News Windows 11 market share declines as users seemingly shift back to Windows 10

[CmdrShepard]

Once you get used to it, it's just as good or better than 10.

"Once you get used to licking the boot it's just as tasty as a burger or better." -- Literally no one, ever.

Yes, it's change.

Nobody is against change -- without change there's no progress. But change can be for the better of for worse, not every change is good. Change for the sake of changing something is a pointless waste of everyone's time and energy.

Yes, that means there's a learning curve, however minor. Life goes on.

And exactly because the life goes on (and passes way too quickly) people who are older dislike pointless changes which introduce friction into their life.

Said friction is taking away their precious time, time they would rather spend on doing other things than re-learning stuff just because Microsoft decided to shift things around for no good reason.

There's also this thing called muscle memory and if you moved your mouse to the lower left corner for the past 30 years to click on Start button, you'd understand why moving it pisses people off.

Most people don't care about customizing every nook and cranny of their OS.

Most people also have friends who know their way around Windows who fix crap for them. Those fixers (system admins, developers) are the people Microsoft is pissing off because they are the ones who work fastest when they can customize things to their liking.

Windows 11 has no reason to exist.

- It has a version 10.0.22631, that should tell you how little has changed under the hood from Windows 10
- All new features it has could have been released in Windows 10

Frankly, I am surprised that nobody has tried to put explorer.exe from Windows 10 into it yet.

 

[USAFRet]

Windows 11 has no reason to exist.

- It has a version 10.0.22631, that should tell you how little has changed under the hood from Windows 10
- All new features it has could have been released in Windows 10

Exactly.

"Win 11" is little more than Win 10, SP2.
The "11" is irrelevant, except to those who wish to throw a hissy fit over the naming convention.

It is little different than Win 10.

 

[Novas_]

Despite many efforts by Microsoft, many users are still sticking with Windows 10 while the new reports by Statcounter showing many users worldwide migrated from Windows 11 last year.

Windows 11 market share declines as users seemingly shift back to Windows 10 : Read more

XD I agree, I always update my OS and after upgrading from win 10pro to win 11 pro I switch back to win10 again.

 

[mavroxur]

It doesn't matter - Microsoft is big enough to bend the market to its will. They'll just force 10 out of existence by forcing the ecosystem around it to Win 11. Make it impossible for software developers to support Win 10 by deprecating software functions that are shared between 10 and 11 and vendors will stop supporting Win 10 and / or start requiring signed code that can't be executed on Win 10 devices. Either vendors get left in the dust and can't compile apps that run on 10 and 11 simultaneously (requiring them to maintain two code bases, which most won't do) or they move to Win 11. Once software vendors start requiring Win 11, everyone will begrudgingly start moving to it.

 

[phxrider]

Exactly.

"Win 11" is little more than Win 10, SP2.
The "11" is irrelevant, except to those who wish to throw a hissy fit over the naming convention.

It is little different than Win 10.

They did it to create a cutoff point to force newer technologies for security. I don't totally expect people on a gaming oriented site to understand why they want to make a TPM mandatory, for example, but it IS highly relevant for corporate security, and corporations pay more for their OSes than gamers and system builders who largely pirate it or buy questionable $15 Pro licenses online, so their concerns go to the top of the heap. It's not that difficult to understand.

 

[slightnitpick]

I was referring to the drama queens on here crying about "OMG they changed it to a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT TASKBAR and now I have to learn a WHOLE NEW OS 😭😭😭😭😭", when in reality they shifted the position and everything works 98% the same.

Some users still have problems because of the switch from the user interface in Windows 7 to 10. Lots of people have used various tools to make 10 look and behave as much like 7 (or even XP) as they can.

So it may be a minor change from the 10 to 11 default user interface, but for some users the lack of customization will mean a huge change. It will mean going from the 7, or even XP, user interface all the way to 11.

