Windows 10

[PowerPC]

This is first time Microsoft has solicited user input for their next OS.

And it has become The Homer (58Kb image).

[Temetka]

This is first time Microsoft has solicited user input for their next OS.

And it has become The Homer (58Kb image).

Lol.

[FryPpy]

You can hate me, but i hate Windows 8, 8.1 and 8.2. IMHO 8.2 is a good name for what you are calling windows 10.
With 8.1 (which is like a service pack) they reinvented Desktop functionality. With 8.2 they reinvented Start menu. I don't know how many hours or lines of code have been changed in Windows kernel from 8.1 to 8.2. But to me (as user) the changes is miserable.
Yes i have installed 8.2 on T61 with intel gfx. I have installed it without connection to the internet. And it has said that it haven't drivers for 965. Brightness control is unworkable out of the box and it turns it to the maximum. Plus acid cyan theme with monotone cyan borders, menus and background image with sharp white or black lines and shapes. In the dark room.... My eyes, head and stomach said that this is not right. I have tried to connect to the network and find drivers for video from device manager - but it can't find anything. I have fired feedback about this. And other about my willing. (but now one of my friends said that 965 driver is accessible from win update)

I hate that windows OS es for their UI design. I understand that this design is dictated by market competition. They want to build complete ecosystem with common UI for roaming users (from PC to tablets | smartphones) without loss of experience. And this targets makes this interface. Interface that accepts finger input and easy to understand on small screen. Other thing (IMHO) they aimed UI on content (information) to be delivering in unified way. The UI for OS usage is the same as for web browsing (which is main way for common people for content uptake). And i understand that they don't want to change this in near future. I think Win 7 was the last OS with classical look and feel. This is not only classical start menu or toolbar. This is for classical decoration of all elements. All this steps were made from XP times to now days. I know that i can use other software to tune up this OS (Thanks RBS for UbitMenu hint ). But this is not Gentoo (or other Linux) where i can rebuild it from the core to meet my needs - this is product they want i have paid money.

For example let's examine icons in new "old" start menu emeraldgirl's screens. Some icons was taken from windows 7 (win Vista more accurate). Big, fullcolor, scalable ("Document" or "Pictures"). But some "My computer" or "File explorer" are "rationalized". They have lost colors and have flatten and sharpen. But this is intermediate design before complete DUMB one. "PC Settings" - fully lost all of its colors and become more sharpen as any standard Metro icons. The thing that designer have in (s)his head - make icon as simpler (and abstract) as it can be. The more simpler and abstract thing is a word - that is placed near this. They want to make common and abstract UI. The develop common color gamut (16 base colors that can be chosen on small devices but can be redefined on desktop OS). W8 is faster than W7 in everyday desktop work (but not in 3D performance . I think this acceleration have achieved by many code refactorings but simplified UI is one of it.

But what they call "Theme" is collection of background images and main color for drawing common desktop primitives. There is no switchable themes that can draw primitives different way. I know themes for XP that can draw primitives and mimicry Win Vista (win 7) appearance. But M$ don't willing to (continue) make themes for W8 to make different look and feel for different people.

PS
PIC WARNING: Think different - feel different - this is not about W8+.

[Medessec]

My stance on Windows 8 has always been mixed... I've been absolutely adamant not to update any of my machines to Windows 8, due to the Metro interface being forced on me.

The Metro interface isn't bad, I think it's actually a good idea. But it's for tablets... and that's alright that they want 8 on tablets. But it makes absolutely no sense to maintain that on desktops and laptops, which are productivity machines that have long since found an incredibly efficient and easy form of input(keyboard and mouse). The problem lies with that Microsoft doesn't provide the option to disable Metro, or re-enable the old start menu. If you want that with Windows 8, you have to install third party mods. WHY?!

From what I'm seeing of Windows 10, it's a godsend. I'm probably going to install the preview on my W700DS at some point this week, and I'm sure a lot of you would like to hear how that goes in terms of drivers and other features. We'll have to see.

[pianowizard]

You can hate me, but i hate Windows 8, 8.1 and 8.2.

