, Office Work, Browsers, Security etc. Again this is very easy to do.

 

Users gets a nice organized menu structure, plus search if need to, and a smart menu which knows how to uninstall apps right there.

 

But all of this requires actual thought and design, not just arbritraly forcing everyone to use a touch based start screen, then hastily shrinking it after everyone hated it, with absolutely zero improvements to usability or functionality.

[HawkMan]

There are a LOT of less technical users who were taught by generations of software to use the menu hierarchy.

 

no, you'll find that none of those less technical understand or even use the start menu, their desktops are covered in shortcuts, it's how they launch every single app and file they use. they need classes to organize their photos, and even then they suck at it.

 

the media and tech people told them the start screen and windows 8 was horrible. however it's perfect for them. and every time I've actually demoed them Windows 8, they get it instantly and don't understand what's so bad about it.

[HawkMan]

.

 

But all of this requires actual thought and design, not just arbritraly forcing everyone to use a touch based start screen, then hastily shrinking it after everyone hated it, with absolutely zero improvements to usability or functionality.

 

actually it requires all installers to be redone, and developers to actually assign their stuff to a category, and not make up new categories.

 

developers are lazy and horrible at all of this.

[JoseyWales]

they neglected the desktop. yes. long gone are the pleasures of installing custom icons, themes, which included color schemes and taskbar and start button customizations.

 

Hmm, I have custom icons, UI and many other things. Not sure what you are goign on about. There are plenty of ways to customize Windows just as there has been for a long time.

[onewarmslime]

the media and tech people told them the start screen and windows 8 was horrible. however it's perfect for them. and every time I've actually demoed them Windows 8, they get it instantly and don't understand what's so bad about it.

 

I don't classify my self as a "tech person" and I think the start screen proper sucks #*#(@

[PGHammer]

I don't classify my self as a "tech person" and I think the start screen proper sucks #*#(

onewarmslime - if folks come to you for advice, or to fix their computers, you ARE a "tech support person", even if you don't have the title or earn the money.

 

That, in and of itself, marks you as an outlier, because you know more AND do more than the average computer user.

 

You may think that it's trite that "with great power comes great responsibility" - but it isn't trite - not one bit.

 

Don't confuse the needs of those that come to you for advice with YOUR needs - they may need far less than you do.

 

If you see a Start menu chockablock with shortcuts, it's a safe bet that they know exactly squat about Start menu management.

 

I know HOW to manage it - however, quite frankly, it's a pain in the rear.  It's busywork, scutwork, and mostly something you do to take up times when it's slow - and I don't plod well at all.  (Worse, the ONLY way to search the Start menu, before 8 and later came along, relied on the mark 1 mod 0 human eyeball.  It's bad enough if you're a home user - Ghu help you if you work in an enterprise.)  The StartScreen mostly manages itself - mini-Start does the same.  Also, both have a slick - and keyboard-driven - Search mechanism that does NOT rely on the eyeball.  (That's right - it actually dares to use the keyboard.  How many of the critics actually put the mouse or other pointing device so far ahead of the keyboard that they despise anything that leverages it outside of Word or Outlook?  While I use pointing devices, I'm not a slave to them.)

[Ian W]

Fast forward a few year - Start menu can become a mess because every single program installs a hundred useless entries. Sinofsky issues a dictate that the desktop is a 2nd class citizen and everything must be done for tablets. Windows 8 is 'touch first'. Thus we get Start Screen with very little discoverability, and Search as the main way to find anything.

I'd argue that the Start screen may have helped increased discoverability. Unlike the Start menu, the All Applications screen didn't hide almost every item within a submenu or subfolder, and the screen even made the application shortcuts larger.

The All Applications screen only improved in Windows 8.1 and Update 1, which provides users with options to categorize applications based on their name, the date they were installed, their frequency of use, or their categories. As a bonus, users could increase the amount of applications shown. These options simply did not exist with the Start menu.

