Windows 10 Start Menu Disaster

[dude]

http://www.howtogeek.com/224805/the-start-menu-should-be-sacred-but-its-still-a-disaster-in-windows-10/

[Merkin]

What a lovely rant!

[Rutabaga]

My computer keeps trying to upgrade from 7 to 10, but my anti-malware tools have blocked it so far.

R

[vwl]

Rutabaga,

I had the same problem until (from a tip) I used the Windows Update feature (either in the Control Panel or by search) rather than the icon. Then it went fine.

[Rutabaga]

Oh, don't misunderstand. I intend to wait. Windows 7 is working just fine and I don't want to change it.

R

[Lugnutz]

Need XP.

[Bruin Fisher]

All the Windows machines I maintain are running Windows 7 and won't be being upgraded to Windows 10 if I have a say in the matter. Windows 7 works.

[Lugnutz]

So, 10 is like ME. A huge CF and useless. Good to know. I'll keep my 8.1. It was top of the line a couple years ago. I still want XP.

[TalonRider]

I get the message that my display isn't compatible and to check with the manufacturer for support. This is for my desktop. I've not checked my laptop yet.

[vwl]

Off the Start Menu, Search box insert 'Windows Update' and then follow the link. Having run Windows 10 in evaluation mode for several months now, I've found it to be very stable -- more so than any of the Windows 8 flavors -- and as good as Windows 7.

[Nick Deverill]

With the exception of the 'start menu', Windows 10 seems reasonable. However, the start menu itself is a joke. Calls your programs 'apps' and cannot be manipulated into nice groups. Not one single 'app' is any use to me, the weather I get from a variety of web sites, or even, by looking out of the window!.

As a result, I'm now using Classic Shell with it and have regained the functionality I need.

[DesDownunder]

Nick, I'm pleased to here that Classic Shell works with Win 10, but I'll wait a while before I switch from my present Win 7.

[colinian]

Doug installed Windows 10 on his desktop when he got the email saying it was ready. No problems at all. He deleted the tiles he didn't want and added tiles for the programs he uses most often. He says it makes finding the programs he wants to run much faster than with Windows 7.

I decided to install it on my laptop. I hadn't received the email saying it was ready, so I Googled "install Windows 10 immediately" and saw a Microsoft website titled "Installing Windows 10 using the media creation tool" which is at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/media-creation-tool-install. It has the step-by-step instructions for creating an installation disk or for upgrading your PC immediately. Since my laptop is new (an HP Spectre x360) and when clicked the Windows 10 upgrade icon reported that there was nothing incompatible, I went ahead with an immediate upgrade. It was painless. Then I made a bunch of changes described in the article "Windows 10: How to Protect Your Privacy" from PC Magazine at www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2489212,00.asp.

The biggest benefits: I like Doug's approach to using the tiles for programs I run all the time. It has a new driver for my HP laser printer that solved a problem with duplexing (printing on both sides of the paper) that printed the back side upside-down. So far no problems.

I then upgraded my desktop PC to Windows 10 with the same results. One thing I've tried and really like is virtual desktops. I can create independent virtual desktops with the programs I use loaded and running. For example, a web development virtual desktop that has Dreamweaver, Bridge, Photoshop, Lightroom, Filezilla, IE Tester, and more. I have another virtual desktop with programs for writing including Word, Excel, Scrivener, Amazon Kindle, Calibre, Adobe Acrobat DC, and more. Each virtual desktop only has the programs I need, and isn't cluttered with all of the other programs that I might have open.

Colin

.

[colinian]

I just read an interesting article by Rob Enderle on TechBuzz, The Best Unsung Features of Windows 10, at www.technewsworld.com/story/82144.html. When I set up my laptop, just playing around, I changed the background on the start screen. When I upgraded my desktop I was a little surprised that it was the same changed background from my laptop. My only mental comment was, "Weird." Seems there's a reason for it being the same. A very good reason. It's explained in the article. Read it and think about it. It turns out to be very cool and very important.

