Windows 11 , The Worst Crap Ever

[UCyborg]

I use two screens, LG W2361V (2009) and Samsung SyncMaster 710N (2004). If I'm not mistaken, first one is LED while the second is CCFL. The effect of changing color in the evening is helpful as far as I'm concerned regardless of which screen I'm looking at.

I use f.lux every once in a blue moon when booting to some older Windows. I normally use Windows 10's Night light, which is good enough unless you "need" something fancier.

[mina7601]

On 5/21/2022 at 11:23 PM, UCyborg said:

Yes, supposedly there is - https://www.thewindowsclub.com/usb-port-remains-active-even-after-using-safely-remove-hardware

The official article regarding this appears to have been removed.

Generally, yes. But fortunately, Wayback Machine has archived the official article.

Here's a link to the archived official article if you and/or @NotHereToPlayGames are interested in a look: http://web.archive.org/web/20101023015931/http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2401954

[UCyborg]

On 5/22/2022 at 12:25 AM, degen said:

I realize this is only tangentially related to the topic, but very interesting you should say this. Windows 10 build 1511 is the last usable version of Windows for some people with eyestrain (including myself) on a different forum I participate in. We use mostly Window 7 through to Windows 10 2015 LTSB (build 1507). Something MS introduced with build 1607 (Anniversary Edition) messes with our eyes.

For me, it's generally the opposite, the older the OS, the worse fonts look. Haven't really used Win10 as a daily driver before 1809, but font rendering was an improvement from Windows 7 -> Windows 8.1 in my eyes. Can't say I notice a difference between Win8.1 and Win10 (1809/20H2). Vista / XP all look worse to me.

So called web safe fonts are default in XP and older for UI rendering, these are the ones that look OK without anti-aliasing, few fonts classify as such, so there's not a lot of variety. Many fonts in use today, particularly on the web, require anti-aliasing to look right. No problem with AA with my eyes as long as it's done in a specific way (which I can't really describe due to specifics / differences that seem to exist beyond configurable parameters).

Then there are also differences how web browsers render fonts and the OS they run on can play a big part (unless you use Links ). Of the browsers I'm familiar with, I would rate them like so: Pale Moon/SeaMonkey > Firefox > MS Edge with Enhance text contrast flags > MS Edge without the flag and other Chromium browsers (Chrome, Vivaldi, SRWare Iron...).

Supposedly regular Chromium based browser on Windows has a hardcoded constant for text contrast set to 0,5 and it's possible that text would appear better with a value of 1,0. Never felt like bothering finding out where the value is stored in the executable or compiling a huge codebase with an unknown number of hoops to see what it's like then.

[UCyborg]

On 5/10/2022 at 10:28 PM, UCyborg said:

Something that persists since Vista days, if you use phone's USB tethering, it will forget about network profile (the one that controls whether file sharing and similar stuff is enabled or not) you saved after reboot and create a new one.

Before Win11, you were always asked by default about the network type when the system created a new network profile. Win11 doesn't ask, but still creates new network profile, even though you use exact same phone and IP address and gateway.

I wonder if there's a proper way to make it remember to use the old profile.

Wow, after so many years I finally learned about the possible solution for this. When USB tethering is on, the phone acts as a network gateway and that gateway may have a random MAC address assigned by default. Don't know how common random MAC address is, given the variety of phone configurations, but at least with root access, it may be possible to set static MAC address.

https://xdaforums.com/t/q-soln-usb-tethering-creates-endless-new-windows-networks.1893015/post-35371421

Quote

I was suffering the same and finally found a solution for this (at least on my S2).
It requires root, plus a kernel that supports init.d scripts (or running a script yourself every time you start the phone and will want to tether before restarting).

