back to article Windows 10 Start menu replacements shifting like hot cakes

Microsoft had one job to do with Windows 10 – but it looks like it's failed to get even that right. Start Menu replacements for Windows 10 are moving almost as fast as they did for Windows 8, which didn't have a Start menu at all, according to Brad Wardell, whose company makes the most popular commercial drop-in Start menu. …

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  1. Efros

    There are others available

    Startisback

    Start Menu 8

    Classic Shell

    Pokki

    All of which are free-reasonable in price.

    1. Blitterbug
      Happy

      Re: There are others available

      Hmm. Pokki sucks the big one. It's almost malware in its tenacity to cling to your system, and in my book any software that positively begs you not to dislodge it by definition requires the bin.

      I tried startisback once, but it blew chunks.

      I'm an ex-Start8 user who switched to ClassicShell as soon as they fixed some initial drag-n-drop issues with it. Bloody brilliant, I put it on all my clients' W8 (& now W10) machines. They love it. Not surprisingly...

      1. Elmer Phud

        Re: There are others available

        " Pokki sucks the big one."

        Damn right it does - when I finally manged to get rid of it my machine booted in about 1/4 of the time.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: There are others available

          Pokki - as a bundled item on a recent Acer -seemed to exist only for the benefit of selling something to me. It was certainly superfluous.

      2. Amorous Cowherder
        Thumb Up

        Re: There are others available

        Just tried ClassicShell for the first time ( on Win10) superb stuff!

        1. psychonaut

          Re: There are others available

          Pokki is a piece of shit. Classic shell 3verytime

        2. P. Lee
          Coat

          Re: There are others available

          >Just tried ClassicShell for the first time ( on Win10) superb stuff!

          But why just upgrade your start menu when you can upgrade your bootloader?

          1. jzl

            Re: There are others available

            Subtle Linux trolling? Maybe some people have software that won't run on Linux. Like most large enterprises, for instance.

            Maybe some other people realise that putting most genuinely non-technical users in front of Linux is a recipe for pain, misery, tears and hours - hours - on the phone trying to sort them out. For what? Geek props?

            1. werdsmith Silver badge

              Re: There are others available

              It's true but you shouldn't say it.

        3. BigbenNZ

          Re: There are others available

          With Classic Shell you can change the Font & Size with a bit of programing, I don't think its possible with any other Start replacements.

          I have a 1080 screen and as I am getting a bit old finding it had to read the screen

          This is how

          http://winaero.com/blog/how-to-change-the-font-or-font-size-in-classic-shell-start-menu/

      3. jason 7

        Re: There are others available

        I install ClassicShell on PCs that customers have said they didn't want Windows 8/8.1 PCs.

        "Ahhh this is lovely, so glad you didn't get me a Windows 8 PC!"

        Yes that's right! They can't tell the difference.

      4. dwonk786

        Re: There are others available

        Thanks! I've had good luck with it, too.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: There are others available

      "Start Menu replacements for Windows 10 are moving almost as fast as they did for Windows 8"

      But Windows 10 is rolling out 10 times faster than Windows 8....

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hardly surprising

    Big companies, government, directors, they've all got some common characteristics - the inability to listen to the unwashed masses, the inability to say "sorry, we messed up", and the inability to actually sort things out once they have messed up.

    Let's ignore the start menu, and consider Cortana. FFS, why? Who wants a resource hogging, poor quality parody of human interaction? I don't see anybody saying Hi Google to their phones, nor even Apploholics talking to Siri (except when drunk). What did Microsoft think they were achieving with this?

    1. Paul Shirley

      Re: Hardly surprising

      Using "OK Google" on my phone and tablet is surprisingly useful (and faster) compared to the chore of using the onscreen keyboard. It works remarkably well in noisy environments though I tend not to do it often in the pub.

      I agree though, on a device with a good physical keyboard I can't see any point to it.

      1. TRT Silver badge

        Re: Hardly surprising

        I'm going to write a song called "Hey, Siri!" which should render it unplayable.

      2. Alan Gauton

        Re: Hardly surprising

        For added giggles you should browse through your Google account history, and listen to your audio recordings of all your Google Now requests....

        1. Sgt_Oddball

          Re: Hardly surprising

          In my case, heavy profanity, threats of violence and occasional pleading.

          Serves me right for trying to use it while driving. (though in fairness it works great with Google maps, just shit when you want it to send a text.... Nee.'is this OK to send?' I dunno I can't read it right now on account of trying not rear end some audi driving <redacted> who's just over taken my junker and braked hard because... Reasons. Oh and I really wish it would work with the radio iplayer app.but never mind )

      3. Shane 4

        Re: Hardly surprising

        Disabled people perhaps, Being able to use speech instead of hands may be the best thing ever for them.

        Maybe for porn addicts as well, Where the other hand is too busy to type. lol

    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: Hardly surprising

      "consider Cortana. FFS, why?"

