Windows 10 beta 10041

Published on March 25, 2015 By Frogboy In Personal Computing

Windows 10 is coming along nicely. A definite nice step from Windows 8.1 (once the bugs are out).

Still, not all is well yet.

The Windows 10 skin

The Windows 10 skin has some issues. The title bar is thicker than some apps expect (such as Microsoft Live Writer). Stardock’s WindowBlinds has had to tackle this issue for years. I suspect WindowBlinds will be making a comeback with Windows 10 as the title bar and borders in windows 10 are a combination of not pretty and a bit hard to use at times (the border is one pixel making resizing a bit of a pain. Seriously.

The Start menu

vs.

I’ve seen people argue that there is no need for a Start10. I think these two screenshots (the Windows 10 start menu on the left and the beta of Stardock’s Start10 on the right) make it pretty obvious that yes, a lot of people will want Start10.

Let’s walk through some of the issues:

Where’s my home folder? Those items at the top left are hard-coded. You can’t remove them. Maybe they’ll fix that but time is starting to run short.
It has no context menu whatosever for the menu. So it’s not easy to understand how/if you can change its behavior.
If I want to pin my home folder, I have to pin it to the tiles part of it.
I don’t even want to go into the spam abuse here. It already includes a bunch of junk I have on interest in, didn’t ask for. I can’t imagine what the OEMs will do. One can almost picture that that is the purpose of the tiles in there in the first place.
You cannot pin short-cuts to the start menu.

If I remove the junk I get this.

This is what you get if you choose “All Apps”.

Please, someone go ahead and make the argument that this is an improvement on the Windows 7 design? Tell me how it’s superior. In fact, if you can name 1 way it’s more usable than the Windows 7 design I’d really like to hear it. I’ll start with 1 freebie: it’s easier for touch UI. But if I’m using touch, I’ll be using the Start screen.

Home Group

Speaking of the home group, these are the icons. I hope these are not what they plan to ship in the final. They’re very distracting.

Then there’s the ribbon. The giant “Pin to Quick Access” thing is very annoying. Luckily, I can minimize it but it seems like a step back. Another thing are all the little pins on the left. I get it, they’re pinned. I hope (assume) they will have an option not to show those. I couldn’t find any options in the folder options panel.

Did I mention how annoying it is that the borders are only 1 pixel?

It’s better than Windows 8

I prefer Windows 8.1 over Windows 7 with some caveats (Object Desktop installed). That’s because Windows 8 is so much better dealing with high DPI and it’s faster.

Windows 10 seems be be an improvement over Windows 8 in those terms as well. But the UX needs a lot of work still. On the other hand, if they don’t do that work, well, I guess I’ll be able to afford to send my kid to college after all. Winking smile

Comments (Page 2)

DrJBHL

on Mar 25, 2015

Nope. Won't be saying goodbye to W7 until 2020 (1/15/2020 last extended support).

Then? Who knows?

harpo99999

on Mar 25, 2015

Wizard1956

reply 6

MS wants to get this out in time for "Back to School." After seeing this mess, MS is looking like the ones who need to go back to school.

probably need to go back to pre-school.

admiralWillyWilber

reply 9

I haven't used ten, but i used 8 , and 8.1 there is no way 8.1 was superion to 7 without the classic shell. At least 10 will have a start menu, and control panel this time around. I do agree that whoever thought that users want the computer and cell phones do the same thing at microsoft is retarded, and dhould be fired.

there seems to be several groups is MSmanagement that need to be severly punished for stupidity of reducing efficiency of the user interface (eg those that removed the keyboard shortcuts for the copy/overwrite dialog) along with the idiots in MS that want everything to behave the same so that they do not have to learn or think (may their door knobs be changed to push in then turn then pull out, then turn back , then push the door to open, then the lock self resets(this might manage to prevent the idiots from actually doing anything with any luck))

Harpo, the NON-subscriber

Cauldyth

on Mar 25, 2015

That is one mind-bogglingly ugly OS.

Philly0381

on Mar 25, 2015

Island Dog

reply 5

Quoting Philly0381,

reply 4

Just had a thought, which doesn't happen often, but what will MS do if folks don't download the free update to Windows 10 and just use what they have, be it 7 or 8.1?

By the way, I'm still running Windows 7, 64 bit, SP1.

They'll just continue using what they have. You aren't being forced to update.

I know I'm not being forced to update, what I was attempting to do is ponder what Microsoft's next step would be if PC users don't upgrade in mass to Windows 10. Gone are the days that folks upgrade just because an upgrade is released.