Just run this script:

chmod u+w /sys/module/g_android/parameters/dev_addr
echo 5a:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx > /sys/module/g_android/parameters/dev_addr
chmod u-w /sys/module/g_android/parameters/dev_addr

Just replace xx's with whatever hex values (0-9 or a-f) you want. Example: 5a:10:20:30:40:50

Windows detects the network you're connecting to by identifying the MAC address of the gateway. It can then know whether you're connecting to your home router (safe), an internet cafe (public), etc.
Whenever it finds a gateway whose MAC address is not recorded yet, it will state it's an unknown network, ask you what type is it (home / public), and assign a new number to it.
The thing is that android (or at least mine) is generating a completely random MAC address for itself whenever tethering is turned on, and naturally that will be different every time.
If you run those commands above, you're overriding that randomness and the device will start having always that MAC address and Windows will remember you're connecting to the same gateway.

PS: This is obviously dependent on whether the kernel you're using includes that /sys/module/g_android/parameters/dev_addr file. I'm inclined to think it's standard, but I'm not sure.

Previously, the content of that file read as "(null)". The MAC you put here or the random one can be seen from Windows when you run:

arp -a

There's another separate MAC address you see when running:

ipconfig /all

Corresponds to the Remote NDIS based Internet Sharing Device (as seen from Windows), it also comes from the phone, it's written in /sys/class/android_usb/android0/f_rndis/ethaddr.

I was looking at registry entries in Windows before at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\NetworkList, under \Signatures\Unmanaged\<profile key>, there's a MAC address. No wonder it didn't make any sense as I was only looking at the one from ipconfig command, but this is the one from arp command. It's like there's "network card" and gateway in one device.

Interestingly, pre-Win11 didn't create new network profile for the same phone, even with apparent MAC changes, until reboot. The current Win11 does seems to make a new profile when tethering is on and gateway MAC changed from last time. Maybe old Windows was caching some other factor in memory, maybe the one MAC that wasn't changing (the "network card" MAC).

Edited January 13 by UCyborg

[Tripredacus]

I had to actually use the OS today... why did they completely change the context menu in explorer?

[mina7601]

1 hour ago, Tripredacus said:

I had to actually use the OS today... why did they completely change the context menu in explorer?

That's one of the things I also hate about Windows 11. They did this basically to match Windows 11 design principles. They still allow the legacy context menu to be opened by pressing Shift while right clicking.

[mina7601]

Though, you can restore the old context menu with the help of this guide:

https://pureinfotech.com/bring-back-classic-context-menu-windows-11/

[Tripredacus]

Fortunately for me, I don't have to actually use the OS personally, on any of my personal systems. I already have the idea that if I ever had to go to Win 11, I'll probably use a Server SKU if there aren't (still) any shells available.

Unfortunately, for the systems that I have to interact with (such as in this instance) we do not have the opportunity to use any sort of software that changes the OS, since those computers are used in manufacturing. While it is nice to know that people are still out there creating workarounds for Windows UX annoyances, I'm still suprised no one has attempted to make shell replacements. Even like a launcher-type thing that could be customized. Perhaps it is due to how much functionality is baked into explorer, but I haven't looked into it. Building a simple launcher is easy enough to do.

[UCyborg]

I don't really have to use it either, must have been curious, so I put it on the smaller partition I have for testing Windows versions I don't daily-drive. Been' using it for a while, with the usual tweaks, switching back seemed to be too much bother. I hide Windows versions from each other, just in case, the Flintstones way, manually changing partition type with Linux's fdisk.

The few programs I use work as usual. Not being able to drop files on taskbar programs' buttons is annoying though.

Edited March 14 by UCyborg

[XPerceniol]

<OT>

How are you @UCyborg doing nowadays? I hope well. 

<OT>

[mina7601]

10 hours ago, UCyborg said:

Not being able to drop files on taskbar programs' buttons is annoying though.

Wasn't that already fixed, I suppose? We even got the "Combine taskbar buttons and hide labels" taskbar option back. Still no "Use small icons" taskbar option yet.

[UCyborg]

I don't know, I have it on December 2023 cumulative update level, with ExplorerPatcher activating the old Win10 taskbar.

On 3/15/2024 at 12:06 AM, XPerceniol said:

<OT>

How are you @UCyborg doing nowadays? I hope well. 

<OT>

Mentally exhausted...

Edited March 16 by UCyborg