Latest Windows 10 Preview Build Brings Slew of Enhancements

Deathspawner writes: Following its huge Windows 10 event last Wednesday, Microsoft released a brand-new preview build to the public, versioned 9926. We were told that it'd give us Cortana, Microsoft's AI assistant, as well as a revamped Start menu and updated notifications pane. But as it turns out, that's not even close to summing up all that's new with this build. In fact, 9926 is easily the most substantial update rolled out so far in the beta program, with some UI elements and integral Windows features seeing their first overhaul in multiple generations.

Comments

Change for change's sake

[rossdee]

Because people have been using largely the same UI for the last 19 years, and are used to it. Thats a good enough reason the screw it up isn't it.

Re:Change for change's sake

[SeaFox]

Because people have been using largely the same UI for the last 19 years, and are used to it. Thats a good enough reason the screw it up isn't it.

It is for Microsoft. If they don't make a new Windows release visually different in some significant way most people will see no reason to upgrade, which will make the product a commercial failure (or at least, not enough of a success to make Wall Street happy). Now, it's true, if Microsoft were do make a new version of Windows significantly faster performing and more secure then they might get a bunch of people on board even if it had the same interface as before, adding shiny to software is much less work than actually improving the product itself.

Ugly as it can be?

[cpotoso]

Ugly as it can be? All decoration gone? Why does everybody have to copy Apple? I understand copying when it is beautiful, but apple is now engaged in making computer graphics look like an X11 system from the 1980s and everybody else is following suit. Awful... truly awful.

Re:Ugly as it can be?

[Dutch Gun]

Sigh... I absolutely agree about the conclusion. But it's a stretch to say this trend is copying Apple. Windows 8 came out long before Apple's new "flat" look came out, unless I'm aware of a trend that started before that in the Apple camp.

Seriously, though, I'm already completely sick of this "flat, clean, simple" trend. But more importantly, the usability is often worse, sacrificed on the alter of the new aesthetic. In the new design language, button borders are uncool, so they've simply done away with them in many cases, and don't offer any indications of what you can click, or where clickable regions are. Windows 8 was particularly bad with this, so we'll see if Windows 10 does any better, despite using the same basic theme. I understand that aesthetics are important, but they should always, always, always take a back seat to functionality and usability.

With any luck, after a few years, when everyone else gets sick of flat, uninspired graphics, someone will create a new, "retro" look and start adding some bevels, gradients, gloss, and transparency back into the UI.

Have some!

[Sir_Substance]

I see the ~cloud~ is mandatory again.

The ability to remove skydrive has vanished since the previous, despite being the most requested feature on the feedback app, and cortana is now stapled to your startbar, taking up 50% of the space with no apparent way to remove it.

Creating a local account rather than logging in with a microsoft account has been made more confusing by making the UI components for creating a new microsoft account bigger, so that the "log in without a microsoft account" button is pushed off the bottom of the page. Microsoft really wants your grandmother confused and scared so she makes an account without understanding what she's doing.

God, what drivel ...

[gstoddart]

We were told that it'd give us Cortana, Microsoft's AI assistant

OK, I'll preface this with a "get off my lawn" to get it out of the way.

But I have to say, I have precisely zero interest in this. The more I read TFA, the more I cringe.

After setting Cortana up, which involves telling her your name, and adjusting some other minor settings, sheâ(TM)ll be good to go. If the respective option is enabled, sheâ(TM)ll always listen out for âoeHey, Cortanaâ, at which point your question can be asked. In the example below, I asked, âoeHey, Cortana. Could you please show me the weather?â, at which point she queried the Internet and spit back the accurate info â" without me having to state a specific location.

Talking to Cortana is finicky at best. After stating âoeHey, Cortanaâ, Iâ(TM)ve found that Iâ(TM)ve either had to keep talking right away to be heard, or have her say, âoeHey, Robâ and then me have to click the microphone icon again to speak. It seems some thresholds need to be adjusted, because in the current implementation, itâ(TM)s easier to avoid potential hassle and just go find such information online.

I don't want my fucking computer to feel like it's on a first name basis with me. I don't want to talk to it. I don't want my computer constantly listening to and parsing everything I say. I sure as shit don't want that crap integrated with an ad platform.

If I want to see the weather, I'll go to the tab I keep open with the weather.

This is a bunch of dreck I can't see myself wanting to use, which is mostly a "make pretend" version of AI which is at best a shortcut to search. I don't see the value in voice commands -- in fact, I see great nuisance in it (like in Offices, or just everywhere).

This sounds like an OS which is heavily focused on "teh social" integration with XBox, with the new lame-ass crayon interfaces Microsoft seems partial to, and a bunch of dorky features which seem like they're trying too damned hard.

I don't see any of these features being useful, I see them as being pointless eye candy, which is full of gimmicks I don't see myself using in the long run -- in fact, I see me disabling as many as possible.

I'm afraid Microsoft's "vision of the future" is a glimpse into hell. At least half of those features sound like shit which will slow down the machine and add zero benefit.

Now, seriously, get the fuck off my damned lawn.

Re:God, what drivel ...

[jones_supa]

You can disable her.