They did it to create a cutoff point to force newer technologies for security. I don't totally expect people on a gaming oriented site to understand why they want to make a TPM mandatory, for example, but it IS highly relevant for corporate security,

Is it so much harder to support TPM 1.2 or no TPM for Windows 11 Home users? But sure, never expect a publicly-traded corporation to do something out of the goodness of their heart, because a publicly-traded corporation has no heart.

 

[CmdrShepard]

They did it to create a cutoff point to force newer technologies for security. I don't totally expect people on a gaming oriented site to understand why they want to make a TPM mandatory, for example, but it IS highly relevant for corporate security, and corporations pay more for their OSes than gamers and system builders who largely pirate it or buy questionable $15 Pro licenses online, so their concerns go to the top of the heap. It's not that difficult to understand.

The cutoff point wasn't security at all.

Microsoft (with Intel's "help") has decided that they don't want to support Efficiency cores in Win10. Thread Director is only working in Win11 while in Win10 you have suboptimal thread scheduling and probably power management as well. They also flat out refused to add support for Intel AMX instruction set extensions in Win10 and that's also another Win11 "exclusive".

So no, the cutoff is about "new" (read: sligthly warmed up) Intel hardware. Intel sells CPUs and chipsets, mainboard makers sell new mainboards, OEMs sell new PCs, Microsoft sells new Windows licenses to those OEMs to include in said PCs -- it's just another consumer rip-off cycle done forcibly and without regard for still totally capable hardware which is going to end up in landfills way sooner than necessary -- great example of privatizing profits and socializing losses at work.

If the cutoff was really just about security they could have just said "starting from Win10 21H2 there are new security requirements" and everything else would have stayed the same including the GUI so no one would have to complain about that.

What they did instead is they tied a pointless GUI change which nobody asked for to security and hardware support features which everyone needs which is a form of bundling, and an extremely user-hostile one.

So kindly stop defending them -- they are perfectly capable of defending themselves. And stop using piracy as a justification for crappy business practices which affect everyone while annoying paying customers the most.

 

[cryoburner]

When Win 13 rolls around, Win 11 will be seen as the Great Savior.

It has always been thus.

I really don't think Windows Me, Vista, or 8 ever gained widespread acceptance as being considered "great", since they all had notable issues that the versions following them largely addressed. Typically, Windows versions have tended to alternate between those largely seen as being "bad" and those seen as being relatively "good", and 11 is in line to fill in the role of being a "bad" release. Typically, those releases make certain problematic changes that the following releases largely backtrack on and improve upon. The "good" releases may make some questionable changes as well, but the largest usability issues introduced in the previous version are generally addressed, at the very least.

As for XP, it was generally positively accepted early on, at least compared to the Windows9X line it was replacing on the consumer side. It was more demanding on hardware than the 9X releases and there were some software compatibility issues, so it was generally a bad idea to upgrade existing systems to it, but it finally brought the stability of Microsoft's NT line to the consumer space, which was a welcome and overdue change by that point, along with a lot of new features, and with the option to revert most major interface changes.

Windows 11, on the other hand, didn't really bring any major improvements to the table with its release, with the only noticeable changes being some questionable alterations to the interface that just made it more tedious to navigate.

I remember back then I was thinking about how short period after W2K before a new one was released.

Windows 2000 was the last business-oriented version of NT before Microsoft finally merged their home and business operating systems with XP, so Me and 2000 both ended up being sort of short-term stopgap releases before XP was ready to roll out.

 

[USAFRet]

I really don't think Windows Me, Vista, or 8 ever gained widespread acceptance as being considered "great"

Right. Those particular versions never were "great".

XP was initially ridiculed as too cartoon-like.

Memory lane: Before everyone loved Windows XP, they hated it

Back when it was new, Windows XP was the worst thing imaginable—ask Ars readers.

arstechnica.com

(there were many other articles like this)

Fast forward a few years, and "XP is the greatest evar!!"

 

[cryoburner]

XP was initially ridiculed as too cartoon-like.

