So, who's planing on upgrading to / skipping Win11 and why?

I've never realy loved a windows version since 7, and I have to admit that I was surprised by the anouncement of Win11, but from what I've seen, I'm not convinced. The more I look at it, the more I'm likely to stick to my (currently modded wo within an inch of its life) Win10 setups on my laptop and desktop, I just don't see any must have feature in Win11 that makes me want to jump over. And now I'm wondering, am I just getting old, or is microsoft who's becoming misguided, which is why I'm asking my fellow tech-heads what's their thoughts on and plans for Win11?

I'm skipping.

Why?

a) most of my machines aren't even 'compatible'
b) even if they were, I'm not seeing any convincing reason why I need to upgrade, and
c) there are several things, not least the taskbar being locked to the screen bottom, that I really don't like.

So for me, reasons to skip > reasons to upgrade. For other people? YMMV.

I will skip it on my desktop machine, because, at over 10 years old, its not compatible, and i have no intention of buying a new one just for Windows 11.

Laptop, that i sometimes use when away from home, maybe, dunno, cant remember if its compatible or not tbh.

Well, I popped on here today to see what the general reception to 11 was like - and also to see if there was anything I'm missing.

Have been busy as hell the last few months, so no time to look at an Insider build, and finally got the release installed on a spare hard disk a couple of days ago.

First pleasant surprise is that it installs and runs perfectly on my old (Z170) Maximus VIII Hero/8700K box without any jailbreaks or compatibility overrides. But...

As things stand at least, it's not replacing my main W10 build. The dealbreakers for me are the utterly useless and counterproductive new Start Menu, Taskbar and Explorer behaviour. And, in addition, it feels sluggish compared with 10 -although at this stage I have no idea how much of that is down to running it on a spare (albeit fast) rotating hard disk rather than an SSD. The Settings is.. well, the whole thing is a real mishmash of 'modern' style - but with the classic Control Panel applets still popping out here and there, looking totally incongruous.

Have been able to get OpenShell running - but there are incongruities - like Classic Start Menu launching from the Windows key, but not from clicking the Start button.

Whole thing has the feel of an incompletely and inadequately tested Service Pack rather than a 'new' OS, and reminds me of the mistakes made with Windows 8 - quite a few of which seem to be repeating now.

Will have another go at getting the UI components running the way I want them without glitches, but as things stand, distinctly unimpressed.

Not changing over for a while. I game a lot and have an AMD chip and there are problems with both. I'm not having any problems with 10 at the moment so I can wait a while yet.

Upgraded my Vivobook, no problems with the upgrade, the start menu thing is a bit naff but other than that were no issues. Was a completely empty laptop with a fresh install of Windows 10 so didn't have anything to lose

It's interesting to see that this thread's collective response seems to be "not touching it" or "tried it and its naff" - particularly given we are all techies, who ought to be excited about new bleeding edge stuff... Looks like microsoft need to go re-evaluate their life.

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Originally Posted by Richh

Well, I popped on here today to see what the general reception to 11 was like - and also to see if there was anything I'm missing.

Have been busy as hell the last few months, so no time to look at an Insider build, and finally got the release installed on a spare hard disk a couple of days ago.

First pleasant surprise is that it installs and runs perfectly on my old (Z170) Maximus VIII Hero/8700K box without any jailbreaks or compatibility overrides. But...

As things stand at least, it's not replacing my main W10 build. The dealbreakers for me are the utterly useless and counterproductive new Start Menu, Taskbar and Explorer behaviour. And, in addition, it feels sluggish compared with 10 -although at this stage I have no idea how much of that is down to running it on a spare (albeit fast) rotating hard disk rather than an SSD. The Settings is.. well, the whole thing is a real mishmash of 'modern' style - but with the classic Control Panel applets still popping out here and there, looking totally incongruous.

Have been able to get OpenShell running - but there are incongruities - like Classic Start Menu launching from the Windows key, but not from clicking the Start button.

Whole thing has the feel of an incompletely and inadequately tested Service Pack rather than a 'new' OS, and reminds me of the mistakes made with Windows 8 - quite a few of which seem to be repeating now.

Will have another go at getting the UI components running the way I want them without glitches, but as things stand, distinctly unimpressed.

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I was reading this article, and the guy was having issues with openshell on windows 11, and made a workaround by making a custom icon that is a 99% transparent PNG in paint.net, then this overlays the standard w11 icon that peeks under the classicshell start menu icon. Details can be found here:
https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/...pen-shell.html

I’d love to try it but I don’t think any of the household laptops or desktop meet the min spec so will have to wait and see if MS ever launch a W11 pauper edition

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Originally Posted by Jay-Bruce

It's interesting to see that this thread's collective response seems to be "not touching it" or "tried it and its naff" - particularly given we are all techies, who ought to be excited about new bleeding edge stuff... Looks like microsoft need to go re-evaluate their life.

