So recently a friend ordered a new custom built system from a place locally and had Windows 11 installed on it instead of Windows 10.
Now just like I do not listen to any pre-released song from an upcoming music album that I will intend on buying, I never looked at Windows 11 before.
My computer hardware is too old, they are officially not compatible with Windows 11 [I’ll get back to that later].
Going back to my friend’s computer, so it already had Windows 11 installed. So I had to learn it on the fly and them show my friend.
First thing to notice is that the so-called Start menu is in the center of the screen and so are your pinned taskbar applications. Live tiles are gone. Now you have pinned applications. It also includes the shutdown/reboot button.
First things first is to get rid of the bloated pre-installed applications as well as remove the pinned items in the Start menu that my friend will never use.
When you look at the various options for a shortcut [right click on the icon], you are only given what could be called the core options. So if you want to see the shortcut properties or maybe send the shortcut to the desktop there is an option to see that but it looks like the same right click menu you saw in Windows 10 and prior.
Settings has been revamped and things moved around. So, instead of the [say] 13 sections, they are all on the left side of a Window just like each individual section was in Windows 10. They added more sections with additional options in each sections.
It should be one heck of a blast to support both Windows 10 and Windows 11 because the settings for some are in different locations.
And guess what? The Control Panel is still there!
Since I believe before Windows 10 came out, Microsoft wanted to ditch the Control Panel because of some limitation [number of icons in it?]. With Windows 10, the Settings section was created and has grown since then. However many portions of the Control Panel have not been fully migrated, such as the Power Options.
As with any newer operating system, some hardware and some software may not be compatible with the newer operating system.
For example, he has an HP P1002 monochrome laser printer. Windows 11 detected it but that was about it. I installed it with the Windows 10 drivers.
In another example, Open Shell [formerly Classic Shell] used by some who dislike the Windows 10 Start menu, isn’t compatible with Windows 11. A slightly compatible Windows 11 [beta] build has been sitting as the last version since July 2021.
For now, many have said to ignore Windows 11. Let it “mature” a bit. Some obviously gave proper reasons for it. Others just jumped on the bandwagon like they did with Windows Vista.
[Windows Vista actually wasn’t bad once it matured and proper hardware drivers and software were available. I used it for about 9 months until Windows 7 came out and even waited a bit before I installed Windows 7. One of the problems with Vista was the big jump in required hardware resources between Windows XP and Vista. Did the complainers seriously look at this before upgrading? And yes, people are complaining about Windows 11 hardware requirements (not resources). Excluding the hardware requirements (SecureBoot, TPM, CPU age), just about any computer running Windows 7/8.1/10 can run Windows 11.]
For those who are notified that their system can be upgraded to Windows 11, I wonder if Microsoft will limit the free upgrade option for a year like they did for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1. I have yet to hear anything.
[You can go from Windows 7/8.1 to Windows 10 by wiping your hard disk and install Windows 10 with your Windows 7 license.]
Regarding my hardware, I have a top of the line Core i7 4th generation processor with 16 GB of RAM desktop and a 7th generation Core i7 laptop. But neither are compatible.
The desktop lacks SecureBoot and TPM 2.0. It actually has a TPM 1.x slot but try and find the “card” I need in an eight year old system.
The laptop is actually just missing the processor generation. Microsoft has allowed a fix that [I believe] will allow Windows 11 to install on my laptop. However they will not support it. So if something buggers up like a cumulative updated, then that’s it. In any case I would have to enable TPM and the SecureBoot – which would make my current installation useless. So a re-install. See here for the link for the fix. [Use the fix at your own risk.]
Note that you have until October 2025 for Windows 10 support. After that, nothing.
[Some novice said “he” would wait for Windows 12. Good luck there! Microsoft has not announced a Windows 12 and wouldn’t in any case after Windows 11 just came out. That novice can spread all the rumors he wants! And since it took about 6 years between Windows 10 and 11, don’t assume a Windows 12 version within the next 4 years. Of course Microsoft did say when Windows 10 came out in 2015 that it would be the last version of Windows.]