As for your comment about the Start menu becoming a mess as it was filled with useless entries, Windows 8.1 actually took steps to solve this problem by not allowing newly installed applications (and their useless entries) to take residence on the Start screen. Now you may argue that this was not a good idea, but like the Start menu, the Start screen also highlights newly installed applications, and again improves upon the Start menu by actually listing the total number of newly installed applications.

 

It is trivial for Windows to discover what executables are present and should be shown to the user. The OS already knows this - for 'open with', uninstall, registered file types etc.

It is also possible to separate entries for each install into 3 sections - the app, uninstaller, and extra stuff. Even the uninstaller need not be shown.

Then this goes to the problem that you previously mentioned: requiring users to search. Completely removing these items from the user's view requires the user to search for them when they are needed.

 

Imagine if you installed programs, Windows automatically categorized them based on a software catalog (like Android can do) and classify them into 'frequently used', 'recently installed', Utils, Office Work, Browsers, Security etc. Again this is very easy to do.

Windows 8.1 already provides options to categorize applications based on their name, date installed, frequency of use, and their categories. I had hoped that Microsoft would improve this for the Start screen.

 

Users gets a nice organized menu structure, plus search if need to, and a smart menu which knows how to uninstall apps right there.

The option to uninstall applications is automatically available to Windows 8.1 users in the application context menu of the Start screen. Users need only to right click the application tile, select the Uninstall option, and then they are done.

 

But all of this requires actual thought and design.

Although I can see where the Start screen could be improved, clearly a lot of thought went into its design. For example, aside from providing users with new options for application categorization, the Start screen also allowed users to customize its appearance and sync these settings across devices.

 

then hastily shrinking it after everyone hated it ...

I wish people would stop saying this. It's not true.

[PGHammer]

Ian W. (and others), it seems that the majority of complaints about 10's Technical Preview pre-9926, AND 8+, are about aesthetics - not performance, application compatibility (or lack thereof) or any other typical metric about a new OS; this is especially (unfortunately) true about the complaints in this thread.

 

It would be one thing if the complaints about the performance of "desktop application X" or "game Y" not working - however, we aren't seeing that in the complaints.  (What is all the more surprising is that there were such complaints by the pound about 7, and Vista, and even XP.)

 

It's the sort of thing that would matter to theologians and designers - not engineers, or even PC technical users.  It is as if we were discussing the "soul" of an operating system.

 

It's something I find well and truly scary.

 

For me at least, a contender as an upgrade to an OS I am using must - at the very minimum - perform at least as well as the OS it is to replace.  By and large, Windows 10 IS meeting this metric. (It's not perfect - there are things that can be improved; however, by and large, it is at least as good as 8.1 overall - not easy to do, even, if not especially, on both a legacy desktop AND a legacy notebook.)

 

The more applications (and games) I throw at the Technical Preview, the more I keep coming back to a question I find myself asking over and over again - "What issues?"  Other than games that use the Sony Online Entertainment Launchpad, I have exactly NO game-compatibility issues.  That's right - none.  I have no application issues at all.  (In fact, I added Google Earth Pro to the mix - no complaints there, either - really shocking, as even the original Google Earth has a history of being notoriously picky.)

 

When aesthetics matters more than performance, that is even more concerning - why would aesthetics be so critical that they are willing to throw better perfomance - of desktop software - under the bus to preserve it?  Isn't improved desktop software performance - and especially desktop application and game performance - supposed to be the entire point of a desktop environment?

 

Sheesh.

[Kazama Levi]

The desktop environment - if it will have ANY meaning for future desktop users - needs to remain usable (and approachable) BY those users - making it overly complicated goes against that grain.  (Windows did NOT get to where it is by throwing the masses out into the cold, and especially not desktop users.)

Exactly, the desktop needs to remain usable by desktop users - which is why Metro with its tiles needs to be flushed down the toilet at least on the desktop, because it's a usability nightmare for desktop users.

They indeed didn't get where they are by leaving the masses out in the cold, but they've become more and more arrogant over time, and with Windows 8 and its Metro, they threw the entirety of desktop users in front of the bus.