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The "problem" is that, as techies, we get excited about actual new things, not pointless and unnecessary reskinning efforts.

Windows 2000, as far as i am concerned, was the last time the UI was most functional, with least unnecessary graphical crap.
Since then, its all been about "improving" the customer experience, and that has been firmly aimed at non-computer users.

I've no current plans to do so. If I do, it'll probably be when Win10 goes EOL (I didn't even move on to 10 until 7 went EOL).

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Originally Posted by BobF64

The "problem" is that, as techies, we get excited about actual new things, not pointless and unnecessary reskinning efforts.

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Exactly. To me, Win11 just seems to be Microsoft's second go at doing what they tried to do with 8, namely make it more like a tablet OS for everyone despite it not being the suitable route for PC users.

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Originally Posted by BobF64

The "problem" is that, as techies, we get excited about actual new things, not pointless and unnecessary reskinning efforts.

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It's not only that but something i listened to the other day reminded me of how half arsed their pointless and unnecessary reskinning efforts are - The 'new' settings app, they've been working on that for almost 10 years and it's still half baked.

New bleeding edge stuff is great and all but when it's done badly or left half finished it just feels like a kick in the teeth, it just feels like they're releasing shiny new stuff because they know people will focus on that rather than the mess they've left behind.

Windows Settings are a mess because somebody in MS refuses to let go of Control Panel

I wish it was that simple but i suspect it's not just because somebody in MS refuses to let go of Control Panel, it's a cultral thing within MS IMO as you see the same thing loads of Windows things. Take the CLI, Command Prompt, for example. Instead of making it better they came up with PowerShell but because PowerShell doesn't do everything cmd.exe can do they now have two CLI's and because switching between the two is awkward they come up with yet another program in an attempt to make it easier.

The same happened with NTFS, instead of making it better they created ReFs but ReFs is missing loads of the feature of NTFS, heck you can't even boot from it.

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Originally Posted by IAmATeaf

Windows Settings are a mess because somebody in MS refuses to let go of Control Panel

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But why do they?

Maybe because completely replacing how all that stuff is done is fine for the technically more literate users, but for those (and I know a few) that still haven't quite mastered actually scheduling a recording on their VCR (and yeah, I am serious about that) they've spent years working out how to do the basics with control panel and then, wham, it's all changed.

More seriously, lots of business users can do what they need to for their jobs, but change that and lots of staff retraining follows, as do complaints from such users.

Yet, if you enable both systems, you now have to maintain both and end up with an OS with a split personality.

They are a bit between a rock and a hard place, perhaps just evaluating the relative size and importance of which group to annoy least.

I'm rather comfy up on the fence for now.

... but then I'm typing this in the comfort of my work Linux environment, and Windows is just for launching games. So I'll need that AMD performance loss fixed before I adopt it, but I'm sure I'll move over at some point.

Right now I'm more miffed that my Linux KDE setup has lost its wobbly windows. I liked wobbly windows, but it looks like they didn't have an active maintainer so with Fedora 34 they went. It's not just Windows that can disappoint :(

I\'ll be dabbling here and there on it earlier than I would normally. Unfortunately because it\'s now effectively Windows 10+ it\'s easy for machines to auto upgrade so I can envisage the incoming support calls when things no longer work.

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Originally Posted by Output

Exactly. To me, Win11 just seems to be Microsoft's second go at doing what they tried to do with 8, namely make it more like a tablet OS for everyone despite it not being the suitable route for PC users.

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Indeed, the 8.1 to the 8.0...so 10.1 would have been far more suitable than 11.

Weirdest part is that the actual OS version reported is 10.0 and the build number.

@Jay-Bruce, thanks for that link. The latest nightly of OpenShell seems to sort that problem natively. :)

So I've got what feels like a functional platform via OpenShell and Valentin-Gabriel Radu's ExplorerPatcher. Back to my heavily customised 7+ style Start Menu and 10 style taskbar and Explorer. And about the biggest nitpick so far is is that the taskbar clock doesn't show seconds.

Have bumped into a couple of errors opening projects in Access which I'm guessing are down to missing references, but other than that it's a lot more functional now than my initial impression.The sluggishness opening apps and explorer windows seems to have sorted itself too - if anything it feels slightly snappier than my Win10, despite, as above, running on a spinning HDD vs NVMe SSD.

It's actually at a point where I'm starting to think about rebuilding my prime install on 11. Need to do some more compatibility checking first tho.

