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
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Started a new job 4 months ago. First time using a windows desktop since windows 2000. Have multi screens always sucked this bad? You never know on what screen a launched window will appear.
How can people work like this?
That’s interesting. Windows 11 is the best multi monitor version of windows ever, in my experience. It “remembers” where apps were last used opens them there. While not perfect, I find it great that it handles more than one multiple monitor setup. I have 3 monitors at home and 2 at the office. I just plug in and they are always in the same alignment. Given how bad it was in previous versions, I’m impressed.
I love the part where it remembers what screen an application was last launched on, even if that screen is no longer connected, so the window is completely missing with no visible way to get it back 😅
But yes, I find multiple monitor stuff to mostly be good in Win11 I agree!
Though it’s sorely missing a feature Win10 had that I find really, REALLY annoying. My monitors aren’t the same resolution, so when I move my mouse from one of a higher resolution to a lower one, if the mouse is near the top of the screen as it often is, it will literally get stuck on the edge of the screen, because the next screen technically has no pixels that high up 🤦♀️
So I then have to move the mouse down an inch or two to get it to be allowed to move to the next screen. Incredibly infuriating, and a problem that was solved in previous versions of Windows (which would just helpfully move your mouse to the top of the neighbouring screen, as you’d intuitively want).
When the invisible app window happens, you can use the windows key + arrow keys to move the current window around.
Agreed about the mouse thing being infuriating. I match my display resolutions to avoid it.
When I still had monitors with different resolutions I used an app called https://cursr.app/ to fix that. Or at least I think that is your issue…
I usually move the monitors around, the move my mouse to test it, until I avoid that, as perfectly aligning then with different resolutions doesn’t work. But yeah, totally know what you’re saying.
to be fair my macbook pro I use for working has the same problems. If I connect it to my dual screen setup at home it always forgets which screen contained which window…sometimes it even forgets which wallpaper I have set up. Multiple screens seem to be a huge challenge for modern operating systems…
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still run xorg. predictable and stable. Win11 multi monitor is a lottery. so is audio. have music playing and then join a teams meeting? sorry there’s a problem with your audio and you need to reboot
fuuucking hell
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Wayland is not ready, 99% of Linux apps don’t run on Wayland. XWayland doesn’t count.
I have been using a multi-monitor setup for years and never had any issues. Windows will usually appear on the screen you closed them on.
We just haven’t advanced technology to that stage yet. Big ask.
we had it in windows 7, 8, Vista, 10
This ancient technology is long lost by now. Pictures on clay plates is not how we are used to read comments in code now.
StartAllBack is a low cost method to fix the task bar.
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To a Russian developer, too. I found that out when my transaction didn’t go through.
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It is $2, its hardly a huge investment.
I won’t use another software to enable a feature that was standart in older windows versions. My computer is fairly clean, will stay clean and is only used for gaming so it has nothing else than drivers, launchers like steam and gog and the games installed.
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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.
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.
“Maybe it’ll work this decade”
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.
Much better multi-monitor support
Tell that to the Snipping Tool.
I was dealing with this yesterday it’s so stupid.
When I press the screenshot button on my keyboard it should only screenshot the display that the cursor is currently on. There is absolutely no reason that it should screenshot the entire display.
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’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.
I wouldn’t be surprised to learn you haven’t tried anything else
MacOS, Ubuntu, Manjaro, Mint, Solus…
really !
“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.
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Integrate AI into everything, even where it doesn’t make any damn sense.
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???
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Profit.
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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 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.
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.
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
Lol its a trillion dollar company. They make the rules. Its Not the other way around.
Who really owns the computer you paid for :/
You. But the People that provide the OS control it. That’s the case with Free OS too.
If someone else controls it then you don’t own it - it only does what you want if the real owners says so.
I’d disagree.you can still sell it’s break it, throw it out of a window, and so on. But control is outsourced. And it has to be, because developing your own system is too impractical. It’s not a bad thing that your OS is controlled by orgs, they push updates and software we don’t even know about that makes stuff work. But it’s a bad thing when that org is scummy, like M$
I can’t make or fix a car but I choose the 3rd parties to fix my property how I want it, or if it gets fixed at all. Being able to crash my car or being able to “resell a license” (in the EU) is not enough.
Man fuck that shit.
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
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.
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The only feature I’m looking forward to is the ability to ungroup multiple instances of the same program in the talk bar. That feature was around forever but for some reason they disabled it in Windows 11.
How do I install the nVidia drivers on Linux? I asking in case I decide to finally switch (found some Linux DAW, now all is happy, likely will go with Ubuntu + KDE).
On Ubuntu it’s just an option during installation. So far that’s the easiest install I’ve seen.
OpenSUSE supports a graphical install through their software manager, but I found it caused some issues so I ended up using the command line. That was actually very easy if you’re not uncomfortable using a terminal. Their docs were also accurate and easy to follow.
On fedora I followed the official docs but their instructions didn’t work, so I had to find some thread on a forum with alternate instructions. It took over an hour to get it working.
For sheer ease of use I would definitely stick to Ubuntu since that’s also the only distro Steam officially supports. I’ve had a good experience with OpenSUSE though so I’m sticking with it.
For the Open Source Nouveau Driver, it’s included in Mesa. You may also need the
xf86-video-nouveaudriver for 2D acceleration on X11 depending on your hardware. For example anything older than NV50 (G80) would likely need it. Newer GPU’s have seen better results when falling back onto the modesetting driver.For the Proprietary Drivers, it depends on the distro; most allow you to install them during the installation of the distro (few do it automatically afaik), using a GUI driver manager/detection tool included in some distros or using your package manager.
A distro like fedora however requires extra steps because they’re not included in the official repos.I hope you find this more informative than “install PopOS or X distro” that includes the proprietary drivers on the installation ISO itself.
Depends on the distro you choose, but these days it’s nothing too complicated. Either clicking an option for enabling the private driver in the drivers settings, or worse case just running a couple commands to manually add the private driver repo and download the package. You are done in 5 min m
What DAW do you use? I was pretty happy with Bitwig, the only con is that it’s not FOSS.
I found LMMS, which is perfectly fine for playing around with music. Lacks a few features though unfortunately, like recording at the moment. Not open source, but I also use Reaper, mainly to test MIDI stuff of my game engine through a loopback port on Windows (I’m a crazy person, and I wrote software synthesizers for my game engine).
LMMS and Reaper weren’t my things. I usually do everything by Terminal, but DAWs I’d where UI is a core necessity. IMO LMMS and Reaper just dont have those. Good that you found a setup through! Music on Linux is definitely getting better, maybe even faster than gaming.
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If you’re set on Nvidia, I recommend Pop OS or Nobara. Pop has a separate image that preinstalls Nvidia drivers. Nobara has a built in tool to download and install Nvidia drivers on first launch. Of the two, I’d probably go with Nobara (I’ve been using it for a year or so, love it) because not only does it have that tool, it also has an official KDE version, which it sounds like you’d prefer. You could install KDE with Pop, but I’ve done that before, and it creates a bloated nightmare of conflicting apps.
Not NVidia driver-related, but I would recommend KDE Neon or Kubuntu since they’re both KDE and Ubuntu-based, KDE Neon is made by KDE while Kubuntu is an Ubuntu flavor.
Clippy on steroids.