 

Now with Windows 10, judging from build 9926, their motto seems to be:

Oops, I did it again

 

Initially, they pretended they would bring back the start menu. However, in build 9926 the start menu is now broken by design. In build 9879, after you removed all of the tiles garbage from the start menu, which you had to do in a tedious one-by-one fashion, it resized down to a sane size and was usable. In build 9926, you still have to remove the tiles tediously one-by-one, but once you did so, it stays at the same humongous size, and it's not resizable as well. To make matters even worse, they now removed the search bar from the start menu, degrading usability even a good bit more.

This is what you're stuck with in build 9926. No matter which way you you look at it, it's just badly broken.

 

 

yes they are.

they started to castrate control panel, hiding it, removing (windows update is gone) icons, making a replacement that is all metro design with 10% functionality.

Everyone wanted start menu back, and they added that horrible bastard child of classic start menu and start screen.

More and more dialogs keep defaulting to metro dialogs instead of normal simple dialogs.

Explorer is still screwed.... hard drives and removable devices all lumped together... details pane still on right side...

new icons are ######, cortana is useless.

needs a proper high DPI support, 4K monitors still not every useful.

there are so many things that can be done, but it seems they only thing they are concerned about is turning into a idiot proof metro interface.

everything I mentioned is being asked about in feedback, and MS simply ignores it, all that BS about them listening is just that BS.

They don't limit their castration to Control Center, in 9926 they castrated the start menu as well - it was still working too well in 9879, so they gave it a humongous size, made it non-resizable and removed the search bar from it. That's probably just for starters, who knows what they'll still do.

Their kindergarten icons are just plain horrible, but at least there's now a matching wallpaper here:

Windows 10 Final wallpaper leaked!

 

Explorer is crap as well. Besides what you mentioned, it repeatedly crashed (and Windows with it) from me trying to copy a simple text file

 

Cortana is useless indeed. Instead of doing such half-assed nonsense, they'd better concentrate on creating a usable start menu - properly sized, without tiles crap, resizable, with search bar, and if it had transparency (as you could see in one screenshot), that would be the icing on the cake.

 

About the feedback - true, first they celebrate how much feedback they got, but then all they do with it is flush it down the toilet because it's not what they want to hear.

 

It is trivial for Windows to discover what executables are present and should be shown to the user. The OS already knows this - for 'open with', uninstall, registered file types etc.

It is also possible to separate entries for each install into 3 sections - the app, uninstaller, and extra stuff. Even the uninstaller need not be shown.

Imagine if you installed programs, Windows automatically categorized them based on a software catalog (like Android can do) and classify them into 'frequently used', 'recently installed', Utils, Office Work, Browsers, Security etc. Again this is very easy to do.

Users gets a nice organized menu structure, plus search if need to, and a smart menu which knows how to uninstall apps right there.

But all of this requires actual thought and design, not just arbritraly forcing everyone to use a touch based start screen, then hastily shrinking it after everyone hated it, with absolutely zero improvements to usability or functionality.

Yes, that sounds like a good idea. However, that would indeed require thought and design - two things of which they've shown again and again that they're inherently incapable of doing either.

 

For me at least, a contender as an upgrade to an OS I am using must - at the very minimum - perform at least as well as the OS it is to replace.

Indeed, and there it doesn't even come remotely close. While it isn't the abysmal failure anymore that was Windows 8, it still fares poorly when compared to Windows 7 in many regards - by far not just aesthetics (which are all too often horrible), but also in terms of usability. A start menu which was poorly done to begin with, but is now badly broken in the latest build 9926, a large step backwards over 9879, more and more things are castrated or dumbed down... no, as it's now, Windows 10 doesn't even come close to being able to replace Windows 7 (and we better don't talk about Kubuntu, where it would fare still a huge deal worse by comparison).

[HawkMan]

 

Initially, they pretended they would bring back the start menu. However, in build 9926 the start menu is now broken by design. In build 9879, after you removed all of the tiles garbage from the start menu, which you had to do in a tedious one-by-one fashion, it resized down to a sane size and was usable. In build 9926, you still have to remove the tiles tediously one-by-one, but once you did so, it stays at the same humongous size, and it's not resizable as well. To make matters even worse, they now removed the search bar from the start menu, degrading usability even a good bit more.