So, edited to add, have been living with it 48 hours now, and all my development environments, programmers and various other bits of 'niche' software and hardware all work fine. Unsigned drivers can be installed via the old technique of restarting with signature enforcement disabled. And it definitely does feel slightly snappier than my 10 build now - so will hopefully be even better once on an SSD.

An annoying habit for tray icons to randomly disappear seems (touch wood) to have been fixed by disabling the 'control centre' tray icon and replacing it with the 10 style separate volume and Action Centre ones, if that helps anyone else.

Probably not surprising that everything seems to run on it, given that it seems basically little more than a reskin of 10. Will be interesting to see what difference the supposed changes to the scheduler make to Alder Lake when it finally turns up.

If anyone is reading this looking for a recommendation, if your system runs fine with 10, unless (for some reason) you like the visual elements, probably just as well to stick as you are. My 10 install hasn't been refreshed in 4 years (partly because it's been running well) so will probably take the plunge and rebuild on 11, now I know it can be made to look work like I want without any downsides. :rolleyes:

Turned my rig on this morning and was offered and but declined for now till they sort it out.

After I saw how it's working with Ryzen CPU-s I wont upgrade for a long time.

@Richh I'm glad that link was helpful, the rest of your post got me thinking...

...but were I able to get something looking like windows 7 aero running on one OS, but not the other, that could swing me onto that OS. Hmm.. Aero on 10? Theres another thread.

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Originally Posted by leopolt

After I saw how it's working with Ryzen CPU-s I wont upgrade for a long time.

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Allegedly, there's quite a bit of effort (admittedly, far too late) going into fixing that. I'd expect patches sooner rather than later, though it will depend on how easy that is to address.

I still don't plan on upgrading, though not for that reason, at least, once that patch appears. It is a definite MS-Oopsie though, innit? :D

I don't understand people who want things like Windows to install on release. Everyone knows that it will have a lot of bugs

Anyone know where to get a genuine, legit digital license cheaper than Microsoft are asking, please?

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Originally Posted by wazzickle

Anyone know where to get a genuine, legit digital license cheaper than Microsoft are asking, please?

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All genuine licenses are provided only by MS or official partners which won't likely be any cheaper since MS don't let them be. Sites claiming otherwise are usually dodgy and since several Hexus users have been burned by suggestions in the past we won't allow recommendations/discussion about non-official partner sites going forwards.

So please, no further discussion on this - PM me if you have questions.

For those of us who have taken the plunge (and have Ryzen CPUs) the two performance fixes are available now - one is KB5006746, via Windows Update. The other is AMD chipset driver 3.10.08.506

going linux I think, only fusion 360 is my slight worry. Will continue to use Win10 for my gaming machine until valve get SteamOS to within 95% in most games then ill switch that. As for windows 11, not interested unless it really has some killer feature I can't do without.

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Originally Posted by j1979

going linux I think, only fusion 360 is my slight worry.

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I often run Fusion in a Windows 10 VM on my Linux box.

It chugs a bit, and occasionally complains about lack of 3D performance, but for knocking out a quick part it is OK. It is probably the only task I will dual boot into Windows for if I am spending a lot of time on there.

I'll be upgrading likely 2023. That'll give it enough time to have all the kinks worked out definitely, and for any programs I use to fully support it.

I personally don't actually see a need for the upgrade. Most of the newer additions don't affect me in a large way, except maybe the Window Snapping options. Other than that I don't plan on using Android apps, I don't use any external device as a display, and I don't much care for the new Start Menu.

Hell, I even have my Quick Launch icons centered on Windows 10.

I was setting up a black friday laptop my sister-in-law bought for my nephew's xmas and it was nagging us to update to windows 11 on every damned reboot, so I installed a copy on a spare SSD on my main PC and had a play with it. It's surprisingly light on its feet, got a couple of nice touches, and a couple of klangers. The main klangers are the dumbed down ui, but I found a registry tweak to resurrect the ribbon in explorer, grabbed an alternative start menu. I've got three choices in my boot menu, windows 7, windows 10 and default is windows 11, 7 is still the warm fuzzy nostalgic favourite, but 11 is now the daily OS.

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Originally Posted by j1979

going linux I think, only fusion 360 is my slight worry. Will continue to use Win10 for my gaming machine until valve get SteamOS to within 95% in most games then ill switch that. As for windows 11, not interested unless it really has some killer feature I can't do without.

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Historically, my solution to that Fusion concern (though with different software in my case) is a removable (trayless) hard drive bay. I also have a couple of 2.5" to 3.5" converters, some 2.5" SSDs and several bare 3.5" HDs, so that I can very quickly switch to a different boot drive, even of a different physical size and meia type.

