





ASUS chairman Jonney Shih [Image Source: NYT]


Source: AllthingsD

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By JPForums on 7/31/2013 10:13:43 AM , Rating: 2
Some people do actually use the start menu. Personally, I make use of it moderately due to the shear number of programs I use on a regular basis and the fact that I can't stand a cluttered desktop. Professionally, at my workplace, people tend to fill up their desktops with product spec sheets, manuals, and documents they are working on. They don't even bother docking their most used applications to the task bar. You can imagine that they use the start menu quite a lot. Don't dismiss a usage scenario just because it doesn't match yours. Given the fact that there was enough user feedback to make Microsoft rethink their decision, I'd wager more than a few people use the start menu to some extent.

That said, the Windows 8 start screen isn't unusable by any stretch of the imagination (especially by a forum full of techies). Nobody made that claim. What they claim is that the old menu was better. Frankly, there are some measurable metrics to agree with this (others don't). For instance, the old start menu exceeds the Windows 8 start screen for number of applications visible (and readable) it can display on a single display. One could argue that the new menu takes less clicks, but if you have enough programs, you'd waste just as much time scrolling as you would clicking. While the Windows 8 start screen can be organized in such a way as to be quite efficient, for those that don't spend the time to mess with it, the old start menu is better by default. Also, it takes very little effort to arrange things alphabetically to make things even easier.

I do feel like Windows 8.1 has moved into the realm of equal but different by giving quicker access to the applications in list mode and allowing it to be set as default. It would be even nicer if they'd allow a contextual default. I'd use tiles for undocked (typically touch input) and list for docked (precision pointer available). Perhaps they already do this, but I don't have anything to check it out with at the moment. Unfortunately, the advantages still lie with tablets. Even if the desktop interface can be considered roughly on par with the older interface, there still isn't a compelling reason to switch. If convertible style tablets pick up steam, though, the change will be worth it.

All things considered, the hardest thing for me to understand is why any company would be so reluctant to monetize a product that they already have and people want.

