Microsoft is releasing a big Windows 11 update on September 26. Update 23H2 includes the new AI-powered Windows Copilot feature, a native RAR app, a new volume mixer and a lot more.
Oh, another system wide crapware that nobody is going to use.
They might as well call it Cortana AI
Still chasing the dream of mainstream Clippy acceptance.
fr tho, MS has been on the digital assistant thing for decades at this point.
Digital assistants are to Microsoft as Messaging apps are to Google.
“Maybe it’ll work this decade”
The problem is Cortana or clippy or whatever they call it now sucks. I’ve never found its suggestions to be helpful. Google assistant has been helpful at least once in a while.
Google now used to be so good. Integration between calendar, email and maps for appointments and travel plans was amazing and I don’t even travel that much. But it just all worked and was legitimately helpful.
No one since has really sat down and tried to figure out ways to speed up or improve a typical users daily routine. They just build little isolated gimmicks that seem cool in an advert, but barely get used in reality.
I hate that everyone wants to build an ecosystem that locks you in and then doesn’t even seem to deliver on the low hanging fruit that being in that ecosystem could accomplish.
I see you are trying to open the terminal, would you like me to:
A: break your knees
B: kill your entire family
“I’m sorry but you didn’t supply a valid answer which means that you want both. I will send a contract killer to your house immediately. Would you like to leave feedback on how I did?”
Bing search is ran instead
“I’m sorry Dave…”
Gonna get downvoted to crap for this, but what the hell - hi, it’s me, I’m that one guy who actually loves Windows a little more with every release. I’m continually surprised by the good stuff that’s baked into the OS now (e.g. Much better multi-monitor support) and how the real power users can do a whole load more besides with Powertoys (key remapping!) - It’s really encouraging to see that I need fewer and fewer specialist programs to get Windows to work just how I want.
I’m not wildly sold on AI being baked into the OS, but what the heck - Microsoft have earned their goodwill from me in recent years. I’ll play around with it with interest.
I was like you until windows 10. I opted out of that. It just felt like losing control over my computer. Windows 11 even more so.
Same here. Switched to Linux because of that.
I’ll be very surprised if AI is actually “baked into” the OS. A client to their cloud AI will be baked in, but that’s not the same thing IMO.
(btw powertoys is great, multimonitor support is great too, if they finally fix the task bar I might finally go to Win11)
A client to their cloud AI will be baked in
That would instantly kill the feature for me. Hope its easy to remove but I know how shitty MS is about getting that data.
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You could use things like StartAllBack to bring back the “classic” taskbar and start menu (Windows 7 style) There’s Open Shell and Start 11 too, I don’t use them but they’re good afaik.
I use Start 10. It’s good, and I’ve tried Start 11 on a Win 11 VM, but while it sort of lets you ungroup the taskbar it wasn’t a great experience. I want MS to do it for real.
Well StartAllBack brings back the Windows 7 style taskbar with all of its functions, Microsoft may add some functionalities but don’t expect them to do it quickly or at all.
Much better multi-monitor support
Tell that to the Snipping Tool.
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Window key + Shift + S
Select only what you need.
Crtl + shift + print screen
You’re welcome.
I tend to use alt + print screen
Alt-Printscreen selects whatever screen you’re in for capture, and Ctrl-Shift-S brings up an overlay to do it manually.
Stop using Snipping Tool and download Share X
Ahh, if only I had such control over a company assigned machine.
Tl;Dr I hate hate hate windows, but 11 is better than 10 (feature wise) and works good for being windows.
When using windows (at work and only at work), I hate it every day. I actively think “I hate windows”. Sometimes multiple times per day. It’s not objective at all (even through there are good, objective reasons to hate windows).
BUT: Upgrading from windows 10 to windows 11 is an improvement (If you ignore all spyware and corporate crap shenanigans). Windows became a little less ugly and does some things that you would previously have to hack into it.
Windows terminal is usable, at least compared to other windows terminals. Don’t get me wrong, it sucks, but it sucks less than many other things. Powertoys is band aid, but that band aid is still pretty useless.
That new AI crap ware is just garbage that is forced on users. I don’t want their crappy “AI” that (in my opinion) highly violates open source licenses (the GPL at least). And I don’t get why they do that too, most people don’t even code, why would they need that copilot crap ware?