No one would hate you for this, unless you add personal attacks like "Windows 8, 8.1 and 8.2 are designed for fools". Unfortunately, more than a few people have made statements like that.

Yes i have installed 8.2 on T61 with intel gfx. I have installed it without connection to the internet. And it has said that it haven't drivers for 965. Brightness control is unworkable out of the box and it turns it to the maximum. Plus acid cyan theme with monotone cyan borders, menus and background image with sharp white or black lines and shapes. In the dark room.... My eyes, head and stomach said that this is not right. I have tried to connect to the network and find drivers for video from device manager - but it can't find anything.

Keep in mind two things. First, this is not the finished product. It's just a very early beta version. Second, the T61 is pretty old. When Windows 10 is released in late 2015, the T61 will be about 8 years old. Windows has never guaranteed full support for 8-year-old hardware. As an example, XP came out in late 2001. Does it run well on all computers made in 1993? I would say it doesn't run at all on ANY computers from 1993, which were at most 60MHz Pentium I!

UPDATE:
Someone just sent me this link: http://www.winhistory.de/more/386/xpmini.htm.en

[Medessec]

I am now running the preview on my spare W700ds, all the drivers except the Fingerprint driver have installed easily or on their own. The Wacom tablet works just fine too. However- there are a few glitch problems, such as when I use the second screen, by default it flipped the second screen "landscape", which rotated the desktop 90 degrees, and it flipped the main desktop completely upside down. I had to rotate that back, and set the second screen to portrait. Also- moving some programs such as a web browser to the second screen really distorts the text and other graphics open on the program for a split second.

I love the new start menu, but I dragged a folder shortcut into the Metro Tiles on the Start Menu pane, and it doesn't seem to work, or want to go away(right clicking does nothing.) Might be a bug.

I'll keep using it... see how things go.

[precip9]

I am now running the preview on my spare W700ds, all the drivers except the Fingerprint driver have installed easily or on their own.

Is switchable graphics working? (Can't recall if W700 has switchable, or just discrete.)

[Temetka]

Just popped my Windws 7 SSD back in my machine. I was experiencing frequent explorer.exe crashes. Not a big deal as Windows 10 is clearly a beta. I really love the OS overall. So I will try it again with the next beta (or whatever) release.

[BillMorrow]

beta for sure..
tried installing on a T400..
it asks for some media driver and then fails to specify WHAT driver it wants..

more tinkering is needed i guess..

[Utwig]

Just popped my Windws 7 SSD back in my machine. I was experiencing frequent explorer.exe crashes. Not a big deal as Windows 10 is clearly a beta. I really love the OS overall. So I will try it again with the next beta (or whatever) release.

I experienced explorer crashes on shutdown.
This fixed them.

https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Fo ... progeneral

Otherwise this 540p has problems resuming from sleep (lattest BIOS, nVidia, Intel graphics and chipset drivers, thinkpad PM drivers). This issue was present on this machine also with 8.1 but was fixed by updating drivers. Anyone has an idea what to try. (I worked around by forcing it to hibernate on closing lid.

[Dekks]

And other about my willing. (but now one of my friends said that 965 driver is accessible from win update)

Just get the Win7 or 8 drivers and install in compatibility mode. But the key to getting the Intel video and SATA recognised is the Intel Chipset drivers.

Win 8/8.1 and W10 are faster as the memory usage by the kernel is better. Reducing the visual decorations probably aren't as big a factor as the under the bonnet tweaks.

[Utwig]

For 965 drivers you need to hack ini so that they install on latter than 7.

[Medessec]

Is switchable graphics working? (Can't recall if W700 has switchable, or just discrete.)

The W700 has discrete only, it's the T400/T500 ATI models or W500 that have switchable graphics.

Funnily enough, I have W500s that I can try out, but I'm not sure I have a spare HDD to test the Preview on with those laptops. I'll get back to you on that.

[Utwig]

I have T540p with nV + Intel, graphics work though I haven't tested whether it switches. I get black screen on resume from sleep which might be graphics related.

I haven't tried any games so far.

What would you like me to test?

[topmahof]

Installed it on an X200 tablet and everything worked except the pen and touch. MS put through an update yesterday and now pen and touch work. Pen works perfect but touch is off by 2 inches and calibration doesn't work.

