Why I downgraded again to my lovely W8.1

I have upgraded 5 systems and all of them are working fine. Some of them are using drivers from Vista or Windows 7, and they are also doing fine.

It's not because there aren't any Windows 10 drivers for a certain part of your PC, that it won't work with drivers that are a bit older. My old laptop, which came with Windows Vista freshly released, is still working with Windows 10 and is even performing better today then with Windows Vista and 7, it's at about the same level as Windows 8.1.

I must say, I really like Windows 10 and it's new Start menu.

I'm telling all my friends to move over to 10 because it is really good and stable. I had one problem with it, which eventually was the fault of a recent updated piece of software from another company. :) So, no, I have nothing bad to say about this new OS. I can't wait for my smartphone to be update to Windows Phone 10 as well!

Steffan said:

What is absolutely ridiculous is the fact that you can't control app sounds anymore! Try installing any of those games from the store, and you'll be surprised when you find out that you can't turn their volume down like you could in W 8.1! See for yourself...

I didn't know that. Absolutely a date to forget, Windows 10's 29th of July.

Steffan said:

One more thing: I can't see how much traffic went through a specific Wi-Fi network, when I click on a connected network in the menu I don't see show metered connection like there was in 8.1 anymore. So many useful functions stripped away...

I already said that in the WiFi section. Now in the new menu of WiFi you can't see how many GB of internet you have used, and you can't set there a metered connection. Windows 10 is a total fail compared to Windows 8.1.

Windows10Freak said:

So this is a Rant?

Only if you want it to be a rant. This is just a post where I explain with arguments why Windows 8.1 is way better than Windows 10. You lose a LOT of things and customization and control, and you get NOTHING, literally, nothing.
Desktops?
Dexpot's been there since 2003, all the linux-lover users have been using it in Windows since then.
Cortana?
Bah, nothing useful in a PC. Indeed how many people do you see use Siri? Exactly. It's the typical feature that's just a show-off and that's it. You all know you won't use it.

RWOne said:

I like it!

One can review and rant and not come off like a troll, and you accomplished it very well. You presented your opinion and reasoning, you have my respect, even if you don't have my current OS. :)

My only caveat is on section 8 - drivers: this really isn't on MS.

The TP has been out for a while, if there isn't a driver available for something like your wifi card, I'd be screaming at that OEM, they had plenty of time to check their drivers against the builds of the OS - that's why it was given out in the first place.

Now in part though, the forced driver updates - I have a DV7 lappy that got borked along with alot of others when MS pushed out crappy Synaptics touchpad drivers, it got resolved, but two weeks of lappy use with a tethered mouse drive me nuts. In that case both were to blame.

Drivers incompatibility isn't Microsoft's fault?
Hell yeah it's their fault. They made all the manufacturers to release new drivers for Windows 8, even Windows 8.1 wasn't fully compatible with many Windows 8 drivers. Now they release a straight copy of Windows 8.1 with some ugly and foolish tweaks that has worsen it, and can't be fully compatible with specific Windows 8.1 drivers?

Oh, come on, you think manufacturers are going to start all over again and check every single piece of hardware they sell?
Nope.

And I'm not even talking about this driver for Windows 7 that was fully compatible with Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 but now is not in Windows 10. I'm talking about drivers that has been released months ago, may be 1 year ago, for an OS that is exactly the same as the "new" worse one.

It should be a total MUST that Windows 10 was fully compatible with at least Windows 8.1 drivers. It's not like Microsoft reinvented the Windows and created an OS way too different from Windows 8.1. It's exactly the same, plus removed features, personalization, more tablet interfaces and less control. It's a plain copy, but worse.

Mystere said:

I get it. You don't like the aesthetics. There's nothing that will change that, until MS adds more customizability.

However, a number of you items are either not correct, or misunderstood.

For example, the screenshot you show of "Windows 10" in #7 is actually for Windows 7. Windows 10 has the close button exactly where you are complaining about it not being.

Attachment 28231

And #9? Windows 10 boots in 5 seconds on my system, with a Samsung 850 Evo. On my laptop with a standard laptop hard disk and i5 it task 23 seconds. I really do know what you're talking about.

So... after all my points and arguments, all my ideas of improvements, your final thought is that I don't like the aesthetics. Wow. So you just read "I don't like icons and I don't like that everything is white". That's all you read. Fine.

Windows 10 has NOT the close button exactly where I want it, it has not the button exactly where Windows Vista or XP had it. It has it over the minimized window, it's worse up there, it slower to use and close, and if you miss some pixels, you click on the annoying "Pin this...".

I hope you can see the difference:

See?
The cursor is (although it's hidden) exactly 1 pixel away from Close. Look, go to your PC desktop, right-click on a blank space. Exactly, that's where every context menu should be, 1 pixel away the cursor.

PD: sorry, I thought W7 had the menu where it should be. It seems that since W7, the menu is always up there over the minimized window. I kind of upgraded from Windows XP directly to Windows 8 4 years ago.

Tabvla said:

Hmmm.... not sure about that. The last MAJOR rewrite of the core elements of Windows was Vista. Vista; W7; W8; W8.1 and W10 are in a very real sense all versions of Vista. When MS makes significant changes to the core of Windows they change the Build number as follows.....