Luckily, I might have the option to ditch windows and install a proper OS, only with the cost of being my own IT department.
Honest question: What about the Monitor improvements? Haven’t noticed anything.
I used to have DisplayFusion to customise just how I liked, so I don’t know exactly when a lot of this stuff changed - could even have been Windows 10 - but things like support for different backgrounds on each monitor, ability to indicate the relative heights your monitors are set at so the mouse flows smoothly between them (useful if you have a proper screen and a laptop one for example), mouse will scroll the window where the cursor is currently located rather than the active window as default, easier snap layouts to simulate a dual monitor setup on one…generally it just works exactly how I would expect out of the box.
What about the Monitor improvements?
Support for more than 3 monitors, for one. Also, support for multi-mon over remote
I wouldn’t be surprised to learn you haven’t tried anything else
MacOS, Ubuntu, Manjaro, Mint, Solus…
really !
I’ve been using Linux in various ways since the mid 90s, work has dictated OSX to me for the last decade or so, and I still choose windows as my desktop OS. I use copilot, and it’s great for development, but also great for generating text in a lot of ways. I miss it in my browser when I go to put in a pull request, and I miss it sometimes when explaining blocks of code or giving someone else an outline of how to do something. It doesn’t really lower my need to understand things, but it just speeds up the most mundane parts of the job. If ‘having it in the OS’ means it could fill in those bits, I’d wish even more I could use windows for work.
It’s great as a dev platform with WSL2 a great experience, VS codes built in remote server, native first class hypervisor support (with competent virtual networking). I know IT admins still hate it, and I’m sure a lot of the things that don’t affect me still suck, but they are building a good user experience.
“a new volume mixer” - please just be an interface change and nothing dramatic 👀
Or make it open when clicking the icon instead of hiding it behind two clicks. Everytime I use Windows, I love KDE more.
Same. Switched to Linux (also using KDE) a month or two ago on my personal laptop, and I’ll never go back. Using my work laptop is a daily reminder that I made the right choice.
It feels like this is how using a PC was always supposed to be. Before the profit motive ruined it like it ruins everything.
AI powered volume switcher?
“a new volume mixer” - please just be an interface change and nothing dramatic 👀
Oof. As if the sound settings weren’t already fragmented to all hell.
We heard your feedback and the volume mixer is now controlled exclusively through ChatGPT! Also it’s their ChatGPT so you’re limited to like 20 commands an hour.
It’s been shown off for months. You click the volume speaker and then a second click will get you to a mixer that almost looks like Ear Trumpet. I’ll probably stick to Ear Trumpet though since it’s just one click
Going off of Dave Plummer’s video, looks like copilot is kind of a wash. It has the potential to do some neat stuff on desktop, but its crappily shoehorned into the OS instead.
“This time you’re going to love Cortana. For reals!”
With love,
Clippy.
Every tech company is pulling this stupid bullshit now. Mine is also trying to find any way they can to shoehorn an LLM into their product. It’s marketing BS
Underpants gnomes economics.
-
Integrate AI into everything, even where it doesn’t make any damn sense.
-
???
-
Profit.
-
Hoping they’ve made it better since
Isn’t this exactly how Skynet was created?
Can we just ungroup the damned Taskbar already? I don’t understand why they are being so stubborn on this.
That’s already available for insiders and can be enabled, meaning it will soon-ish come to the stable versions of Windows 11.
That’s the number one reason I stayed on 10. I’m figuring out a swap to Linux - gaming is my only concern. Might just dual boot.
Other than game devs who intentionally block Linux with anti-cheat (Epic, Riot) almost all other games work perfectly fine on Linux nowadays.
Does Teams work on Linux?
Awesome, thanks!
This is a LOT of people currently. We all want off of this Microsoft crapfest. Luckily a lot of us bailed on Windows 11 so we won’t have to deal with this further enshittification of windows.
Gaben had a talk about the future of Linux gaming so things are moving and windows will finally be a forgotten memory.
I’m a passionate Linux User, so take it from me: Many things won’t work. Especially without figuring technical things out. Steam stuff is often okay, modding sucks, Anti-Cheat crapware will Mist probably not work at all.
