Windows 7 Classic vs. New Start Menu

[SteveWiilliams]

Wrong values:
- Taskbar locked
- Quick launch off
- language bar on
- similar taskbar buttons groubed
- hide inactive icons
- clean unused icons
- My Computer and My Documents missing from desktop

15 minutes? Why would this take you 15 minutes.

Right click on an empty space in the taskbar, and left click on 'Properties'. In the Taskbar Properties box, just tick a few boxes, click OK, and you're done. That takes about a minute. As for unlocking the taskbar, that's gonna take a maximum time of 10 seconds, and takes about three clicks to accomplish. You can easily switch several toolbars on in about 30 seconds, and QuickLaunch is not needed when you can dock shortcuts to the left end of the taskbar anyway. The whole idea of 7 is to group icons. When you move your mouse over the icon for an application that has several documents open, a thumbnail preview appears displaying each of these said documents. Click the document you want and it is brought to the fore, as simple as that!

And now I'm going to have a small shout at you. If you've been using 7, or even Vista, then you would know that the 'My' prefix has vanished from before 'Computer' and 'Documents', as well as 'Pictures', 'Videos' and 'Music'. Besides, getting the shortcuts for Computer and Documents onto the desktop is as easy as opening the Start menu, and dragging the shortcuts from there onto the desktop!

Overall, the things you listed should take no more than 3 minutes. For 10 computers, this takes a meagre half an hour.

In Firefox I can hide the bars and get the full screen by F11. It is really a stroke of genius !

You want a fullscreen shortcut for maximizing Windows? Try Win+Up. It maximizes a window if it's minimized.

I hope MS makes at least 5 profiles for the new Win7: games, multimedia, homeserver, office, laboratory.

By 'profiles' I am guessing that you mean versions or editions of Windows 7? Well, unfortunately for you, Microsoft is never going to make an operating system especially for gaming. Nor is Windows ever going to have a version based specifically around multimedia. Why? Because Windows Ultimate can already do these things. Windows Server already exists, so you must have been living in a cardboard box for several years. Office is a suite you install separately, and lab technicians normally have their own bespoke system anyway.

word processing program, where the menus could be awaken with the second key of the mouse or mouse gestures.

There's these things called keyboard shortcuts. Try looking into them.

 

[john3347]

F11 also toggles between window and full screen in Internet Explorer 7 and 8 beta. Firefox has no advantage over Internet Explorer on that point. (Perhaps Firefox stole the idea from IE in the first place????)

 

[SteveWiilliams]

I don't think Mozilla would copy anyone. They're not like Apple and all the other annoying little copy cats.

 

[john3347]

Perhaps Mozilla would not copy anyone, but they certainly could improve their product if they did. The ability to "Save to desktop" (a button to create a desktop shortcut to current URL) would be one option that would greatly improve Firefox

 

[davehc]

"You want a fullscreen shortcut for maximizing Windows? Try Win+Up. It maximizes a window if it's minimized."

"F11 also toggles between window and full screen in Internet Explorer 7 and 8 beta. Firefox has no advantage over Internet Explorer on that point."

Not forgetting that in 7, all you have to do to get a full screen in any window, is simply drag it to the top of the screen.

On the Classic menu posts. At the start of Vista, I found it was worthwhile customising my menu how I wanted it, and, as I did in XP. I don't have don't have a long list of programs. I have this menu saved and , on reinstallations, I copy it over.

 

[SteveWiilliams]

I know! Isn't it amazing! I love the way dragging it to either side of the screen fills one side of the screen!

Also, I love the way you can just drag the window out of a minimized state!

Amazing!

 

[iroken22]

Anyone that wants a classic start menu emulator for windows 7 try Link Removed - Invalid URL. Basiccally it gives you back your branching off menus and takes away some of the graphics in the new one. I have attached a screenshot of what it does.

 

[reghakr]

NICE,

That's one of the reasons I like the Classic menus that fold out. it requires less clicking to locate the program you want to run.

