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Ugh…. searching has sucked in every version of Windows past XP. I will say I like the instant search feedback (though it can be annoying at times especially on a less powerful machine), but it’s much more difficult to do more “advanced” searches. And what I mean by this is I want to find a file that had a .doc extension, on the C: drive, modified in a certain time frame. In XP it was much more clear where you were searching, and the options were all in neat little fields that you picked from. Now you have to make sure you’re in Explorer, at the C: drive, type in that little tiny search field, try to figure out the syntax or pick what they choose to give you from the drop-down, and finally search and HOPE that the stuff was indexed or you’ll never find it. I now use 3rd party search utilities, which really should not be necessary. By the way the method above was for Windows 7, I haven’t even figured out how to do advanced searches in Windows 8 yet, because the new search interface seems even worse…

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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Oh – and forgot to mention – I’ll gladly accept change if it’s for the better and doesn’t remove useful features. As many others have said, a lot of this is change for the sake of change, which is just dumb. Windows as it was was not “broken”, so it didn’t need to be “fixed”. They could have added a lot of new useful features without breaking the way people currently work and making it more difficult to be productive.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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Right, because any of those is easier than clicking a clearly labeled (ok now they use the Windows logo) button that’s always there so you don’t have to guess where to click or wait for it to pop-up. These stupid gestures are freaking annoying, too.. Too many things to memorize and they never work quite right.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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It isn’t faster if your hand is already on the mouse.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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Except it’s not, because first you have to hover over it to display it, then click it. Though I guess if you clicked all the way at the lower left corner, it would bring up the Start screen anyway, even if you didn’t really wait for the little preview thing to show up… the problem is, it’s going to be finicky and it’s not obvious. Unlike that little Start button/orb, which took up very little space and was easier to activate.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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Not everyone enjoys using the keyboard for navigation. Hello, that’s what the mouse was invented for! I typically keep my hand on the mouse to navigate and only use the keyboard when I need to type. I find it easier and quicker that way. Some people find it easier and quicker with the keyboard, and that’s fine. But everyone works differently.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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Yes, but you could bring up the Start Menu (which I use more than the desktop itself) and not cover your entire screen… it was less jarring and also more customizable than the Start screen. Plus… no Taskbar? How ridiculous! How do you even see what apps are running?

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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People hated Gadgets/Sidebar? Why? Never heard that. I do know that the Gadgets were a big security vulnerability and that’s why they were disabled by default. I loved having Gadgets/Sidebar, until I found out they were vulnerable. It’s nice having some information right at hand. It’s basically like Live Tiles but more useful and configurable, plus they coexisted with your regular desktop.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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Not really, buddy. MS intends for EVERYONE to use the Start screen/Metro apps, at least eventually. The “Desktop” is there for legacy use. What they don’t realize is, the entire Metro UI is a clusterf*ck when using a traditional computer with mouse & kb. They give you NO flexibility, that’s the problem…. hopefully they will be bringing that back in 8.1 by giving you a choice to boot to desktop – but I’m sure even that will be taken away eventually. The other issue is, you’re thrown back and forth between the UIs which is jarring and annoying.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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As I commented on the other person below this, not everyone works the same and the point of a graphical operating system is to have visual cues. You want to memorize everything you need to do and guess what to do next? Use a command line. Or a mobile OS. (though I think mobile OSes should have more cues as well, especially with larger screens now, there’s plenty of room). Right-clicking is an interesting example. You’re right, people just “know”, but they also had to learn it in the first place, especially say someone switching from a Mac to a PC. But I would argue that right-click is a fairly consistent action throughout the operating system, and is mostly for secondary actions anyway. It’s also an extremely simple action, and the visual cue is right there on your mouse, right under your finger. In fact it would be nice if Apple labeled or put an icon on the HOME button, as it’s pretty unintuitive. I find it MUCH easier to have a button for the Start Menu/Start Screen, because it’s there all the time, taking up very little space…. having the hot corner is extremely annoying, as you have to be fairly precise, and is annoying with a touchpad. I don’t like hot corners AT ALL. It gets in the way if I move my mouse to that part of the screen and didn’t WANT to activate the hot corner. Even more annoying on a VM where you can easily move your mouse outside of the screen if you’re too close to the corner (or on a multiple monitor setup, or a KVM setup with screen edge transition, etc.) And don’t tell me to use the Windows button on the keyboard, as I do most of the navigation with my mouse and that’s where my hand usually is – don’t feel it necessary to reach over to the keyboard and hit that key.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button 1 reply