That’s just what were dealing with. Praised be all game companies with Linux Support, this and “No Tux no Bux”.
Due to lack of this I just started tinkering with computers instead.
I much prefer Linux to Windows except for a few key things.
One key thing is hardware / driver support. It isn’t that Windows is easier to develop drivers for, it’s just that most people use it, so that’s where manufacturers put their effort. But, it is really annoying that things mostly just work under Windows, but often under Linux they don’t. Sometimes getting them to work is a matter of a quick internet search and a small patch. Other times there is no solution and you’re stuck with hardware that doesn’t fully work.
The other key thing is game support. Again, since Windows is the default platform, games work on Windows. But, for a long time, they didn’t work at all on Linux.
I’m really excited that Valve is changing that thanks to the Steam Deck. It could end up solving both of those problems. As more and more games work on Windows, there will be less of a reason to use Windows if you’re into PC games. If more people use Linux, there will be more of an incentive for driver manufacturers to support Linux.
The year of the Linux desktop is coming my friend
I know it’s a joke, but I never saw “The Year of the Linux Handheld Gaming Computer Which Was Released and Supported By Valve” coming so…
It’s only a joke if times seem desperate
I swapped about a month ago. I’m running Ubuntu on desktop and openSuse Tumbleweed on laptop; both with KDE Plasma desktop environment, which makes the transition from windows easier. It’s a little bit of a learning curve as the names of software packages are unfamiliar to me, but I’m liking it.
My partner who never even contemplated anything else but windows did some work on my computer and I expected questions and frustration from her, but alas she did what she needed to do and I doubt she even noticed.
Mind you, I don’t really do gaming.
Even gaming is good on Linux now. Until you use the minimum softwares portfolio it’s okay. But if you are a content creator or if you need many softwares for your work it’s better to keep windows. After years of testing and trying to swap, Linux still have issues with hardware compatibility and version update (without reinstalling all the stuff) on my concern. And it will never replace windows cause the software library is too small. I am not saying that is not polish or easy it just depends what you need to do with.
I recommend StartAllBack. Granted no third party apps should be required for such a simple feature, StartAllBack does this and more.
I second this. I’ve tried all of the other programs that make customization changes to the taskbar and StartAllBack feels native. I forget that I’m using a third party tool until I switch to another computer and wonder why the start menu is utter garbage.
It won’t be needed on the 26th, ungrouping was announced months ago.
I do love StartAllBack though. I’m curious if the new file explorer will convince me to stop using the Win10 Ribbon mode in StartAllBack
Start11 by Stardock does this and more, its not FOSS, but is cheap (if you go the legal route). There is also Winhawk, which is FOSS, though is a little less intuitive.
Ungroup icon of multiple instances of one app into separate taskbar items? That’s been in insider builds for some time now. (Luckily…)
They’re not being stubborn, it’s coming in this same update and was announced at least 6 months ago
I keep hearing this complain so I guess it clearly bothers some people but personally to me it never causes any issues nor I see the benefit on ungrouping.
If you have multiple windows of something you can go to the one you need directly. Them always bring grouped and requiring twice as many steps instead feels like I’m being handicapped by the OS.
Idk I guess I barely use the mouse for windows changing and that’s why doesn’t bother me. Well that and I don’t think I have that many apps with multiple windows that group, except I guess the file explorer but now it has tabs support.
I actually spoke with one of the people on the team for this the other week.
They have significant money problems. Copilot is expensive as crap to run, and this is about to make the situation 10x worse.
(Also this feature was completely broken a few weeks ago, so I’d be surprised if it launches without a hitch)
They have significant money problems.
Who is “they” here? Microsoft?
I think they’re doing just fine financially.
The particular team is burning money to run Copilot, and this new feature will burn money faster. Microsoft is mega profitable and happy to do this in the short-term, but they’re banking on a better solution in the long run.
I also specifically asked if Copilot was nerfed, and all the employee said was (paraphrasing): “Some people have run benchmarks and found it is worse than a year ago”
It’s GPT itself that’s shittier. All of these cloud AI platforms are very expensive to run. These are both well-known and you definitely didn’t have to talk to “Microsoft” to make that conclusion.