It's a bit trickier if you normally boot from an M.2 NVMe,but on that machine, I dont, so haven't tested it. What might work is to put external boot option higher in the boot sequence, and let it default to M.2 if there is no drive present in the external bay.

I don't see why that same logic wouldn't work with an external (HD or SSD) USB drive, for boot?

It effectively gives me several machines for the price of one, plus a few drives (that I had anyway) and the removal (IcyDock) bay, which was about £40 IIRC.

I'm on Windows 11, I have noticed some latency issues in WZ though so might switch back to 10 and see if that solves the problem.

File explorer crashes, right click context menu.. Downgraded back to w10 while i still had the chance!

Initially, I was impatiently waiting for the arrival of Windows 11 but now I have to skip it. The reason is that although my system configurations are impressive, they are unable to meet the requirements of Windows 11. Overall, it is sad. I

I've upgraded to Win 11 and theres no issues for me, it just feels like a Windows 10 annual update with a new look to some things, nothing major.

As with the move from Win7 to Win10, I'm seeing no need to go to Win11 any sooner than absolutely neccesary.

If it's not too complicated I'll try and do a clean install onto a spare Sandy Bridge or Haswell machine, but from everything I've read the new UI looks like a big step backward for the way I work.

I'm on 11 and have been for a month or so, nothing untoward to report, other than a re-skin and MS removing the ability for me to move the toolbar all is as was under Windows 10.

I'm also on 11. Just put together a new machine, And since I upgrade so infrequently (my last PC was 9 years old!), it made sense to go to 11. No problems to report, other than a bit of registry editing to get it working the way I wanted.

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Originally Posted by MrJim

I'm also on 11. Just put together a new machine, And since I upgrade so infrequently (my last PC was 9 years old!), it made sense to go to 11. No problems to report, other than a bit of registry editing to get it working the way I wanted.

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Did you go into regedit? How did you know which entries to edit please, you just know them or is there a source you could link me to?

There are some here : https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/new...e-your-device/

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Originally Posted by wazzickle

Did you go into regedit? How did you know which entries to edit please, you just know them or is there a source you could link me to?

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The main annoyance for me was the extra step of having to press shift-f10 to get the full context menu. I found this article with a bit of Googling:

https://www.winhelponline.com/blog/g...enu-windows-11

Just used the context menu one, the rest I'm not bothered about, even the taskbar being on the right of my screens not so much of an issue, context menus though, that was annoying.

i decided to instal win 11 on my secondary rig and its not bad.. the only thing that bothers me at the moment is that the win11 doesn remeber windows size and position

My main rig is not compatible so as it stands at the moment I cannot upgrade. I was looking to build a new rig at the end of the year when AMD release their new platform but who knows what state everything will be in by then. In reality I may get that sorted in 2023.

My laptop is compatible so I may rebuild that, just not any time soon.

Given I run Win11 on my main rig, its perfectly usable, however, if you are happy with Windows 10 at the minute and there's nothing that Win11 brings to the table that you need then I'd stick with Win10 until you need to do a reinstall or build a new rig.

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Originally Posted by [GSV]Trig

Given I run Win11 on my main rig, its perfectly usable, however, if you are happy with Windows 10 at the minute and there's nothing that Win11 brings to the table that you need then I'd stick with Win10 until you need to do a reinstall or build a new rig.

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I see it a little diffeent to that. Not much, but a bit.

Come next build/re-install, it will be a case of :-

- what reasons do I have to upgrade,
- what reasons do I have to NOT upgrade, and
- how does the balance fall between them?

My reluctance is no secret, and the article I saw a few days ago about MS trying to force ALL users (of home/pro, I don't mean enterprise licences) to have an MS account just re-inforced the "not upgrade" route for me, as did the piece Linus just did about Edge (which was no surprise).

Nonetheless, I can smell a time coming when the choice is upgrade, or ditch Windows entirely, and I'm not sure it'll wait until W10 goes unsupported (2026, IIRC). They're certainly trying to make it harder but I'm getting less inclined, weekly.

I can see me shifting even more 'online' uses to Linux, and ending up with the few things that still need Windows running on an air-gapped W10 machine.

I moved to Windows a couple of weeks back and amazed by the complete lack of problems.

Even my ancient Canvas 8 (which lists Windows 98 compatibility) runs OK. After rumours of old 32 bit software not working...

So I'm happy with it.

Microsoft plans on cutting off support to Windows 10 in a couple of years, so eventually we'll all have to upgrade, or at least, pay for updates (on Windows 10). For now, I'm going to stick with Windows 10, as I'll need to go through a lot of trouble, creating a new BCD, then upgrading my file format to GPT etc, before eventually upgrading. I'll wait it out for now.