This is what you're stuck with in build 9926. No matter which way you you look at it, it's just badly broken.

 

 

It's almost like you PURPOSELY ignored the other 10 times it's been mentioned , several of the times in direct replies to your post, that the start menu in the current build was re-coded in XAML and is currently missing most of the features from early builds, features that are coming back...

 

you wouldn't be purposely ignoring this just to troll or anything would you ? that would be bad. 

[Ian W]

Exactly, the desktop needs to remain usable by desktop users - which is why Metro with its tiles needs to be flushed down the toilet at least on the desktop, because it's a usability nightmare for desktop users.

They present a "usability nightmare" because they are . . . large? Square? Flat?

 

They indeed didn't get where they are by leaving the masses out in the cold, but they've become more and more arrogant over time, and with Windows 8 and its Metro, they threw the entirety of desktop users in front of the bus.

I fail to see how Microsoft threw desktop users under the bus with Windows 8 with all of the new desktop features it introduced. I'm not saying the features were perfect, but the desktop did seem to get a lot of attention with the new Task Manger, Storage Spaces, multi-monitor improvements, the revised file collision and file management dialogs, the Ribbonized Explorer interface, USB 3.0 support, .ISO mounting and .VHD improvements, Hyper-V, the security improvements (including the Measured Boot that I love!) hybrid boot, Internet Explorer 10 . . . The list goes on.

 

Initially, they pretended they would bring back the start menu. However, in build 9926 the start menu is now broken by design. In build 9879, after you removed all of the tiles garbage from the start menu, which you had to do in a tedious one-by-one fashion, it resized down to a sane size and was usable. In build 9926, you still have to remove the tiles tediously one-by-one, but once you did so, it stays at the same humongous size, and it's not resizable as well. To make matters even worse, they now removed the search bar from the start menu, degrading usability even a good bit more.

This is what you're stuck with in build 9926. No matter which way you you look at it, it's just badly broken.

You do realize that this isn't the final product?

 

Their kindergarten icons are just plain horrible, but at least there's now a matching wallpaper here:

Windows 10 Final wallpaper leaked!

Your opinion of the icons is rather peculiar, calling them 'kindergarten icons' so as to insinuate that kindergarteners designed them. For the sake of argument, let us assume that this is true. Now, since you have gone through the trouble of creating a, as you say, "matching wallpaper," does this mean that you also must be a kindergartener? No?

 

Explorer is crap as well. Besides what you mentioned, it repeatedly crashed (and Windows with it) from me trying to copy a simple text file

I hope you realize that the product that you were using is incomplete, and as such, is prone to instability, bugs, and  unexpected behavior in general.

 

Cortana is useless indeed. Instead of doing such half-assed nonsense, they'd better concentrate on creating a usable start menu - properly sized, without tiles crap, resizable, with search bar, and if it had transparency (as you could see in one screenshot), that would be the icing on the cake.

Do you say this because she is not complete? If so, this would be the only time in your post where you have explicitly acknowledged that the OS and its components are incomplete, and this only when it suits your agenda.

 

About the feedback - true, first they celebrate how much feedback they got, but then all they do with it is flush it down the toilet because it's not what they want to hear.

Burden of proof and all that.

[Kazama Levi]

the start menu in the current build was re-coded in XAML and is currently missing most of the features from early builds, features that are coming back...

 

I seriously doubt that any removed features (especially the ones concerning the start menu) will be added back again.

Imagine this:

 

"Okay guys, we need to rewrite the start menu in Xaml. While it's working fine in 9879, we have nothing better to do anyway. This will require removing pretty much all the features that are presently in it, like resizability or the search bar. Should we do it in an internal build where no one will ever notice this, or should we do this publicly in the Customer Preview 9926, which is there for the average customer to preview it and get a general idea of what to expect?"

 

If they really intend to add back the removed features (which I seriously doubt), they're incredibly stupid to publicly post a Customer Preview with lots of removed features, so the customer gets a wrong impression.

