What did you change first?

Just out of curiosity...
... with the ever increasing amount of these types of threads and the escalating amount of 3rd party software to circumvent the issues found in these treads...,

... anybody have any sneaky suspicions that MS may have made some bad decisions on the design and functionality of Windows 11!?!?!?

Edwin said:

anybody have any sneaky suspicions that MS may have made some bad decisions on the design and functionality of Windows 11!?!?!?

Click to expand...

Naah...I don't use any 3rd-party apps to modify anything. One exception though is a script or reg tweak to ensure it will get latest Release Preview patches outside of being registered Insider.

It has always been the same - it happened with every OS change I can recall - and that's a lot

whether its a simple case of "where's my Cheese" or a more logical reset to familiar workflow any changes to the OS in either design or workflow will generate a "need" to change it back, and there will also be those willing and able to sell the tools to achieve the reversions.

Edwin said:

Just out of curiosity...
... with the ever increasing amount of these types of threads and the escalating amount of 3rd party software to circumvent the issues found in these treads...,

... anybody have any sneaky suspicions that MS may have made some bad decisions on the design and functionality of Windows 11!?!?!?

Click to expand...

I suspect the parties that drove the design were not users like us but business and tablet users. I don't have any issues with the new design but there are ways to change it to fit most users needs.
So. in the end all is good

SlicEnDicE said:

Naah...I don't use any 3rd-party apps to modify anything. One exception though is a script or reg tweak to ensure it will get latest Release Preview patches outside of being registered Insider.

Click to expand...

I hear ya!
Some things are a must though!
I'm a design consultant for a half a dozen livestreams wherein I'm editing hundreds, if not, thousands of resources weekly...,
... I cannot let a simple thing like a lackluster right click context menu hamper my productivity flow!

Hazel123 said:

I am still hopping between left taskbar and centre. It doesn’t quite work on the left with that design for me. Better in the centre - except then you’re limited to the number of apps pinned to the taskbar as therun into the right taskbar icons.

Click to expand...

Taskbar on the centre for me, but I also use multiple Desktops. This is a hidden gem. My main Desktop will have my browser, TB mail, Excel, and other apps I am currently using. The second Desktop with have less frequently used apps, like Gravity, iTunes, etc. This allow me to switch faster between open apps using Alt-Tab and only see the apps that are open in the Desktop.

The Taskbar will have all the pinned apps, and any other opened apps for that Desktop. All apps do not operate the same way though. There can be a browser open in each Desktop, but only one TB mail or Gravity app. Knowing this can assist in switching from one Desktop to the other by clicking the icon, as it is slight faster than clicking the Desktop icon and then selecting the required Desktop.

I tried RoundedTB just now. It looks quite nice - but uninstalled it again like I did with Start 11 (uninstalled too). They are bound to get glitched at some point by an update and in the end I just want a stable task bar and menu. I've given up trying to recreate the search icon on the taskbar (which is missing on one machine but it is very old hardware). And just removed the search icon from the taskbar, because I've only just found that you can right click on the start button and select search and shut down from there, without even opening the start menu at all - which is much better. It is wasn't so second rate looking as a right click menu - pale grey - ugh. No design there at all. I am actually hugely disappointed in the basic text and backgrounds for menus - really isn't 21st century.

But - it all works. No problem with the os - just the design which looks like the designer must have been off sick. I almost think I could have done it myself. If Windows 10 was a huge step forwards, this design is an even bigger step backwards. Not as nice as Windows 7. Maybe they were trying to recreate XP but at least that had some colour on it!

Serious gripe here over the lack of colour, the lack of being able to customise - honestly it looks worse than linux.

All we have is a fancy desktop photo (and there are plenty of other good desktop photos around), a task bar as usual, less right click options and an irrelevant start menu.

I would like to keep using it for the updated software but the lack of "look" annoys me so much I'm going back to Windows 10 - which doesn't insult me.

The more I use it, the more the menus annoy me - looks like half of it is missing. As our teenage said when looking at it - it's xxxxt.

So yes I like Windows 11 but hate the lack of design or ability to tweak the design.

One of those is greyed out for me. The other doesn't do much. The only thing that changes any colours is changing theme and then very small details. Maybe it's because it's unsupported hardware? I'll try colour tweaking on the core i7 laptop and see if that's more functional. I'd like something more than grey or black (light or dark) though. Don't like dark mode and the grey is horrible.

I guess I'm missing the colours on the start menu on W10.

I'm keeping it on the netbook though - it's brought that to life.

Same on the core i7 with lovely screen. Second option greyed out. I'd like the right click menu on the task bar to be a bit less grey. Anyone else have that option greyed out? Or is it because it's unsupported hardware - although everything else working ok. "Show accent colour on start and taskbar" is greyed out. So if that works can you change the colour of the task bar?

The first thing I change is to rearrange the app icons on Start to put all my most used ones at the top, manually adding shortcuts to All apps for some obscure ones so that I can pin them to Start.

I actually like having Start centred, I've re-ordered the apps pinned to the taskbar so that my favourite browser Firefox is always front and centre, easy to find and open.

Hazel123 said:

... "Show accent colour on start and taskbar" is greyed out. So if that works can you change the colour of the task bar?

Click to expand...

I would have to say yes!
Do you have anything like "Some settings are managed by your organization" or similar, showing anywhere?

Bree said:

The first thing I change is to rearrange the app icons on Start to put all my most used ones at the top, manually adding shortcuts to All apps for some obscure ones so that I can pin them to Start.

I actually like having Start centred, I've re-ordered the apps pinned to the taskbar so that my favourite browser Firefox is always front and centre, easy to find and open.

Click to expand...

That looks good :) Dark mode definitely looks better - be nice to change dark mode to dark blue though.

Edwin said:

I would have to say yes!
Do you have anything like "Some settings are managed by your organization" or similar, showing anywhere?

Click to expand...

Don't think so. I tried turning everything else on and off on that menu to see if that option became selectable but it didn't (on either laptop).

See..., to me, this is senseless:



Recommended?
What does that mean??? You're recommending that I re-open an app that I've just added and have probably investigated in full...,
... doesn't make a damn bit of sense!!!
Tragic waste of precious, un-expandable, un-customizable real estate!

This explains it

"By default, you can’t set accent colors on the Start menu and taskbar in Windows 10 unless you have your appearance set to dark mode." So light mode is uncustomisable and dark mode is all dark.

So in dark mode I can have a blue start menu and blue task bar. But in light mode everything is washed out grey. But in dark mode absolutely everything is dark! Even google. Something not right there. What about middle mode or colour mode!

And even in dark mode with colours set to on - you open paint and everything is grey - the whole page, no contrasting backgrounds anywhere. The only splash of colour and design is control panel! Because it's from Windows 7.

Edwin said:

Recommended?
What does that mean???

Click to expand...

Poor choice of wording on Microsoft's part, I agree. In practice it means 'your recent installs and/or recently opened documents' (guess that wouldn't fit in the space available though )

Hazel123 said:

Something not right there. What about middle mode....

Click to expand...

My preferred mode is Custom, I like to set my Windows to Dark and apps to Light.

Ok I was wrong There is actually custom mode as explained below. So now I have blue task bar, blue start menu (Windows mode set in dark mode and apps set to light mode) and light web pages. But still have dark style for right click on the menu. Which looks weird next to the blue on the task bar.