Jaroepz

on Mar 25, 2015

Wizard1956

reply 3

I won't be using it without Start 10 and WB's (and looking at those icons, I'd say there is a dire need for a nice new, fully up to date release of IconPackager) Please, please make that happen, Brad! Saddest crap I've ever seen. Win 98 icons had more appeal. Come to think of it, so did 98's Start Menu IMHO. MS keeps this up, my Windows 7 install will outlive me.

absolutely agree with Wizard!!

Daiwa

on Mar 25, 2015

They won't be migrating to it much, certainly not en masse, Philly. Not unless there's a major overhaul. Many gamers will go for it because of DX12 but probably not until there are some games which take advantage of it & from what I understand that may take a considerable period of time. Even then, how big is the PC gaming market (I realize Jafo is an entire market unto himself, but I don't think he'll make or break Win10)? Currently, there are more XP desktops than 8/8.1 desktops and Win7's share of desktops grew nearly 50% over the course of 2014.

Jafo

on Mar 25, 2015

Daiwa

reply 21

(I realize Jafo is an entire market unto himself, but I don't think he'll make or break Win10)?

Oh, I can surely break Win10. MS hasn't made an OS I could not break...

RickJP

on Mar 25, 2015

I wonder what the chances of the forum clock showing the right time on window 10 is, as I sit here my watch tells me it is 02:49 but my un edited reply was posted at

03:43 an hour from now and I never felt a thing as I traveled through time.

Daiwa

on Mar 25, 2015

Trolling for Jafo has a 100% success rate.

Major Stress

on Mar 26, 2015

I have no incentive to upgrade to Windows 10 right now. I am running Windows 8.1 (with start8), and windows 10 inside VMWare Workstation 11. So far i am not impressed with Windows 10. While it may be "better" under the hood than Windows 8.1. I don't see any significant improvements for the average user (unless the average user is completely illiterate, and just uses "pictures"). The icons are a mix of both old style windows 7, and the god awful "euro street sign looking" icons. The start panel IMO is useless in its current state with no option to switch it to the classic windows 7 start menu. DX 12 would be the only benefit "if" my laptop supports it.

8.1 came with this laptop, and if i had my way i would downgrade it to Windows 7 pro, but i don't want to blow more money on a win7 disk. The old saying.. If it aint broke, dont fix it. With Start8 i have no issues with windows 8, and if i have an old program i cant run on windows 8 there is always vmware, and windows xp, or 98.

"IF" i do upgrade to windows 10. Then YES i will get Start 10. just because i cant stand that metro wannabe start menu.

admiralWillyWilber

on Mar 26, 2015

Here was the problem with dos vs windows, or real dos mode vs dos being a window. Basically there are more teenagers, and early 20 year olds than there are older people. It is easier to sell to people who haven't used computers very long.

They are telling us what we want. It is easier to convince someone who wants to be like everyone else than someone who knows technology, and wants better even if it means older. Stop telling us what we want, and ask us, also how about asking thr minority who have been around the block. Instead of asking young people who will like it because it looks good with advertising, or only cares that they have what everyone else have. Here's an idea how sbout asking people who have been around who know better technology, and advertise to the ones who will buy anything with advertising. Instead of having backwards priorities.

The issue if better gaming is not a concern untill games come.out for this. It is still to new.

harpo99999

on Mar 26, 2015

and the jafo is not the only master of MS shatter in these forums, and some of us can even manage to re-assemble the shattered windows into a able to function window frame, even if there are a few lines across the view.

I have been breaking MS products since 1980, then getting them to work again afterwards.

Harpo, the NON-subscriber

benmanns

on Mar 26, 2015

If I remove the junk I get this.

Makes me Wonder, you tested the new build of the beta and i have seen you complain about the startmenu before in the previous one, did you report the problem with the startmenu back then?
After you removed all the live apps it stays at the same size. i would´ve reported that problem right away that is part of beeing an insider.
No that is what you are supposed to do, same when we beta test stardock products.
SO my question is did you or did you not, since they seem to have not noticed your previous comment about the issues, while everything else that was reported by the community has been fixed so far.

thejynxed

on Mar 26, 2015

I have the feeling we're going to have to be brave explorers and muck about in the registry directly before this is all said and done, although it would be nice if MS would fix these issues directly.

Am still going to upgrade to Win10 because it's coming to me free of charge, and Win7 is starting to creak for me in some of my more common use cases.

starkers

on Mar 28, 2015

An Irish friend of mine said that he'd read a lot about Win 10's icons and UI being butt ugly to look at.... reckons he especially bought a bottle of 'White-Out' for the bits that he doesn't like.

I tried to tell him about WindowBlinds but he rejected the idea outright cos he'd just bought new curtains and wasn't about to waste money replacing them just yet.

I dunno, you just can't help some people.

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