Who would even create rar archives these days, when there is 7zip?
Everybody using usenet.
Memesters, because WinRAR is a negware type of shareware (having an unlimited trial period), which constitutes as being “the good guy”.
Okay but 7zip can open and create .rar archives so why would anyone ever use WinRAR
Don’t try to understand memesters. I once installed one 7zip instead of WinRAR, and he installed the latter because “it’s free, you just have to click the button and wait a little bit”. It was even worse with the uTorrent vs. qBitTorrent situation, where the former is a de-facto spyware/adware, but the latter isn’t in piracy memes.
People using WinRAR. “Why would people use WinRAR?” It has more features than 7zip (password, encryption, profile presets especially).
If you’re asking why Microsoft would include it as a format for their extremely basic compression tool built into Explorer… why not, it’s one of the top three formats.
more features than 7zip (password, encryption,
Eh? 7zip supports these.
profile presets
I have to admit, I’m not familiar with this feature.
What I mean is more options for those features. The profiles and password tools are especially clever. (Examples: Password organizer can be locked with short master password, great for quickly decrypting archives matching ANY stored password. Profiles can quickly encrypt using specific settings, including super-long saved password without entering it.)
Ah, I see what you mean. 7zip’s password support looks pretty simple in comparison.
But that’s WinRAR not rar file format, no?
Man fuck that shit.
a native RAR app
It better come with a “Trial Expired” pop-up or I am not using it
Damn, this is actually kinda sad news that the OS will come with a rar app. Makes me finally want to buy a copy on WinRAR for like 15+ years of service.
If I look at what Windows 11 is, its features and the new features, I honestly can’t work out who Microsoft’s target market is anymore.
With the pricing for AI, I can’t even work out which enterprises would consume it.
Here’s the funny thing. Some enterprise sectors will not use W11 until it has some sysadmin reliable way to disable all the telemetry. In my company W11 and Chrome are banned because they cannot be locked down from phoning home, which is a security liability. No way they’re going to allow a rogue blackbox LLM running wild in our computers.
You just have to use the Enterprise addition and group policy out their stuff. It isn’t really hard if you have been doing it with Windows 10 but you have to start with the Enterprise addition and that can be $$$
They explored that option and find it not secure enough. Even with strict group policy settings W11 still misbehaves. We are locked to W10 for the time being, but ICT is not convinced for how long we can keep it.
they are making excuses, I get to see the firewall data and Win11 isn’t really different from Win10 that hasn’t been cleaned up
The thing is, if you use Office 365 the point is moot and if you use any cloud system, its straight out the door already
They get to spy and keep your Corp data if they add ai, it’s a win for MS
This type of shit is why i jumped to linux mint recently. Who the hell removed the right click menu options. I’m sure it will be back as a feature.
They didn’t remove it. Go down to the bottom and choose More Options.
It’s bullshit but they’re still there
Old context menu is still there. Need to do a regedit to make it default again.
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Like baking a turd into a mud cookie.
Im so happy I uninstalled W11 and installed W10 LTSC
I’m so happy I replaced Win 10 with Linux and now can watch this dumpster fire from afar.
I got hands on w11 after 3 years on Linux and didn’t know what to do - it was some home edition and I couldn’t find what I want in the amount of unwanted apps.
Btw it was fresh install.
Windows 11 has preinstalled TikTok. It’s so fucking bad.
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Most laptops are “made for Windows”, but they run Ubuntu just fine. It’s highly unlikely that wifi isn’t working out of the box nowadays.
So the only reason not to switch would be if you have certain applications that only work on Windows.
This person just stated it wasn’t a pleasant experience for them, you’re not going to magically change that by trying to argue it away.
Dual booting is never a pleasant experience, because Windows is a bitch that fights and breaks the bootloader at every opportunity it can to claim superiority over the computer. But deleting Windows and just running Linux is a perfectly viable and pleasant option.
It definitely used to, but I have been using my laptop with dual boot Ubuntu / windows 10 since last years summer (using either several times per week, and keeping up with all the updates), and not once did the bootloader break.
My biggest problem was chasing down the windows drivers, but after that it was golden.
Oh, I’m stuck with Windows at work myself. It’s even more painful if you know what the user experience could be.
