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Besides some of the good things like game compatibility and enterprise, what are some things you like about Windows 10?
There are a lot of complaints such as the preinstalled bloatware and lackluster window management, but what are some genuinely good features you enjoy?
Edit: Sorry about the extreme title gore.
The task manager and resource monitor are nice. I can't stand Windows for the most part anymore, but those two programs are pretty great.
Win10's task manager is such a vast improvement, I sometimes forget Windows 7 uses the old version and whenever I see people using it, it really drives home how old that OS is.
Isn't ResMon the same between 7/10 though?
I have no idea, honestly. I wasn't aware of it until I got a Windows 10 machine, so I don't really have a basis for comparison.
Multi-monitor support is much better than other versions of Windows.
For my money, Windows 2000 or XP were the best Windows of their own time. Slipstreaming updates and drivers and removing unwanted bloat with nLite improved them a lot. Firefox+Winamp+mIRC was snappy and responsive even on old/cheap laptops I was using at the time. Obviously trying to use either OS today would be a mistake, but by the standards of their day, I think both were better OS in early-2000s than Win10 is in 2018.
Maybe my opinion would change if I bothered trying NTLite to slim down Win10. It does have the most crapware MS has ever bundled with anything. But I haven't bothered, because desktop Linux and MacOS are both so good for my purposes I've relegated Windows to dedicated gaming usage.
One option that slims win10 down a fair bit is Windows 10 Enterprise LTSB (Long-Term Service Branch).
LTSB's selling point is that it is intentionally behind of feature updates. It mostly only applies security updates except that every couple years they do a feature update. But even that's pretty barren compared to other versions.
My biggest selling points are no Cortana, and no App Store. The latter might be a problem for some, but I think you can still install UWP apps via powershell. Though, I'm not exactly sure how you'd download them to begin with.
I bought a sketchy license off ebay for $15, which has worked for 10 months and 2 reinstalls, but it's not strictly kosher. So, there's a chance when the account that whatever this license is tied to is closed I might run into licensing errors. I think the only other ways of getting it legitimately are via volume licenses ($$,$$$), or something like dreamspark, msdn, etc.
I definitely don't agree with every choice MS has made about 10 and XP was revolutionary for the time, but Windows as a platform is still my favorite, albeit not how I would make an OS, but that's not an issue I can fix in a weekend haha
My eyebrow involuntarily raised when I read that bullet.
It's inconsistent as hell across different systems. It constantly tries to get you to use the new UWP apps instead of the older programs, classic control panel for example. In general it's a huge pain in my ass on a day-to-day basis.
It's easily one of the more significant complaints I have with 10. I hear that frequently from my clients, too.
The search in Classic Start is significantly more reliable in my workflow.
I personally don't use it too find files but I can find almost any program I'm looking for within typing only 2 or 3 characters. The only issues I run into where sometimes it'll return 2 results instead of my exact one is [File Explorer vs Internet Explorer] and [Paint vs Paint.NET]
When was the last time you used settings? I haven't needed to be switched over to control panel in ages.
Have you tried KDE? Even more fluid than Windows for that in particular IMO.
If you have a phone with unlockable bootloader, try LineageOS for MicroG edition. You can have a mostly-Free Software phone without any Google software at all. You don't have to give up much if you don't use a huge number of apps--but it comes with F-Droid for open source apps. Make sure to take advantage of the Privacy Guard feature for enforcing permission rules better than stock Android ever does.
You'll want a better web browser than LineageOS ships with. I think Lightning is nice--interface similar to Chrome, but with ad blocking and a cool tab drawer.
And if you're a Linux desktop user, don't miss KDE Connect on F-Droid. It syncs notifications, SMS, clipboard, files etc to your desktop, over WiFi rather than thru the cloud like Pushbullet. The desktop app is KDE Connect if you use KDE, GSConnect if you use Gnome.
I like the new terminal emulator that supports multi-line copies and resizing on the fly to any size, rather than a max of 50 columns it had before.
I like the color scheme. I've always liked dark themes. Mostly because it's easier on my eyes, but also because I look like a 1337 hacker. The closest I think MS ever came to a dark theme was Royale Noir in Windows XP Media Center Edition.
Does it support ANSI colours in the new terminal?
I wasn't sure so I just tested. I'm honestly surprised to see it does indeed have full ANSI support.
Here's what I did from linux to create the test batch file:
In windows, running the batch file echoed two red "hello"s, one at 10:10, so it looks like both colors and cursor movement are supported.
This is actually kinda great. Now I can write batch files that are compatible with DOS and Win10, but nothing in between.
I don't like Windows 10 very much, I still stand by either Windows 2000 or Windows 7 as the best ever Windows, but I really like the fact WSL exists. Being able to run Linux applications on Windows without having to use cygwin is amazing, and super handy when you need it. I wish Microsoft had made this a thing sooner, but oh well.
I get paid to use it and write code for it at my day job.
Two things I think most people just get used to and forget they were not there before. Scrolling on any non-active window, and changing the sound playback device by just clicking the volume icon.
Aside from the telemetry, I think it is the best, most polished Windows. I still use Linux for development, but I have to concede that for a lot of stuff, namely gaming and UX, Windows is superior. Still think that stuff like command line integration, package management and file-systems are better on Linux however.