I wasn't too fond of XP's default blue-plastic theme either, as it was pretty garish and distracting. However, XP also included an alternate silver-metallic theme that arguably looked much better. And of course, it was also possible to disable those new themes entirely and revert to something that looked similar to Windows 9x/2000. If the more recent versions of Windows similarly offered the ability to revert their interface changes, you wouldn't hear nearly as much complaining about them. And of course, most of these changes to the interface arguably make navigating it more cumbersome, whereas XP was still at a point where a lot of meaningful improvements were getting added to the OS. When your new OS is mainly just the same as the old one, just with some divisive interface changes, that's more of a problem.

 

[USAFRet]

I wasn't too fond of XP's default blue-plastic theme either, as it was pretty garish and distracting. However, XP also included an alternate silver-metallic theme that arguably looked much better. And of course, it was also possible to disable those new themes entirely and revert to something that looked similar to Windows 9x/2000. If the more recent versions of Windows similarly offered the ability to revert their interface changes, you wouldn't hear nearly as much complaining about them. And of course, most of these changes to the interface arguably make navigating it more cumbersome, whereas XP was still at a point where a lot of meaningful improvements were getting added to the OS. When your new OS is mainly just the same as the old one, just with some divisive interface changes, that's more of a problem.

Right.
XP wasn't too bad. It was much better after SP1.
I used it extensively.

My only point was the rose colored glasses people look back with.
"XP was the bestest evar!" ignores the initial hatefest.

 

[in_the_loop]

Windows 10 functions fine with Alder/Raptor Lake. Some techtubers also did tests with this and found nothing discernible in gaming. Its also possible to disable the ecores if you are a gamer, and that too has no real noticeable impact. The competition to Alder/Raptor Lakes is 7800X3d, which only has 8 cores and performs better in gaming. Task manager is a user preference and subjective thing, but losing customization options isn't "better", thats a slap in the face, or rather living under the boot of a monopolistic company thats forcing its will on users and stealing all their data.



Win11 actually has worse requirements, for example, MS now requires (with work-arounds of course, but not obvious or advertised) an online MS account login to install. There is also a TPM requirement, this is also not good because it renders a lot of older hardware obsolete that would otherwise work totally fine. Also, Win11 will place a water mark on PCs that don't have NPUs (AI acceleration) for the unnecessary and looking for a problem copilot AI assistant. How were you measuring that win10 had higher system requirements?

I'm not that interested in performance in gaming since the GPU matters so much more. At worst it is about the same for games give or take a percentage or two for 10 or 11.
What has been shown is that it benefits in other things were multithreading matters, for me a 13600k processor which have the E-cores.
For DAW:s (music production applications with soft synths, effects etc being generated) there is a clear benefit.
And that is what I find most usage for it, performance wise.

 

[USAFRet]

Despite many efforts by Microsoft, many users are still sticking with Windows 10 while the new reports by Statcounter showing many users worldwide migrated from Windows 11 last year.

Replying to @bluenorw :

"This latest report reveals a drop of 0.97 points which translates from 26.68% to 25.65% while showing a corresponding increase in Windows 10."

"many users" == less than 1%.

 

[bluenorw]

Despite many efforts by Microsoft, many users are still sticking with Windows 10 while the new reports by Statcounter showing many users worldwide migrated from Windows 11 last year.

Windows 11 market share declines as users seemingly shift back to Windows 10 : Read more

When logging on to Win 10 this morning, I hit enter to bring up the PIN entry screen before realising that MS had added a pop-up screen with yet another invitation to download Win11. Tried various suggested solutions including Reg edits to try to stop the download and installation but these didn't work. Eventually Win11 installed but I was fortunately able to recover to Win10 without any mishaps or losing any data. It is damn annoying that MS tries to force this "upgrade" on users who are perfectly happy to stay with their existing OS. Installing any other programme on Win brings up the prompt of "Do you want this app to make changes to your device" but for a major issue such as an OS upgrade, that prompt isn't available. Very poor customer relations on the part of MS, which makes me want to have another go with Linux.