Installed it as an upgrade to the factory Win. 7 upgrade and Power Manager and Toolbox works. Even the german fan control works, but I'll bet future builds of 10 will probably break most of those. No issue in Device Manager and using the image drivers provided by MS.

I'd be careful though, MS can see everything you do in the tech preview, so I wouldn't do anything or go anywhere which requires a password.

It's pretty quick, runs really well and I like the new interface a lot.

Regards,
Dave

[Dekks]

For 965 drivers you need to hack ini so that they install on latter than 7.

No just install the win 7 ones in by right clicking the exe and then select trouble shoot compatibility then run test when asked.

[x220]

I don't tend to use Windows too often as I've mainly been using Linux for a few years now. I do quite like Windows 7 and get on with it well when I'm using it. I did install the pre-release of Windows 8 on a spare computer when it was available as a test, but didn't get on with it at all so it was a short lived test.

I installed the Windows 10 pre-release on my battered Dell L502x the other day and have to say I quite like it, it appears quite stable, especially for a pre-release. It also feels quite polished and very usable (although the lack of media features is a little annoying, but that will be sorted for the final release.

I did a brief review of it here -> http://thevdm.com/2014/10/21/testing-mi ... indows-10/

As mentioned near the beginning of this thread, although Windows XP grew into an operating system that was very usable I remember its initial release and it was atrocious at the start.

[BillMorrow]

got win10 on an X300 (or 301)..
so far it runs quite nicely..
much better/faster than the native Lenovo preload win vista on an X300..
it seems to have all the hardware drivers needed to run..

so, i'll see what else it has to offer..

[jmar896]

I loaded Windows 10 on my R500. It works OK, and all of the necessary drivers seem to be there. I haven't used it that much, but so far its been pretty good. I like it better than Windows 8.

[BillMorrow]

I loaded Windows 10 on my R500. It works OK, and all of the necessary drivers seem to be there. I haven't used it that much, but so far its been pretty good. I like it better than Windows 8.

why..? do you like it better than win8..?
inquiring minds want to know.. and i do too..

[KRAZY KEV]

Has anyone managed to successfully install Windows 10 on a T43. I would like to try it myself.
My T43 has the ATI video chip and also 2gb RAM.
It is currently running W7 Ultimate 32 bit

[emeraldgirl08]

I had the Technical Preview installed for a month or so on my Dell Latitude. I thought my install was working fine however when I tried to update to the latest build it just would not work! Also my location for the weather tile would not keep after a restart. After every restart it would show Washington DC- not sure if that is the default city I had to initialize the app and then it would finally display the correct city.

As for what my impressions are of W10 so far? I think once it is polished and less buggy I could make use of it. As for now I split-time between 4 other OS. Although it seems I am one of the 3 or 4 people on the planet who does not mind W8.1. I have it set up the way I want and I also like how my start page looks. My desktop programs all work on W8.1 and I have never ever had a BSOD (knock on wood). I think at the most I play the occasional game on my desktop which the graphics card I have installed handles fine and also do web-based research. As far as crunching data I do not have any courses this semester that calls for it.

W7 is installed on my X201T and for drawing all the chemical and mathematical notation for classes I find it just excels in that area! The upside of the X201T is that I save $$$ which would normally be spent on paper Recently I started a foray into Crouton with my c720. It's been fun so far and I took it out for a test drive at school this morning. It worked quite well and I can recommend it for those who like to dabble in OS and different hardware. I think in respect to my line of OS I am okay for now. At least until that mixture of curiosity and boredom get the best of the technical-gadget aspect of my psyche! The joys of being geeky lol

[Norway Pad]

Spending a snowy Sunday here installing Win10 on a T420 I recently purchased. And my first reaction is Wow, the Start menu is back! At least a version of it that is actually usable. I never became accustomed with the Win8 Start Menu (Rather, the complete lack there of), so I run Win8 with Stardocks Win7 Start Menu software. While installing Win10 here, I went all the way, and signed up for a Microsoft account. This laptop is just a test environment, as my daily drivers are still the Win7/Win8 operated machines. So this is an excellent chance to see if I feel comfortable with this. I really haven't had the time to study One Drive in depth, but it might be something I could be willing to continue to use on a permanent basis.

