Win 11 but system tray/notification area looks like Win 10

Hi All,

I recently got a new laptop, a Lenovo running Windows 11.

One of the first things I noticed was the system tray/notification looking exactly like Win 10, rather than the way Win 11 looks.

Normal Win 11 group: (my battery, sound, network etc are not grouped like this):


Mine looks like this:


It gets weirder.

This is Windows Version (winver):


But this is shown in MS Config:

supermonkey said:

I recently got a new laptop, a Lenovo running Windows 11.
One of the first things I noticed was the system tray/notification looking exactly like Win 10, rather than the way Win 11 looks

It gets weirder.
This is Windows Version (winver).....

Click to expand...

Welcome to Eleven Forum.

Your Winver explains it all, really. The build 22000.9 that it shows is a very early internal development build, never meant to be released outside of Microsoft. In fact it is so old that it pre-dates the very first Insider Preview release of Windows 11, build 22000.51 released back in June 2021.

Announcing the first Insider Preview for Windows 11

There were a few leaked builds around before Microsoft officially acknowledged that it was even going to be called Windows 11. Yes, the Taskbar had not yet been rewritten in those very early builds, it was still using the one from Windows 10. And yes, even in the early Insider builds it still described itself as 'Windows 10' in a few places, such as your System Configuration screenshot.

Where on earth did you get this 'new' laptop from? And who installed Windows 11 on it?

Many thanks for your reply.

What a Wally I am - I looked at the version 21H2 and hadn’t checked the build.

This was bought direct from Lenovo. It’s really strange then that this version is installed.

I’ve barely used the machine (havnt even run any updates yet) but doesn’t appear buggy or anything. And I like that it’s retained the win 10 features. We’ll, I’ll probably update it and lose it all now. Had I done that on day 1 I wouldn’t even be asking this question

supermonkey said:

We’ll, I’ll probably update it and lose it all now. Had I done that on day 1 I wouldn’t even be asking this question

Click to expand...

Yes, if it manages to update through Windows Update then you'll be on build 22000.675 with all the latest W11 taskbar and features baked in. With a build that early in the development cycle there's no guarantee that Windows Update is fully functional though. You may need to download the current ISO and do an in-place upgrade.

Before you do anything like that, you might like to make a recovery drive usb including system files for this build. That will make a usb that could clean install your 22000.9 on another machine (or in a VM) to play with it later.

supermonkey said:

This was bought direct from Lenovo. It’s really strange then that this version is installed.

Click to expand...

If you bought this as a brand new machine direct from Lenovo, then I would contact them directly and ask for then to look into how on earth this happened. They may offer to replace it under warranty.

Tjanks

Do u think there is any need to replace it?

supermonkey said:

Do u think there is any need to replace it?

Click to expand...

Depends on how it ended up in this state. If it just had this early build installed at the factory then probably not, but if you somehow were sent an early prototype machine by mistake, then maybe yes. Best to ask Lenovo Support for their advice on this.

👍🏻

I’ve now had a response from Lenovo and it’s simply to run windows update.

This is fine, but my concern is that they’ve not actually investigated and are simply fobbing me off without checking.

Assuming the update is successful, would you have any further concerns?

I’m not sure how far to push the issue.

supermonkey said:

Assuming the update is successful, would you have any further concerns?

Click to expand...

Assuming it is successful, then no - you should be fully up to date and running build 22000.675.

Slowly getting htere, more updates to do!

Looks like it's finally there now!

supermonkey said:

Looks like it's finally there now!

Click to expand...

Congratulations. You are now fully up to date and can relax.

Bree said:

Congratulations. You are now fully up to date and can relax.

Click to expand...

I would still be rather annoyed - I reckon this is a refurbished PC, or old stock used in house.

Passing it of as brand new is decidely dodgy in my opinion, and I reckon this contravenes UK trades description laws i.e passing off a used device as new.

cereberus said:

I reckon this is a refurbished PC, or old stock used in house.

Click to expand...

I'm not so sure. I've been researching this 22000.9 build, and it appears to be the first one released to manufacturers for installing on new machines. I'm finding reports of it being installed on a number of different new purchases....


...including ones from Microsoft. (Scroll down to the comments section)

I recently purchased a new Surface Go 3 and it was stuck on build 22000.9 of Windows 11...

Click to expand...

Quick update to this thread, I’ve received the following response:

checking with RD in plant, 22000.9 is version of RTM (Release to Manufacturing), MS webpage released version is updated monthly with 2-3 times with different naming.

Click to expand...

22000.9 version is not pre-production version and it can be upgraded to MS webpage released version.

Click to expand...

So it doesn’t seem like there are any concerns here thank fully!

supermonkey said:

So it doesn’t seem like there are any concerns here thank fully!

Click to expand...

No concerns at all.

The reply you received confirmed what I was beginning to suspect in post #15 - that 22000.9 was the RTM given to manufacturers.