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Wow, condescending much?! Because you’re a perfect human being, right? Visual cues are EXTREMELY important, and it is one of the things that annoys me most about Android (or pretty much any mobile OS for that matter). So you’re in an app – how do you get back to your home screen? Hit home. Oh wait, but that doesn’t CLOSE the app, so now it’s sitting in the background eating resources. Hit the back button. Nope, that only works sometimes, other times it brings you backwards in the app itself, for example back to the last webpage you were on. And it doesn’t necessarily close every app. Why not just have a simple small button (wtf happened to hardware buttons anyway, which are MUCH better) that can close an app? Or put that app in the background if that’s where you want it to be? There’s plenty of inconsistency and it makes it very hard to learn the OS since there’s no CUES or visible ways to interact with the interface. By the way – funny you’re comparing Windows 8 to phone OSes. Windows is primarily a desktop/laptop OS, and this shouldn’t be some second-class function to the mobile/touch functions. Get off your high horse and realize not everyone works the same or feels like memorizing ways to do things when there could easily be some cue to guide you along.

25 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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THANK YOU! I only know a few keyboard shortcuts in Windows because that’s all I care to learn and memorize! And my hand is usually on the mouse, so that’s what I use. Easier than having to reposition my hands on the keyboard and figure out which keys to hit. And I am a power user/IT expert. We all have different ways of working. But it makes sense in a GUI to have the available commands easily identifiable and accessible by mouse.

27 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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We’ve been conditioned NOT to use the power button to shut down unless you want to do a hard shutdown. I still use the Shut Down/Restart feature in Windows simply because you have more control – you know what the action will do, and you know (hope) Windows will shut down safely.

27 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button 1 recommend

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Except, Network settings and Brightness settings (notice the word settings) are things that you CHANGE. Shutting down/restarting the computer is something you DO – people do not think of this as changing a state, even thought that’s what it does. But then I guess everything in Windows 8 should be under the settings menu – since you’re just changing zeroes to ones and ones to zeroes ;)

27 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button 1 reply 2 recommends

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I don’t know how people can even compare the two. To me, PCs and mobile devices (phones/tablets) are two entirely different categories, and are used for absolutely different things. I ALWAYS prefer to use a PC when I have a choice. If I NEED to be mobile and only need limited functionality, I use my phone/tablet.

27 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button

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I’ve been working with computer since the mid 80’s and I work in the IT field. I use the Start Menu several times a day (Windows 7), and I use plenty of the features. I use Devices and Printers often, Documents, Computer, Run, Control Panel (which I have expand out so I don’t have to open another window to get to the setting I want), etc. I find everything much more difficult on the Start Screen, since they hide so much stuff by default and it takes more effort to get to “All Apps”. I have to search through a million icons on the Start Screen to find anything, whereas with the Start Menu I was able to isolate what I was seeing to only the folder I was looking at. Made sense to me.

27 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button 4 recommends

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Right, because a screen full of tons of disorganized icons (more for your eyes to have to look at to find what you need) is sooo much better! I have to argue that the hierarchical menus were much MORE user friendly.

27 days ago on Windows 8.1 set to bring back the Start button 2 replies 4 recommends

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Unfortunately though, T-Mobile cell service itself is terrible in most places. I get absolutely zero T-Mobile service at my house, while Verizon is 4G and like 4 bars, and Sprint is trailing just behind that (or was when I had a Sprint phone like 1.5 years ago). Doesn’t seem like it would be a good tradeoff to get calling over wi-fi for the limited amount of time you might be on a wi-fi network (outside of the home, I mean.)

29 days ago on Facebook rolls out free voice calling for Android users in the US