Everything works fine so far, except that IE freezes and uses excessive CPU sometimes, particularly when I try to open Gmail. There are also some unknown devices in Device Manager still, so will be looking into those. The most disappointing is actually the screen of the T420. But I guess it could be expected, coming from 4:3 IPS screens, and it's really not a Win10 issue.

Update: Intel ATM 7.1 driver fixed the last one of the unknown devices, and Intel HD graphics driver also installed ok. So it seems like all Win8 / Win8.1 drivers work in Win10. The Synaptics software actually came through Windows Update. But Hotkeys OSD doesn't work and Power Manager 6 refuses to install at all. (Cannot run on this system)

[Norway Pad]

I have been working some more with the T420 and the Win10 install, and by reverting to Hotkeys V3.81, as suggested in another thread, OSD does now work, including all Fn+Fx keys. This was also the case when I tried to install Hotkeys on a T410 with Win7, so this appears to be an issue with Hotkeys and not a Win10 problem. With some creative installing, Presentation Director also works in Win10. In all honesty, Win10's native Fn+F7 menu is actually equally good, but beating the system counts for some too.

Fn+F3 does however not work, as I haven't made any more attempts with the Power Manager. Power Manager is apparently not supported past Win7, and I know from previous experiences with Win8 that due to the incompatibility, Power Manager couldn't be uninstalled once installed. Luckily it id work for me initially in Win8, but I suspect it later screwed up my Win8.1 upgrade, and it was the only software I couldn't uninstall. I might create a restore point and give it a new try to see if it installs at all in Win10 now that some more System Software is in place. It's really a shame to have lost the battery information option, and the ability to set charging thresholds.

Anybody know if some other software is / will be available for accessing battery status/settings, or will that be an option that's lost forever?

IE seems to behave better after an Windows Update, it doesn't freeze or act up like it did.

[GomJabbar]

@Norway Pad

A solution such as the following may work for you.
http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=18823

Just an idea...

[Norway Pad]

Thanks for the input, interesting to know. I understand that this "inserts" the various power settings directly into the registry if they for some reason can't be set with Power Manager.

All my power settings are however made with the Win10 native Power Options tool, and appear to be ok. So it's the status of the battery and the possibility for setting the battery charging thresholds that I miss.

[precip9]

I have been working some more with the T420 and the Win10 install, and by reverting to Hotkeys

Anybody know if some other software is / will be available for accessing battery status/settings, or will that be an option that's lost forever?

Perhaps this is not directly applicable, but I have three X61s in which Power Manager is completely functional with W8.1. It was installed with the original W8 clean install, and remained working with W8.1.

The currently installed version is 6.30. I can't recall whether I pulled in an update.

[Norway Pad]

precip9: Did you run the Power Manager Setup file in some compatibility mode, or was it directly compatible? On Win10, I simply got the message that the software wasn't compatible and couldn't be installed when I tried to install Power Manager. I used the T420 / Win7 version, which seems to be 6.67.2.

I run Power Manager just fine on a T60 with Win8, but I ran into issues when I upgraded to Win8.1. It took 5 minutes to boot up, froze randomly and became unusable. I uninstalled as much as I could of system software and applications in an attempt to find the conflicting software, but it didn't work out. I can't say for sure it was Power Manager that caused it, but I couldn't remove Power Manager, as the uninstall file didn't work. Judging from your experience, it probably wasn't Power Manager, so maybe I'll create an image and attempt this upgrade one more time. Otherwise I have to make a clean install of Win8, which will be some work.

Edit: The reason for the 8.1 issue is later found to be components connected to the ATI graphics driver / CCC software.

[hhmcsv]

ON my spare T60, I am running all of the "neccesary" utilities (Power Manager (grku10ww), On Screen Display, Active Protection system) on the latest two releases of Win 10. No issues. Some of it I recall is being installed in Win7-compatability mode

[precip9]

precip9: Did you run the Power Manager Setup file in some compatibility mode, or was it directly compatible?

I'm sorry, I can't recall.