 

[mistofeles]

15 minutes? Why would this take you 15 minutes.

Right click on an empty space in the taskbar, and left click on 'Properties'. In the Taskbar Properties box, just tick a few boxes, click OK, and you're done. That takes about a minute...as simple as that!

It seems that you have installed various Windows hundreds of times like I have done. Still, there is people, who doesn't do this daily. Some of them spend hours to make their PCs work.

And now I'm going to have a small shout at you. If you've been using 7, or even Vista, then you would know that the 'My' prefix has vanished

Hooray ! Great change ! The world has been saved !
(I think they at last noted that those damned blankos in the directory names are a real nuisance, when you copy material to and from Linux servers.)

You want a fullscreen shortcut for maximizing Windows? Try Win+Up. It maximizes a window if it's minimized.

By 'profiles' I am guessing that you mean versions or editions of Windows 7? Well, unfortunately for you, Microsoft is never going to make an operating system especially for gaming. Nor is Windows ever going to have a version based specifically around multimedia. Why? Because Windows Ultimate can already do these things. Windows Server already exists, so you must have been living in a cardboard box for several years. Office is a suite you install separately, and lab technicians normally have their own bespoke system anyway.

There is a real need for different profiles/versions of Windows. I would prefer to have various versions for the gamers and office people. ( I do know program 'Office', thank you ). The gamers want all bells and whistles in rainbow colors to their computers. For office people this is real nuisance.
And yes, Win Ultimate does have multimedia for the laboratories, office tools for gamers and DVDboxes. One system, which tries to fullfill all the needs there is. No wonder the system is such a megalomaniac memoryeater.

A possible solution would be to have different easily creatable user profiles. In WinXP you had this possibility as long as you didn't have your PC in a domain. When you connected your device to a domain, it castrated itself and become one-user-multitasking system. You didn't even have the 'SUDO' or 'SU' command. RUNAS is a joke.

And about the 'server'. Please read carefully: HOMEserver. I do know there is server versions of Windows. I have some of them running here. Still, I would not recommend any of them for a family use running backups, diskservers, multimedia server, identification server, home web server and home security. The installation and setup of Microsoft servers are still for professionals.

 

[geowick07]

I like the new Start Menu also. Much cleaner and more pleasing to the eye. Also, as mentioned above, I like the Shut Down function being there from the start, rather than having to customize to get it that way.
I am running 7048 right now, and can't say enough about how well it is running on my system. P4 @3.0, 2Gb ddr, 512Mb GPU...and it blows Vista away. Can't wait for the official release.



geo

 

[sebastian___]

Well, I can understand why so many prefer the new Start menu and the New UI. Why not ? It's shiny with nice colors and the design is pretty good. I like the design, the graphics. But as a graphics designer trying to create myself pretty pictures I rather have an ugly boring interface which will not distract me from my real work where I'm trying to do the exact same type of graphics.

- Not to mention that over the years I gathered / or created some really good tools for speeding up tremendously the UI . Naturally I wanna keep those fantastic tools - but they work only with the classic UI

For me the new interface is something that I play with for an hour marveling how beautiful it is, then I say - OK play time is over, now let's get to the real work - and switch to the old ugly grey UI. This way I can work as fast as possible to get the job done - because, hey ! . Who wants to look at that ugly UI for so long ?

And there are tons of graphics designers thinking the same as I do. What choice do we have ?

 

[mistofeles]

Well, I can understand why so many prefer the new Start menu and the New UI. Why not ? It's shiny with nice colors and the design is pretty good. I like the design, the graphics. But as a graphics designer trying to create myself pretty pictures I rather have an ugly boring interface which will not distract me from my real work where I'm trying to do the exact same type of graphics.

It is nice to have something new and shiny every now and then. Play with all the bells and whistles for a moment. Then: back to work. In the long run I take all those eyecandies out and try to make the system run fast and clean. In the long run it is irritating to see windowses slide and change their colour. I have not found any use for transparent windowses.

