Thursday, October 29, 2015

The Windows 10 Experience | Part 3

So, I've been running Windows 10 for a few months now. A wise old lady asked me for another post, and I've put it off until she bugged me about it again. Sorry mom.

Back when my mom asked me to write another post, I really didn't think I had all that much more to say. There were a couple of things that I thought deserved to be mentioned, so here it all comes.

I'm pretty sure that it was the same day that I was asked to do another post, that I turned on the computer and found this.
That little "Sign out now" button was completely useless. It let me log back in, but came up with the same error. I had to power the computer off, by holding the power button for a few seconds, and restart it to get it to start up properly. It has not happened again, but I don't have any idea what prompted it that one time.

Wednesday, August 5, 2015

The Windows 10 Experience | Part 2

After a few days of having Windows 10 on the new laptop, I thought I would go ahead and post part 2 of this experience. I'm not going to pretend to share any great insight, but rather to just share some thoughts and opinions.

Travels to the Edge.
I said before that I found Microsoft's new browser, Edge, to be just as useful as Internet Explorer in that I used it to download Firefox. I decided that in all fairness I should actually go ahead and give it a try.

From what I can tell, it's a fairly straight forward web browser. The interface is clean and simple, yet seems a little blockier than what I am used to. There are no "curves" to it, as there are with many other programs. This almost seems to be the way with Windows 10 in general. Nothing inherently wrong with squared edges and such, but it definitely doesn't look pretty.

I started this post in Edge, but I just had to switch to Firefox instead. I'm used to the Blogger interface giving me a WYSIWYG interface, but instead in Edge it was HTML only. I'm not brushed up on my HTML enough to be comfortable working with it. In Firefox I have the option to switch between WYSIWYG and HTML. Perhaps there is a plug-in that Edge needs for it to work, but it did not request to add anything, and it Firefox it just works.

Speed. I really don't know how to measure a browser's speed to be able to compare Edge to Firefox. There are times that it seemed a little slow, but that could just be the computer. At other times it did seem to be moving at adequate speed.

Conclusion: It won't be my every day browser. I'll still stick with Firefox. Maybe it's the familiarity, but why fix what's not broken.

Start Menu.
I decided that it was only fair that I revisit the start menu. After my friend Marty left a comment on my earlier post about how the "tiles" could work, I decided that I would take a look at it. I understand it somewhat now, but I'm not convinced that it's a better interface than what was in previous versions of Windows. For now I plan to continue using the Classic Shell interface, but I still have the option to use the W10 start menu at any time.

If you spend the time getting your commonly used programs setup as tiles, then it could be beneficial. Aside from doing that, it seems that a lot of extra time and effort is expended in actually locating the program that you want. Sadly there are some things that do not show up in the Classic Shell menu, but can be found with the W10 menu. All newly installed programs will show up in both locations. I do not know why there is a disparity, but it seems to be mainly with Microsoft applications.


That's it's for this installment. Futures posts on the Windows 10 experience will be dependent on my deciding that there is actually something worth me saying about it.

Thanks for reading, I'd love to  know your thoughts.

Monday, August 3, 2015

The Windows 10 Experience | Part 1

Unless you've been living in a cave, or even if you have, you may have heard about Windows 10. The "big" thing about W10 is that Microsoft is offering a free upgrade to users of W7 or W8.1. With this in mind, I thought that someone might be interested in my experience with W10. This is the first, and hopefully not last, installment on this subject.

Very recently, I picked up a new laptop computer. It's not a high end machine, thought I wish that I could justify spending more on one. It's in many ways a replacement for the laptop that I got 5 years ago. The old one has a display that no longer works, but, thanks to the magic of the HDMI port, works well to watch streaming video from Hulu and other sources on the TV.

Not only does the new laptop solve the issue of having one to take on any trips that we go on, but also provides a needed computer for the children in doing their school.

So, Windows 8.1. I really have no interest in dealing with it. I've seen enough of W8/8.1 to know that I don't like it. I decided that my first project with this computer would be to upgrade to W10.  Really, it can't be worse than W8.1, and there is a chance that it's better, after all, it does have the start menu again.