But why get an OS of which you have to disable half of the features? I don't want Modern UI, I don't want to send information to Microsoft to help to improve my computing experience, I don't want a Windows Live Account, I don't want SkyDrive, I don't want Cortana.

Me no want anything! Waaah!

Not the review I wanted.

[Anonymous Coward]

What I want to know about is performance. I don't care about the changes in explorer, taskbar, or start menu. I don't need them I use Directory Opus.

Here is what I'd like to know about.

CPU Usage of system processes 7/8 vs 10
Memory usage 7/8 vs 10
Services performance 7/8 vs 10
Load times
Thread performance/handling/optimization
Memory leaks
Page file performance
Virtual memory management upgrades?
Indexing performance

I feel like I visited an art gallery, but instead of talking about the pictures they talk about the plumbing. Well in reverse at least O_o..

Wow so negative here

[Billly Gates]

Yes this is a Linux oriented site yada yada.

But why so strong resistance to change on a technology site of all places? Does anyone else find this weird? Never in my wildest dreams would I picture slashdot turn into +5 comments with "CHANGE FOR THE SAKE OF CHANGE etc" I ask because I am curious and wonder if I am alone? You would not expect to see comments in a fashion oriented blog like "NEW LOOK FOR THE SAKE OF NEW LOOKS" be posted as an example.

It kind of saddens me a little bit as we computer geeks came here because we love technology and like to have new new things. Now that is uncool and I have seen it become more prevalent in other articles. Is it age or just scarred from experience?

What happened?

Anyway my unbiased 2 cents ...

I think this would be a good upgrade for a notebook or tablet. Much improved battery life and the ability to run Netflix and Hulu on the road is really cool. As long as the applets are not like Windows 8 and I can do work too I am fine if they can integrate.

For the desktop? I see little reason to upgrade. Windows 7 works fine. However for those reading my previous paragraphs I do not hate 10. I just think it offers little value besides enhanced security over 7. I probably will upgrade next fall after it stabilizes since the upgrade is free.Now if I bought a new computer with it on it I would not downgrade it. Can't say the same with Windows 8.1 though :-)

On my i7 4770k I have to say I find it faster and more responsive than 7. It was surprisingly stable with just 1 bug with nvidia if I do the dual screen 4k hack to stretch it. A MUST if you already ahve 8.

It is nice modest upgrade for desktop users and a BIG upgrade for mobile users.

Re:Wow so negative here

[Sir_Substance]

The problem is with the PC being turned into a toy out of the box, making peoples lives hard in the process.

The thing to remember is that your operating system is actually not made for the end user. It is made for the developer, and it lets developers do useful things like pretend a USB drive is exactly the same as a network share magnetic drive.

What you see on the desktop isn't the OS, it's a graphical file manager. That's useful, I'm happy to have that preinstalled. I'll take a browser as well, so I can use it to bootstrap to the browser I want to use and then remove it.

The problem is that now I also have to take a voice assistant and a cloud sync drive and weather and finance apps and a media player and this and that and the other. Half of them can no longer be uninstalled. The rest I have to spend 15 minutes removing before I can download the browser, media player and p2p sync tool I use.

A lot of people here are sysadmins, which means they are responsible for securing corporate or government information. It isn't possible to uninstall skydrive or cortana, which means these people cannot guarantee that the PC isn't listening to everything in a cabinet meeting, and cannot guarantee it isn't sending every document offsite. The capability to do so lurks in the operating system itself, like an uninvited friend of a friend who can't take a hint.

Re:Wow so negative here

[serviscope_minor]

What happened?

I'm guessing that people got fed up with churn and started to realise that change for its own sake is annoying. Getting irritated at having to get used to a new system AGAIN that does things worse in many cases is not unreasonable. Being fed up with churn is not the same as fearing change.

Personally, I like to see "change" actually make things better, because if it doesn't then why bother with the change? And if it makes things worse, then WTF?

A lot is just uninspiring and meh. Going from flat to bevelled to bulbousd and back to flat (hello Athena!) user interface elements is just a huge meh. I mean sure, now they're coloured and antialiased and with nice fonts and whetever, but I really can't feel myself getting excited about "flat" design. Actually, personally I think it's a bit of a usability regression becase it's harder to explain to people which the active user interface elements are.

Change where it's an improvement I like. I like large, high res screens. I like running a modern kernel with all the new power saving features and better, newer filesystems and so on and so forth. I tend to run recentl builds of tools I like like vim and mplayer because the changes make them better than the old version. I keep promising myself I'll finally switch from Xterm to Terminology, but I can't get some of the features to work properly at the moment.

All those things, all those changes have made stuff better. On the other hand, I still run FVWM2. I've tried more modern things, but they all seem to make things worse in interesting ways. I've still adopted some changes, however which make it more modern.

I think there are quite a few people here with similar opinions to me. Another example: the reason that tablet stuff coming to laptops is bad is because a lot of the UI stuff is designed around single, non cooperating, full screen apps. I don't want that, not because I fear change, it's because I changed AWAY from it in the 90s and I have no desire to go back to the bad old days. I remember what it was like all too well (and my phone just keeps on reminding me). What I fear is being dragged back to something I know from experience is inferior.