Colin

[TalonRider]

I was finally able to upgrade my laptop. I went to HP looking for help for the Nivada and wound up downloading their downloader assistant. Big mistake! After a few minutes, the desktop would freeze totally. I did finally manage to remove the installed programs and have had no more freezes.

[Alien Son]

Doug installed Windows 10 on his desktop when he got the email saying it was ready. No problems at all. He deleted the tiles he didn't want and added tiles for the programs he uses most often. He says it makes finding the programs he wants to run much faster than with Windows 7.

I decided to install it on my laptop. I hadn't received the email saying it was ready, so I Googled "install Windows 10 immediately" and saw a Microsoft website titled "Installing Windows 10 using the media creation tool" which is at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/media-creation-tool-install. It has the step-by-step instructions for creating an installation disk or for upgrading your PC immediately. Since my laptop is new (an HP Spectre x360) and when clicked the Windows 10 upgrade icon reported that there was nothing incompatible, I went ahead with an immediate upgrade. It was painless. Then I made a bunch of changes described in the article "Windows 10: How to Protect Your Privacy" from PC Magazine at www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2489212,00.asp.

The biggest benefits: I like Doug's approach to using the tiles for programs I run all the time. It has a new driver for my HP laser printer that solved a problem with duplexing (printing on both sides of the paper) that printed the back side upside-down. So far no problems.

I then upgraded my desktop PC to Windows 10 with the same results. One thing I've tried and really like is virtual desktops. I can create independent virtual desktops with the programs I use loaded and running. For example, a web development virtual desktop that has Dreamweaver, Bridge, Photoshop, Lightroom, Filezilla, IE Tester, and more. I have another virtual desktop with programs for writing including Word, Excel, Scrivener, Amazon Kindle, Calibre, Adobe Acrobat DC, and more. Each virtual desktop only has the programs I need, and isn't cluttered with all of the other programs that I might have open.

Colin

Colin, thank you for the link to the media creation tool; being able to download and create an installation disk is a much better way to go.

I've been using the tiles the same way you describe Doug as doing since I upgraded to Windows 8 nearly three years ago. I have them sorted into groups that make sense to me. I can't fathom the amount of opposition to the start screen; I find it much easier to use than the start menu in Windows 7. I actually tried several of the start menu replacement programs in Windows 8 but ditched them all because the start screen was so much better. I much prefer 8 to 7, which I have on my laptop and don't like at all.

John

[Chris James]

I am still stumbling along with Windows 8 which came with this PC some years ago. Since I treat this machine with little attention to the sophistication available in the multiple tasks i see on the desktop that is just fine. To me my PC is just a glorified word processor although my internet visits are mostly to sites like this. But knowing the history of MS I wonder when they will take away Windows 8 and force us to use 10.

[Cole Parker]

Here, here. (Or is that hear, hear?) Computers demand a sophistication I don't wish to take the time or effort to acquire. To me they're a young man's sport, and the sports I enjoyed when young were physical, not intellectual. So I churn out words on mine, and read stories, and leave the more picaresque activities to those who are into their arcane wonders.

C

[Merkin]

I'm with Chris and Cole on this, without shame and with no less admiration for those who are willing to roll up their sleeves and get into it. To me it's sorta like an automobile. When I was a young guy I could change a tire or patch a tube or gap a sparkplug and dry the distributor like most other drivers, but nowadays I'd be a fool to get under the hood of any modern car. The technology has changed so radically that I can read my tire pressures on the dashboard. I'm satisfied to limit myself to pressing the button on my remote keyfob. At least I know how to change the battery for that.

That illustrates the problem I, and many others, experience with modern technology: if we touch it, we usually screw it up. Repair work, much less modification, requires a level of expertise and usually a set of tools and technologies that are almost always out of reach for the ordinary user, who usually lacks the time (to say nothing of the ability) to inform himself fully about the technology at issue. Did you know that the modern refrigerator has a motherboard concealed inside its door whose responsibility is to run the refrigerator? When my icemaker stopped making ice it wasn't a simple matter of defrosting the freezer compartment; it involved a service call, replacement of the motherboard, and a service fee that in earlier times would have made a down payment on a new refrigerator.