Two things I would appreciate is a change to COPY and MOVE commands:
- PAUSE copy (and MOVE)
- COPY only those files, which are missing from the destination.

 

[HeadCase]

I'm still a Classic Menu fanboy. Now just trying to adjust to the New.

I understand how some folks like the New Menu. Many people just install programs, leave all the messy folders and shortcuts and want a direct link to the programs they use most (majority of these wont really use more programs than would fit on the Recent Programs List).

Me on the other hand, as soon as a program is installed, I remove all the folders and place a cleanly named shortcut into one of my personally catagorized folders (System Tools, Games, AV Editing, etc).
When the classic menu is unorganized, it is hard to navigate. But if it is organized, everything is very easy to find.

I like to do things on a whim. I open my Games folder and look at the list before I chose one that hits me for the moment.
I do likewise when I'm working. Do I feel like watching (or rather listening) to a random movie or the Futurama playlist while I organize photos or do some digital painting?.

Shortcuts to open windows explorer and show a big box with a list of shortcuts is just obtuse.
It would be great if you could at least chose which showed first, the Recent Programs List or the All Programs Menu (since the All Programs Menu at least has expandable folders).

Adding expandable Document, Music, Game, and Picture folders to the menu is great. But why cant we make custom folders to do the same?
Guess I'll just trick myself and link Documents to one of my shortcut folders and just rename it System Tools or somesuch.

 

[john3347]

Headcase, I am learning to use "Libraries" much in the way you describe and Although I still prefer the simplicity and "efficient look" of the classic start menu, it is less of an issue that it was earlier. They haven't made any improvement over Windows 2000, but 7 is an improvement over XP and a HUGE improvement over Vista.

 

[HeadCase]

No doubt it is an improvement. The search bar is genius if you know what you're looking for. No need to fuss through anything at all.
But I think I broke it somehow. That's a different story.

Recent Programs list is also functional for those with short lists (but that's not me). And customizing the list just doesnt seem to be working out for me since I like categorizing things and have quick access beyond just programs.
I find myself hitting the WinKey >selecting the All Programs menu > Selecting the Category > Opening Program/Game/Whatever.
It doesnt sound like much but the act of clicking feels sluggish when I used to have my pointer movements memorized for every program I would open in a swift arc of the mouse through instantly expanding menus (the unnecessary extra click for the All Programs menu doesnt help either ).

 

[sebastian___]

I can't understand why can't they make the Windows customizable ? I mean..isn't this the progress ? I seem to remember seeing a video with someone from Microsoft a few years ago - saying that Windows 7 and the future versions will be all about customizability. And that person said something like :

"What if I wanna make my windows looking like Windows 3.1 ? We should have the possibility to customize the windows in every way we want. That is the true power" -or something like that. I don't remember exactly it was a few years back.

But they just assume everyone has the same experience and want the same thing from their computer. And they just assume everyone is a beginner. Maybe the Windows should just ask you on install : Beginner ? Advanced ?

It seems instead of giving more options to customize, they are taking back some. While all major programs are giving you more options with each new version like custom shortcuts and such.

 

[davehc]

Maybe this thread could be closed. It seems to have lost it's way and seldom, now, relates to the title.
Perhaps posters could start new threads if the subject matter is not related to the classic menu?

 

[unawave]

It seems instead of giving more options to customize, they are taking back some.

I agree with you completely.

And remember: In Vista it was possible to switch between "new start menu style" and "classic start menu style". I thought Windows 7 wasn't so far away from Vista. Microsoft has dropped this feature. And this is the opposite way to that what you quote:

You should have the possibility to customize the windows in every way you want

 

[shudau]

New:
Reasons - Search feature, cleaner, doesn't fold out, much more stylish graphically, more options in less space....

New Menu due to same reasons mentioned above

 

[Matteus]

I'm a big fan of the new menu. Seeing as alot of my time, mainly for recreation, is spent on the computer it's extremely nice to be able to work with something as visually pleasing.