I think that it's far more likely that they have no intention whatsoever to add back the removed features, and that the current Customer Preview is in fact already a good representation of what to expect.

[Ian W]

I seriously doubt that any removed features (especially the ones concerning the start menu) will be added back again.

Imagine this:

 

"Okay guys, we need to rewrite the start menu in Xaml. While it's working fine in 9879, we have nothing better to do anyway. This will require removing pretty much all the features that are presently in it, like resizability or the search bar. Should we do it in an internal build where no one will ever notice this, or should we do this publicly in the Customer Preview 9926, which is there for the average customer to preview it and get a general idea of what to expect?"

 

If they really intend to add back the removed features (which I seriously doubt), they're incredibly stupid to publicly post a Customer Preview with lots of removed features, so the customer gets a wrong impression.

I think that it's far more likely that they have no intention whatsoever to add back the removed features, and that the current Customer Preview is in fact already a good representation of what to expect.

January build now available to the Windows Insider Program

Emphasis mine.

New Start menu: You

[PGHammer]

They present a "usability nightmare" because they are . . . large? Square? Flat?

 

I fail to see how Microsoft threw desktop users under the bus with Windows 8 with all of the new desktop features it introduced. I'm not saying the features were perfect, but the desktop did seem to get a lot of attention with the new Task Manger, Storage Spaces, multi-monitor improvements, the revised file collision and file management dialogs, the Ribbonized Explorer interface, USB 3.0 support, .ISO mounting and .VHD improvements, Hyper-V, the security improvements (including the Measured Boot that I love!) hybrid boot, Internet Explorer 10 . . . The list goes on.

 

You do realize that this isn't the final product?

 

Your opinion of the icons is rather peculiar, calling them 'kindergarten icons' so as to insinuate that kindergarteners designed them. For the sake of argument, let us assume that this is true. Now, since you have gone through the trouble of creating a, as you say, "matching wallpaper," does this mean that you also must be a kindergartener? No?

 

I hope you realize that the product that you were using is incomplete, and as such, is prone to instability, bugs, and  unexpected behavior in general.

 

Do you say this because she is not complete? If so, this would be the only time in your post where you have explicitly acknowledged that the OS and its components are incomplete, and this only when it suits your agenda.

 

Burden of proof and all that.

 

Ian W. - he has been consistent in one thing, and one thing only - he wants the flipside of the now-dead WindowsRT - a desktop-only OS.

 

The problem is that the only reason he wants it is due to aesthetics.

 

Never mind that desktop performance - merely in 8 and 8.1 - is better than that of 7 - and this is with desktop applications.

 

Never mind that nobody - at all - has complained about desktop-application breakage with Windows 10's Technical Previews.  (That wasn't the case with 7 - which was a desktop-only OS.)

 

That means that Microsoft has actually dared do the unthinkable - a multimode OS that didn't neglect the performance of a desktop OS.  (This was supposed to be impossible - not merely improbable.)

 

Kazama Levi - is aesthetics so important that you are willing to throw performance under the bus to get it?

 

I'm a desktop PC user - and a legacy NOTEBOOK PC user.  As much as you wish, I have exactly zero complaints about 8+ (or the Windows 10 Technical Preview, for that matter) - from a desktop-application performance standpoint.  (From what you have said, that isn't YOUR issue, either.)

 

Instead, you are hanging everything on aesthetics.  (You sound like a politician complaining that the carpeting in his office isn't blue - therefore, you are rejecting the entire office.)

[nosense]

 

If they really intend to add back the removed features (which I seriously doubt), they're incredibly stupid to publicly post a Customer Preview with lots of removed features, so the customer gets a wrong impression.

I think that it's far more likely that they have no intention whatsoever to add back the removed features, and that the current Customer Preview is in fact already a good representation of what to expect.

The latest build is not CP, it still Technical Preview...... It's obvious they doing the beta different from windows 8, So ya this throws your last argument out the window.

 

[binaryzero]

I really don't know what all the fuss is - I haven't changed the way I've used Windows in years, no matter what version I use, basic concepts and principles are still there and functional. 

 

But cool 25 pages and counting...