 

[Grobe]

Today, at work - end of a meeting I just had my W11 moment, yes of course I wanted to leave quickly because - end of the day. However the W11 wanted it a different way. The shutdown menu does have an option in the menu to "Shut down" instead of "install updates and shut down" so then of course I selected the "Shut down" menu. However, the OS is in charge not the user, so of course the OS overridden my choice and the much dreaded te xt appears on screen "Please don't shut down the computer" - all while OS was downloading some updates.
Everyone leave the room but me.

I don't want to hate a product, especially when on work - but, well the mind is free you know.

So while I was waiting for W11 to do its thing, I wondered how this would look like if an employee have had similar issues that W11 at the end of the day, meetings etc.

Imagine having an employee under you, a secretary I can use as example. When that employee has his day with bad mood, that employee not only simply refuses to leave the room after any meeting or at the end of the day, but also is totally mental and cannot tolerate you leaving the room first.

• If you tries to leave the room without the employee, he hiss at you, threatens to go full public with all documents if you don't please wait for him to slowly calm down or whatever he does.
• If you try to force or persuade the employee to leave the room, he hisses at you and threatens to do some bad things to himself, complete mental meltdown while trashing and potential burning down any documents already brought into that room.

However, it's kind of impossible to give W11 fire because of specific software needed for some machinery.

Sorry for ranting, probably not adding any constructive ideas either. Ok, so I can be diplomatic and state that I dont hate W11, but I hate what it does - sometimes, when the timing is really bad.

 

[Rokinamerica]

Imagine having an employee under you, a secretary I can use as example. When that employee has his day with bad mood, that employee not only simply refuses to leave the room after any meeting or at the end of the day, but also is totally mental and cannot tolerate you leaving the room first.

• If you tries to leave the room without the employee, he hiss at you, threatens to go full public with all documents if you don't please wait for him to slowly calm down or whatever he does.
• If you try to force or persuade the employee to leave the room, he hisses at you and threatens to do some bad things to himself, complete mental meltdown while trashing and potential burning down any documents already brought into that room.

If you have this happening, you need to notify a manager and HR immediately. The employee is unstable, and therefore possibly dangerous to themself or others. They need assistance/intervention/possible termination. And this is obviously above your pay grade.

Blaming software for any of this is way off track. Good luck in your workplace.

 

[USAFRet]

Imagine having an employee....

That is a human issue, not a Win 11 issue.

Software updates have been a thing forever. Across all operating systems and packages.

 

[35below0]

so then of course I selected the "Shut down" menu. However, the OS is in charge not the user, so of course the OS overridden my choice and the much dreaded te xt appears on screen "Please don't shut down the computer" - all while OS was downloading some updates.

I would be pissed off at that. So far i have used the Shut down but without updating option twice, and it worked like it was supposed to.

Next time you see this at work, select Sleep

 

[Grobe]

Next time you see this at work, select Sleep

Yes, good idea - I should try to remember next time I have to bring the laptop to a meeting of some sort

 

[CmdrShepard]

Yes, good idea - I should try to remember next time I have to bring the laptop to a meeting of some sort

Even better idea is not to go to any meetings. They are always utterly pointless waste of everyone's time on a company dime.

 

[Viking2121]

Yeah i'm one of them who switch back before the Co pilot AI bull crap, I had windows 11 for over a year and I didn't hate it directly, but hated the direction and UI choices, I still dislike Win 10 UI choices to a degree, but it much more easy to get around than Windows 11 when you have to navigate to 3 different menu's to do things that took one or 2 clicks before.

Idk, Maybe Windows 12? Lol Yeah I doubt it.

 

[Grobe]

Even better idea is not to go to any meetings. They are always utterly pointless waste of everyone's time on a company dime.

well, sometimes the meeting rooms have big screen in the front to use when there is figures, images (or bad statistics to mislead some big hats) that promptly require a computer being dragged along into the meeting.