Build : 4.0 Product Name : W95
Build : 4.1 Product Name : W98
Build : 4.9 Product Name : Millennium
Build : 5.0 Product Name : W2000
Build : 5.1 Product Name : Windows XP
Build : 6.0 Product Name : Vista
Build : 6.1 Product Name : W7
Build : 6.2 Product Name : W8
Build : 6.3 Product Name : W8.1
Build : 6.4 Product Name : W10

The name of the Build Number was changed from 6.4 to 10.0 prior to the release of W10. But Build 10.0 and Build 6.4 are the same Build, with different names. The name-change was incorporated so as to enable developers, who rely on the actual Build Number, to recode those elements within their software to refer to 10.0 (which makes more logical sense) than to 6.4.xxxx.

T.

Windows 8, 8.1 and 10 have two OS's. One, the old Win32 OS and the other the new WinRT OS. The WinRT OS is what is increasing in functionality each new OS version, and Win32 is decreasing in functionality.

What you call the "Build" is just the overall product version. It has nothing to do with what we're talking about.

BrownianMotion said:

I'd love to know what you're smoking.

But by all means, continue using an inferior OS and browser.

Well, I tested it in several PC's 2 years ago, and IE 11 was smoother and faster than Chrome in 2013. I tested it in several pages in several PC's.

I was gonna told you that test it yourself, but now in August 2015, I've visited the very same pages (basically, pages with HD images and full of data and tables), and Chrome 44 is way, way, way smoother than IE 11. That's not what I saw 2 years ago. I don't know what happened to IE 11. May be the Intel HD 4600 drivers I installed the 28th of July are responsible of the amazing lag today in IE 11, but I remember clearly that IE 11 was noticeable smoother than Chrome and faster loading web pages. The scrolling was perfect. But today I'm testing it and this is not normal, IE 11 scrolling's way, way worse than I remember and than it was.

Whatever, 2 years ago, January 2013, when I tested it, that was a big truth.

Mystere said:

That's going to depend on what, and how many services start. Also, the POST time of the computer is different for every system (mine is UEFI and posts very quickly).

I time mine from the moment the spinning circle starts to the login prompt, as everything after that will vary from system to system.

Well, I start timing the time I press down the ON button, and I stop timing the time I'm actually watching Google fully loaded. That takes 18 seconds in my lenovo Y510P, and that includes 3-4 seconds of BIOS, loading Windows, enter my password, click on chrome and wait Google to be fully loaded. 18 seconds.

heracles said:

So are we going to have this same debacle 3 or 4 times a year now?

Most people just don't seem to understand what Windows 8, 8.1 and 10 are. They don't quite get that these are transitional OS's, and they're transitioning from Win32 to WinRT. Win32 will eventually go away (other than for legacy compatibility) and WinRT will be the primary OS. Yet there's always people who keep complaining that Win32 features are going away. THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT!

CountMike said:

Just one question, why didn't you post all of this on Windows 8 and W7 forums ? Around here is just not applicable, we already made our minds one way or the other.
Around here on this and other forums that are about W10 it's just a rant at best and trolling at worst. If anybody thinks that can make or change my mind using only words, has something else coming. We are not idiots, you know.
I'm old enough and have long enough IT experience to remember same stuff at every OS change, since first DOS and before. I went thru Win 95 Alpha version and most other ones since very beginning or somewhat after (Vista) so comments like that are known to me since long tome ago.

Why not?

This is Windows 10 forums. Seems you don't like anyone criticizing Windows 10, but that's not my problem. I'm here talking about Windows 10 and all its disadvantages compared to Windows 8.1. Indeed, I don't find any solid reason to use it instead of Windows 8.1 besides because it's newer.

I created a well structured post talking about WHY it is so bad compared to Windows 8.1. I've talked about features, loss of features, loss of control, loss of customization. If you think my first post was a rant (a rant with myself?), then you should never again enter in a post that doesn't state what you think, cause everything would be a "rant".

A troll doesn't provide all the points I provided, a troll just use undefined words, does not talk about loss of features, and pretty much what he/she does is to say "I don't like it, it's rubbish, it's worse just because".

Did I ever told you not to use W10?
NO
Did I ever try to change your mind?
NO

But anyway, you seem annoyed by my simple analysis, with solid arguments. That sums it up. It's funny to read some users here say "I disagree". Like if I where giving an subjective opinion on Windows 10. I'm giving it when I talk about the blinding whit and the ugly icons, and that's it. All the rest of the points are just information about features that has been removed. You can't disagree about a missing feature, it's a fact, it's not there anymore, it's not a matter of opinion.

Thank you.

Mystere said:

Most people just don't seem to understand what Windows 8, 8.1 and 10 are. They don't quite get that these are transitional OS's, and they're transitioning from Win32 to WinRT. Win32 will eventually go away (other than for legacy compatibility) and WinRT will be the primary OS. Yet there's always people who keep complaining that Win32 features are going away. THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT!

I don't understand you. What's your point? Why you say removing features is the point?

DeathStalker said:

Bottom line? It's just an operating system. No better or no worse than any other .

What?
OK, seriously, did you read any single point I made?

You think Windows 10 is not less personalizable?
You think you have the same control over updates and drivers?
You think the separation between items doesn't matter?
You think Metro is faster than classic Control Panel?
You think it's fine to have a PC to launch Android browsers?
Do you think the WiFi icon has the same features as Windows 8.1's?
Do you think it's fine that a driver that was released a few months ago, specifically for Windows 8.1, doesn't work now in a straight worse copy of Windows 8.1?