      Surely you know the answer: "me too".

    3. Fungus Bob
      Windows

      Re: Hardly surprising

      "What did Microsoft think they were achieving with this?"

      Its the closest some of those nerdboys have ever come to sex.

      1. TheVogon

        Re: Hardly surprising

        "Its the closest some of those nerdboys have ever come to sex."

        There is a Linux version of Cortana now?

        1. Fungus Bob

          Re: Hardly surprising

          All us Linux nerdboys have been giggling like schoolgirls for years about how we have to *mount* drives.

          We're a pathetic bunch, really.

    4. P. Lee

      Re: Hardly surprising

      >What did Microsoft think they were achieving with this?

      Feeding Bing with your life in an effort to stay relevant.

      By "relevant" I mean, desperately adding features because no-one really wants to pay for an OS any more.

    5. This post has been deleted by its author

  3. Elmer Phud

    I'll give it a while

    When W8 arrived I wasn't sure whether to grab another Start tool or wait

    I put some on machines where older people were a bit confused but never got round to it myself, ended up not needing one.

    Apart from making sure I don't go for the 'quick set-up' I'll wait to see how W10 drives when it arrives. It's going to be different, that 's for sure.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Seller of Start menu s/w bigs-up Start menu s/w

    1. Richard 81

      No he's saying it's still pretty popular. MS claim they've designed all the start menu anyone will need, but his sales say otherwise.

      1. Vector

        "MS claim they've designed all the start menu anyone will need..."

        That's because Microsoft, along with the rest of the software world, seems to have forgotten how to ask questions!

        It all very nice that they've come up with this new start menu, but why not leave the old versions as well and ask which one people would like to use (just as they did in Windows XP with the classic Start Menu). AFAIC, this should be the case with all new features. Lovely that they're there, I'll decide whether I want them or not, thank you very much. Google is driving me up the wall with exactly this same mentality.

        I blame Apple and the whole Steve Jobs philosophy of "user's don't know what they want until we tell them." OK. Show me your new gizmo and let me decide. Don't force me into it because it's more convenient for you!

        1. dubious
          Black Helicopters

          Microsoft doesn't need to ask users any more - the amount of telemetry and spying Windows 10 does obviates it!

          1. Pookietoo

            Re: Telemetry

            Telemetry will only show MSFT how people are doing things in ways that have been forced upon them, rather than ways they would prefer. If someone totally can't figure out how to do something, how is telemetry going to tell MSFT what they were trying to do? Are they going to bring back Clippy to interrogate the user?

  5. Jim Willsher

    Within 5 minutes of installing W10 in a VM, I had downloaded Start10.

    Live Tiles - WTF. Start10 gets rid of those, and that makes it worth every penny.

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      "Within 5 minutes of installing W10 in a VM, I had downloaded Start10.

      Live Tiles - WTF. Start10 gets rid of those, and that makes it worth every penny."

      It takes about as long to get rid of the live tiles manually. The native start menu itself is a different matter but then my preference is the configurability of the KDE classic menu.

      1. Kurt 4
        Alien

        You people clinging to your old start menu are probably the same ones hanging on to other old crap because you're too afraid of change, can't stand change, complain when something changes, and won't spend more than 5 minutes trying something new.

        1. jzl

          Not everyone - Reg readers aside, obviously - is interested in computers. Most people use them when they have to, but don't care about them, don't understand them, and don't want to spend any more time than they have to with them.

          For those people, the start menu change is a real pain and an application which restores it is a good idea. As long as that application is installed by their techie friend or family member, obviously. They'd never do it themselves.

          1. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

            Not everyone - Reg readers aside, obviously - is interested in computers

            I'm a Reg reader, with a CS degree and 27 years as a professional software developer, and I'm not "interested in computers", generally speaking.

            I'm interested in computer science; I'm interested in various problems in software; I'm interested in producing a good product. I'm interested in some particular computer models of historical interest.

            But "interested in computers"? Nah. Computers are ubiquitous and the vast majority of what they do is boring except to people with a vested interest in that domain.1

            I'm sure as bloody hell not interested in changes to a user interface that in any way impede my work, any more than I'm interested in having the controls in my car rearranged, or my woodworking tools redesigned, or my clothing replaced with a silver jumpsuit. If you want to show me an alternative, sure, I'll take a look; but don't force it on me as a new default.

            1What's the single most popular computer application in the world? Hint: Its most common UI manifestation is "12:00". There are probably two dozen instances of it running in my house. It's not interesting.

        2. kmac499

          We are also the people that developed years of muscle memory in using OUR computers efficiently.

          Just imagine if one of us came and screwed around with the precious 'levels' on YOUR audio kit, or changed the button assignments on YOUR gaming systems.