That's why I believe it is incumbent upon the developers of any of these technologies to make the user interfaces as foolproof as possible, and provide for a learning curve that fits the needs and the abilities of a majority of its users. It is my understanding that Microsoft has consistently failed its responsibility to do this, and consequently every new advance announced by them is met with deep suspicion and initial pushback. Am I correct in this assessment?

I've got a laptop with Windows 7 on it, and I plan to hang on to that until it is in its deaththroes. My old desktop was equipped with Windows XP, and I miss it every day. After all, I hung onto my last automobile for sixteen years before I risked trading it for something more up-to-date, and it has already suffered two recalls. I'm still dealing with that trauma.

[Lugnutz]

I have and been driving the truck I got in the spring of 2000. It's a 97.

[Rutabaga]

I've actually been using Windows since Windows 1, a little-known initial version of Windows that was shipped with Microsoft's new spreadsheet product, Excel, in the late 1980s, which was the era of DOS 3.1 and 3.3. Windows 1 was a graphical interface that was required for Excel's graphing and display features. Ironically, it was a very compact and fast-running operating system that fit entirely on a single floppy disk for installation. And it ran just fine on the modest 286 machines of the day. But other than this little oasis of graphical interface, PC's used a text-based interface (DOS). Word processing was done on WordPerfect for DOS. If you wanted graphical interface, you went to a Macintosh, which had been introduced in 1984.

So far as I am aware, there never was a Windows 2. Somewhere in the early 90s, Microsoft finally came out with Windows 3, which was fully graphical and was a technological catastrophe. It wasn't until Windows 3.1 came out, containing fixes to the major programs, that anyone could seriously consider using Windows for anything important. Then we had Windows 95, which was a huge improvement over Windows 3.1, and then Windows 98, which was a very modest upgrade, Windows 2000, and so on.

On the business side, companies I was at used Windows 2000 until they upgraded to Windows XP in the 2004-2005 time frame. Windows 7 was the next version after XP that was any good; the intermediate ones had many problems. Windows 7 is much more stable and has fewer security problems than Windows XP, and has been widely adopted in the business world. I am perfectly happy with Windows 7 and am in no rush to change anything. I would not want to go back to XP, especially because it is no longer supported by Microsoft and therefore is highly vulnerable to hacking exploits that will not be fixed by software updates.

I, too, wish that using computers didn't present so many problems for non-technical people. I am responsible for the network and workstations at my church, and it always seems like the people with the least technical expertise (and comfort) are the ones with the most problems, including being lured into clicking on nasty malware installers masquerading as something legitimate. I spend a lot of time cleaning that kind of stuff out of our system and scanning for other malware.

Anyway, I would say to anyone with Windows 7 that they might as well stay with it for the time being. The free upgrade to 10 will be available for a year, and in that time Microsoft will undoubtedly fix a number of things and respond to a number of complaints. There's no reason to be an "early adopter." And I would say to anyone still with Windows XP that if they connect to the internet at any time in any manner, they are being very foolish because major infestations with malware are virtually inevitable.

R

[dude]

I upgraded to Windows 10. If you have Windows 7 or Windows 8.1... wait til Microsoft gets the bugs out of Windows 10/Edge!

Mike

[Cole Parker]

I have Windows 7 and hope I never have to change. XP was the best.

C

[Lugnutz]

I went from XP to 8.1. Only doing this once.

[colinian]

I upgraded to Windows 10. If you have Windows 7 or Windows 8.1... wait til Microsoft gets the bugs out of Windows 10/Edge!

Mike

You don't have to use Edge (I don't). A big problem: password managers like Roboform and LastPass can't be integrated in Edge because there's no SDK yet. IE 11 comes with Windows 10 and is really fast compared to Chrome, Firefox, and Opera. But if you prefer those browsers they work just fine under Windows 10.

Colin