Things that Microsoft possibly wants to address with Windows 11.

hader · Apr 7, 2026

An interesting video from CyberCPU about some things MS want to address....

- Retract Co-Pilot functionality and less AI.
- Turning off the Recall option *when installed*
- Introducing a moveable taskbar.
- No more mandatory MS-account. (possibly...)
- Reducing Windows space and memory by 20%.
- No more automatic updates but whenever you want.
- A start menu redesign. (UI3) Needs a slight rewrite of Winhance, Start all back, Winhawk too because of changes to Windows internal "Hooks". Some already did.

All because of complaints and slow decline of users using Windows or... They are waking up... It's about time.

Microsoft is exploring major changes to Windows 11, including a shift away from heavy AI integration and bringing back older, requested features.
Discover how these updates aim to improve system reliability and user control over updates.

Mark K · Apr 7, 2026

hader said:
An interesting video from CyberCPU about some things MS want to address....

- Retract Co-Pilot functionality and less AI.
- Turning off the Recall option *when installed*
- Introducing a moveable taskbar.
- No more mandatory MS-account. (possibly...)

If Microsoft actually does these changes, this would be great. All of these changes I have read in various news articles many times, just hope it is true.

hader said:
- Reducing Windows space and memory by 20%.

Reducing AI and disabling certain services within Windows 11 now can save you more memory. However, you have to always re-apply these changes after updates are installed.

hader said:
- No more automatic updates but whenever you want.

What I read is that you can delay Feature Updates, but Security Updates will install as normal.

hader said:
- A start menu redesign. (UI3) Needs a slight rewrite of Winhance, Start all back, Winhawk too because of changes to Windows internal "Hooks". Some already did.

Whatever they do or change, it has to get better.

hader said:
All because of complaints and slow decline of users using Windows or... They are waking up... It's about time.

Big drop in market share and big loss in stock value made them change. Microsoft simply does not care about users, just for now because they are losing money. Once this gets corrected, if it does, Microsoft will fade back to its non-user experience ways.

FrancoDT · Apr 7, 2026

Well, I'm already planning on having to use the new default native Windows for a time while all the 3rd party customization apps play catch-up. I'm primarily using Windhawk mods currently.

andrew129260 · Apr 7, 2026

Mark K said:
What I read is that you can delay Feature Updates, but Security Updates will install as normal.

Good, people should not be able to hold off on security ones. It makes protection weaker for everyone.

hader · Apr 7, 2026

andrew129260 said:
Good, people should not be able to hold off on security ones. It makes protection weaker for everyone.

Yes. But I have seen many people that want to defer update longer for some reasons.

But I agree. With security in mind it is better to keep your system up-to-date security-wise. We can see the consequence already at commercial company's. Want to reduce costs and does not apply security updates on a regular basis. They found out the hard way of the consequences; A hacker broke in making use of a zero-day exploit and stole data. Recently it happend at a Telecom provider in our country. Hackers demanded Bitcoins. They refused to pay. They sold the data on Telegram as a reponse.... Bye-bye reputation....

I must be also realistic; Hackers are not interested in people with a Windows 11 PC. But scammers do. Installing a bot that by a C&C center sends spammail to everybody over the world from your PC. Misusing our resources thus. Although rare I came across one a couple of years back....

I think this option is a good thing. But... It places also the responsibility for it in our hands. So if you do this? Don't start complaining at Microsoft.... Anyone who does not have a deeper understanding what this means: Hands-off the regular updates. Security-updates are fixing holes inside Windows programs that needs to be plugged. If you not delay these security updates (but do so with builds) and it is intended to fix an issue into a build you don't have? It then must say; not for your build rather to break off with some illusive error code....

hader · Apr 7, 2026

FrancoDT said:
Well, I'm already planning on having to use the new default native Windows for a time while all the 3rd party customization apps play catch-up. I'm primarily using Windhawk mods currently.

I am using it too. Tried other products but found this one more to my liking. Flexible also. Concerning catching-up; I think that they are already aware of this change and adapting for it because an other product already had made these changes. Is not that complicated. If build lower than this, look here else look there.

cereberus · Apr 7, 2026

I just saw a pink elephant fly by at the suggestions

Critical Mass · Apr 7, 2026

Give us the ability to switch off Efficiency Mode system wide easily.

rk911 · Apr 7, 2026

Mark K said:
What I read is that you can delay Feature Updates, but Security Updates will install as normal.

That feature is available now from Gibson Researh's InControl tool.
InControl

Steve C · Apr 8, 2026

This is a late April 1st post

PhilB · Apr 12, 2026

Mark K said:
Big drop in market share and big loss in stock value made them change.