          Live Tiles are crap because they are distracting, there is no way for your minds eye to filter the relative importance of a notification. I couldn't give a flying for the latest twitter trend but I do want to know when a works email arrives.

          Old Guys (and Girls) Rule... and can be very inventive when it comes to retribution

        3. Hollerith 1

          Clinging to the start menu (@Kurt 4)

          Certain things get adopted because we either get used to an early version, even if crap, or because the early version got it right, or because it works just fine and the labour to learn the new version doesn't bring equal rewards.

          I do not want to learn how to use every new system. I need totopen up and get to work. I do not have time for a learning curve. I have adapted the older way of doign things to something useful for me and now it is as engained as playing the piano. Keyborards have remained Qwerty for almost 130 years because they were just this side of good enough.

          The change has to be gaspingly wonderful for most people to decide that the cost of learning is worth it.

        4. Chika
          Mushroom

          You people clinging to your old start menu are probably the same ones hanging on to other old crap because you're too afraid of change, can't stand change, complain when something changes, and won't spend more than 5 minutes trying something new.

          That's a bit short-sighted and somewhat unfair.

          First of all, the start menu evolved in a fairly logical way from its inception in the 1990s to what we knew more recently, whether you have the Windows 7 version or those versions that appeared in various desktop environments in Unix and Linux. The arguable notion of referring to it as a "start" menu aside, it worked because it evolved into something that did the job efficiently.

          Second, there's this notion that we should all accept something purely because it is "new". Certainly there is a point to trying out new ideas and new ways of doing things but unless that way is actually better than what we have then it is hardly likely that it would be accepted.

          As somebody else in this article said, Microsoft have forgotten how to ask a simple question. My own view here can be found in my LiveJournal but to sum it up I am unwilling to upgrade all of my Windows 7 machines to Windows 10 for a number of reasons, the start menu being a niggle compared with other reasons, but in the test that I did I found that I got a lot more done with Classic Shell in place than I did with Microsoft's sop to the masses start menu.

    2. AceRimmer

      "Live Tiles - WTF. Start10 gets rid of those, and that makes it worth every penny."

      There is a free method which I'm surprised some one technically literate hasn't shown you yet:

      Right click -> Unpin from Start Menu

      1. Jim Willsher

        Agreed, but the banishing of live tiles is just one advantage.

        Right-click unpin, the technically literate solution to which you elude, just leaves a huge blank area where the tiles used to be. Is that meant to be a solution? And yes I know I can resize it, but I'm pretty sure the next application I install will want to plant itself there.

        1. AceRimmer

          I unpinned them all and then put the shortcuts I use and need in there.

          No huge blank areas left over

        2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

          "Right-click unpin, the technically literate solution to which you elude, just leaves a huge blank area where the tiles used to be."

          There's a technically literate solution to that as well. Drag the border of the blank area back to the actual menu. Unless they removed that from the release version.

          1. Pookietoo
            Headmaster

            Re: the technically literate solution to which you elude

            Allude means "refer", elude means "escape"

        3. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

          Right-click unpin, the technically literate solution to which you elude

          While we're talking about literacy, the word you want here is "allude". "elude" means "evade" or "escape".

          And even allude is wrong. He didn't allude to it, which would mean he referred to it indirectly or by implication. He described it explicitly.

          (None of this is meant as a comment on Live Tiles or the unpin mechanism, by the way. I haven't used Win10, but I expect that when I'm forced to do so, I'll be downloading a Start Menu replacement as well.)

      2. herman

        Yes, you can unpin the tiles, but then the bladdy thing still fills up half the screen with nothing.

  6. Jean-Paul
    Joke

    They are mad the lot of them

    I like the new start menu on my Surface Pro 3, then again I liked Windows 8.1 as well and it made me move back from OS X. In comparison Windows 7 looks so dated, and navigating the menu structure is is inefficient...

    But hey ho, at least there is choice.

    1. Richard 81

      Re: They are mad the lot of them

      Yes but you have a touch screen. The Win 7 menu would be horrible with a touch screen, so no wonder you find it more intuitive.

    2. bozoid

      Re: They are mad the lot of them

      > In comparison Windows 7 looks so dated, and navigating

      > the menu structure is is inefficient...

      It's instructive to note that no 3rd party ever developed a Windows 8-style Start Screen to improve our user experience on Win7 or XP. Wisdom of the marketplace?

      1. RM Myers

        Re: They are mad the lot of them

        Actually, I believe Classic Shell was originally developed when Windows 7 was released - don't know about the others. Third party replacement user interfaces (graphical or command line, complete replacements or just "enhancements") have been around for decades. They were available for DOS before windows was even developed, and unix/linux has numerous replacement interfaces (I can remember arguing over the interface to use for a SUNOS system in the early 1990's). My professor in Operating System design didn't even consider the user interface to be part of the OS - he just saw it as a specialized application program.

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