As Windows 10's technical preview has been released two days ago, several of you may have lunged into trying it out and may have already formed a strong opinion on the new features and general improvements. What are your thoughts on it, and what would you like to see? Microsoft have promised big things and they've created this proprietary Asimov feedback system, so they're openly asking their users for direction.
So far, I definitely like the fact that the Start menu is officially back and insanely versatile. Like, it's exactly what was needed in previous versions and then some. It can be stretched all the way to the top as a column, or all the way down to spread the tiles across the bottom.
Another neat touch is that the menu's background can be changed independently, but even cooler, when it's set to Automatic, the Start button's accent colour's also picked from the wallpaper:
As for actual functionality, I really enjoy the fact that windows can be snapped similarly to the app system in 8.1, although it's currently a bit clunky, unpredictable and obviously very incomplete to me. Better yet, instead of being limited to 50/50 snapping, windows can be snapped to take up any remaining space, even to the corners of the screen--the end result is that Windows finally has a tiling interface. I can see this being extremely useful for many people. Oh yeah, there are drop shadows again.
Unfortunately, the new snapping feature doesn't seem to play nice with puush, so I had to upload that screenshot to imgur. It looks like the snapping treats each window in a similar way to 8.1's app snapping, which also screws around with puush. Definitely worth bearing in mind for the rest of you who decide to run this preview.
Virtual desktops are also a feature, but I haven't found any real use for them yet. Alt+D shows the desktop on all of them and every active program is always active on the taskbar--as such, it kind of takes away the feel of having virtual spaces in the first place. It's certainly no spinning cube.
Among other visual things, system icons are finally being flattened. I really hope that this ends up being a comprehensive overhaul, because the mismatched clusterfuck of icons and UIs look like arse.
Lots of people have also reported substantial performance improvements in games, so this'll hopefully be felt in osu! as well. I swear that there was lag in 8.1 that's disappeared in 10.
There haven't been any tremendous changes as such, but there are already lots of nice conveniences. All 8/8.1 drivers seem to work, which means that those who might want to upgrade from 7 should have little trouble in that regard. It's all looking promising and I'm very interested to use this while all of these future changes will be made.
*Takes off anorak*
So far, I definitely like the fact that the Start menu is officially back and insanely versatile. Like, it's exactly what was needed in previous versions and then some. It can be stretched all the way to the top as a column, or all the way down to spread the tiles across the bottom.
Another neat touch is that the menu's background can be changed independently, but even cooler, when it's set to Automatic, the Start button's accent colour's also picked from the wallpaper:
As for actual functionality, I really enjoy the fact that windows can be snapped similarly to the app system in 8.1, although it's currently a bit clunky, unpredictable and obviously very incomplete to me. Better yet, instead of being limited to 50/50 snapping, windows can be snapped to take up any remaining space, even to the corners of the screen--the end result is that Windows finally has a tiling interface. I can see this being extremely useful for many people. Oh yeah, there are drop shadows again.
Unfortunately, the new snapping feature doesn't seem to play nice with puush, so I had to upload that screenshot to imgur. It looks like the snapping treats each window in a similar way to 8.1's app snapping, which also screws around with puush. Definitely worth bearing in mind for the rest of you who decide to run this preview.
Virtual desktops are also a feature, but I haven't found any real use for them yet. Alt+D shows the desktop on all of them and every active program is always active on the taskbar--as such, it kind of takes away the feel of having virtual spaces in the first place. It's certainly no spinning cube.
Among other visual things, system icons are finally being flattened. I really hope that this ends up being a comprehensive overhaul, because the mismatched clusterfuck of icons and UIs look like arse.
Lots of people have also reported substantial performance improvements in games, so this'll hopefully be felt in osu! as well. I swear that there was lag in 8.1 that's disappeared in 10.
There haven't been any tremendous changes as such, but there are already lots of nice conveniences. All 8/8.1 drivers seem to work, which means that those who might want to upgrade from 7 should have little trouble in that regard. It's all looking promising and I'm very interested to use this while all of these future changes will be made.
*Takes off anorak*