What drop in market share? Of what market(s)? Who gained market share as a result

Mark K said:
Microsoft simply does not care about users, just for now because they are losing money.

Uh, this quarterly earnings report shows lots of profit FY26 Q2 - Press Releases - Investor Relations - Microsoft

Mark K · Apr 12, 2026

x509 said:
What drop in market share? Of what market(s)? Who gained market share as a result

Microsoft's Windows market share was in the 90% area for some time. Around October 2018 shows 80% and gradual decline with some ups-n-downs:

Mark K · Apr 12, 2026

hader said:
An interesting video from CyberCPU about some things MS want to address....

- Reducing Windows space and memory by 20%.

In the past I never had to look at the amount of memory in Windows to find out anything. Windows 11 changed that behavior. Someone asked me what the memory difference is between Windows 11 and Linux. I been comparing the memory usage differences in Linux and they are the same as I have used different distros (ArchLinux, CachyOS, Fedora, and Linux Mint). Now when memory consumption between Linux and Windows 11, there is a big difference.

On the Dell laptop running Windows 11 Pro with 32GB memory, the average after a restart of Windows 11 is between 13GB to 14.5GB:

Additional software installed from after installing Windows 11 (excluding default install software):
Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, LibreOffice, Bleachbit, and RustDesk.
Services WSAIFabricSvc and SysMain are enabled in Windows 11.

When I disable WSAIFabricSvc and SysMain services, Windows 11 is around 7.5GB-8.2GB memory usage:

With Linux (ArchLinux, CachyOS, Fedora, and Linux Mint) the memory usage is considerably difference and memory usage is far less with using the same programs/apps in Linux:

The Dell laptop running Linux has 16GB DDR4 memory, which still runs Windows 11 Pro, and Linux after restart uses 1.6GB of memory. With all the programs opened (Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, LibreOffice, text editors, screen shots utilities) Linux uses around 8GB to 12GB of memory.

If Microsoft would make Windows 11 run like Windows 7, Windows would be a much better and faster operating system.

Remember back in Windows 7 when 8GB memory was a lot and you could run many programs within 8GB.

Just my observation.

CarlSD · Apr 12, 2026

I still don't know why these YouTube videos about all the problems with Windows 11 nearly always show Bill Gates?

"Bill Gates Furious About The Big Drop In Windows 11 Users" was one I saw recently. And there's many, many more similar YouTube titles.

As far as I know, Bill Gates has had nothing to do with the day to day business of Microsoft and Windows for a long time now.

Perhaps they need to start using images of a furious Satya Nadella instead?

Mark K · Apr 12, 2026

CarlSD said:
I still don't know why these YouTube videos about all the problems with Windows 11 nearly always show Bill Gates?

Clickbait videos.

idgat · Apr 12, 2026

I doubt whether Microsoft want to address any of these issues, at all

On the other hand, it's more like some users would want Microsoft to address these issues

Mark K · Apr 12, 2026

idgat said:
I doubt whether Microsoft want to address any of these issues, at all

On the other hand, it's more like some users would want Microsoft to address these issues

After what I heard about Windows 11 changes, nothing much is getting changed. Just a bunch of rebranding and renaming (or just hide the Copilot icon in apps). Renaming already existing AI/Copilot features is not correcting anything. The next several "feature" updates are not going to be much real improvement.

PhilB · Apr 12, 2026

CarlSD said:
Perhaps they need to start using images of a furious Satya Nadella instead?

Steve Ballmer?

PhilB · Apr 12, 2026

Mark K said:
Microsoft's Windows market share was in the 90% area for some time. Around October 2018 shows 80% and gradual decline with some ups-n-downs:

View attachment 168572

If I were Microsoft, I would be most worried about market share lost to OS X and iOS. I'm going to hazard the guess that most Linux desktops are used by developers who don't see Windows as a viable alternative. OS X and iOS users are definitely users that Microsoft has lost, and would want back.

glasskuter · Apr 13, 2026

Ms should be afraid of Linux.,Microsoft tends to forget how many users fall into being a "Not Gamer" and "Not Power User". They don't want and don't need all the bells & whistles that MS thinks we need. A large percentage of everyday people use a computer for casual purposes, email, browsing, etc. Add that to the fact that people either don't want to get rid of their old hardware or can't afford to. Many Linux Distros can run very well on old hardware and can do anything these forgotten users require, and do it damned well with very little learning curve.

I've been playing around with Mint Cinnamon on an old, underpowered machine and am loving it. I think Ubuntu would work for me just as well. Yeah, I have 4 Windows 11 PCs in this house, but I truly think I could say goodbye to Windows in a heartbeat and never look back.

Things that Microsoft possibly wants to address with Windows 11.

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