In a long post titled “Our commitment to Windows quality,” published on Microsoft’s website and sent via email to millions of members of the Windows Insider Program, Windows boss Pavan Davuluri laid out a laundry list of changes Microsoft plans to make in Windows 11, starting this month.
What’s most remarkable about this post is what it doesn’t contain. Here’s how Davuluri kicked things off:
Every day, we hear from the community about how you experience Windows. And over the past several months, the team and I have spent a great deal of time analyzing your feedback. What came through was the voice of people who care deeply about Windows and want it to be better.
That paragraph belongs in the non-apology Hall of Fame, with a cross-reference to “Friday news dump” – a classic PR technique that aims to minimize media coverage of the awkward news being released.
Windows < 11 is legacy software and Windows > 10 is slop. Nobody should care about either.
Simply: Windows XP began the enshittification and it has only gotten worse since then.
Too little, too late.
Already left for Cachyos and it is for me without a doubt better at everything than Windows.
Good riddance.
I setup a mini pc using CachyOs for my Jellyfin server and I am surprised by how easy it all was. I am still going to use windows for my gaming pc (Nvidia gpu…if the drivers get better, then I will switch entirely over), but I am glad I got a Linux computer now.
At this point, the only thing I have Windows around for is VR. Every non-VR game I have runs swimmingly (often better!) on the Linux partition, but VR still struggles to keep up…
I’m also on an NVIDIA GPU (4070 Ti) and I have no problem so far.
Even if the NVIDIA driver are marginally less performant, i think the leaner OS makes up for it.
I’m fairly sure I have better FPS and stability in Rocket League.
As long as you are ok with some tinkering with proton from time to time I think cachyos can work as a daily driver for gaming and most desktop tasks.
Anti cheat is the main reason I should have said on top of the slightly worse drivers
I play DBD, Arc Raiders, Wild Assault, and others just fine. Funny enough, it’s just a few specific big names with the most anticheat problems: Valorant, Fortnite, BF6, and COD. In some ways, I’m happy not to have to even consider them.
Yeah. I have BF6 so…
But at this point I’m reluctant to boot up my windows partition just to play this game.
I’ve been using Linux with Nvidia for a few years now without any problems. I don’t play the most cutting edge stuff at high resolution, but like path of exile 2, elden ring, expedition 33 all ran just fine.
What hardware have you, I have paired back my jellyfin requirements to being just local but UHD.
Intel N150 DDR4 16GB Ram. Can play any 4K video with ease.
It’s a bit optimistic. N150 processor is a low-power, budget-oriented CPU designed for basic tasks like office work. It is not powerful enough to handle the demands of modern games specifically in 4K
Microslop
The revealing part isn’t what they’re changing—it’s the opening. ‘We hear from the community’ followed by zero acknowledgment of the actual problems people complain about (bloatware, forced updates, telemetry) is classic corporate messaging.
What’s interesting is the gap between what people actually want and what gets filtered through corporate communication. Companies sanitize feedback to protect the business model. That’s not just Microsoft—it’s how the system works.
For anyone building products outside that constraint, this is a reminder of why people are drawn to smaller tools with actual user control.
Item 3 is even shovelling more AI into more places. About the only thing that is real in that list is the taskbar being able to be moved, and this was something they have promised would happen since they rewrote the taskbar and crippled its functionality.
You’re hitting the real pattern here. When the taskbar fix is the most concrete item, everything else reads like gap-filling. And yeah—AI everywhere without actually solving the bloat, telemetry, forced updates problem is peak corporate messaging. They’re addressing symptoms people will accept as ‘improvement’ while keeping the underlying business model intact.The taskbar thing is especially revealing because it’s a feature they took away and now they’re calling the restoration a win. That’s the system working as intended.
This is an LLM-controlled account, check it’s comment history with regard to time stamps over the past four days or so. You will notice that it often makes long fully formatted multi-paragraph comments within 10-30 seconds of each other.
Haha so true, its not what they are changing, its their opening…
This is fear. They screwed up on requiring you to purchase new hardware for Windows 11. Now everyone who held off so far will purchase those cool looking, inexpensive Apple Neons.
It’s more than just the hardware.
They screwed up by finally forcing everyone onto an objectively shitty OS. Every other time MSlop has dropped support for an OS, they’ve had at least two others to choose from, and one of them was passable.
They screwed up by letting AI vibe code updates, which were then vibe tested and vibe deployed. The last 3 “patch Tuesdays” have been absolute nightmares of system breaking bugs.
They screwed up by sloppily forcing AI in to every aspect of their OS, and then (allegedly) bragging about how the next one is just going to be an AI.
They screwed up by not recognizing that AI is not popular among the common user. There are like 3 people at my workplace who actually use it, and the main thing they use it for is to add fluff to a chat message to turn it into an email.
They screwed up by putting a “line go up” business moron in charge of the company, who then put more “line go up” business morons in charge of the projects and departments. It’s no wonder that the new outlook sucks and is not fully featured, despite being the “default” outlook for years. It’s no wonder new teams is buggy, inconsistent, bloated, and always changing for the worse. It’s no wonder why all the perfectly functional menus and features of 10 have been hidden by slick and useless facsimiles in 11, while confusing and clunky elements of Win95 still lurk in the shadows.
If Microsoft wants to get back on top, they need new leadership. An apology changes nothing, action does. The current man in charge and his posse of yes-men flat out lack the character and understanding to make a good product that people and businesses want to use. They’ve been coasting on the momentum of being the top dog for 30 years, but that source of market force is not infinite.
Nup, we’re sticking with Linux. It was the elevation we really needed.
This is, like, 95% in response to the Neo. MS hardly gives a shit about your or my opinion but they do care about the common computer user who sees it as just another appliance.
Meanwhile, Apple made a laptop\appliance that’s capable enough to do the things these people care about in a very affordable and attractive package without really mentioning AI, the cloud, or people losing their jobs.
There is no committment to quality. Marketing lies. Nothing new.
And I dont think anyone who uses windows cares deeply about it.
The only reason Microsoft is doing anything is their enterprise customers have had enough of their BS.
Well…yeah. That’s their bread and butter.
I think it’s because laptop vendors are threatened by the MacBook Neo, which is the first serious threat to PC sales for non tech people who buy the shitty $300 laptops at Best Buy since Chromebooks, which is the majority of the market. Bad press about Windows absolutely will convince people to get one instead of a windows laptop
Linux could also be a genuine threat if someone like Valve comes out with a Linux laptop for gamers or a major vendors starts preinstalling like Ubuntu or Fedora on consumer oriented laptops but I doubt any major vendors would unless they have a serious falling out with MS
Yes 100% The neo devices will lock in the newer generation to Mac OS and the next three decades will be them switching to Mac based enterprise solutions. And windows will be losing marking share then - linux and mac over taking enterprise solutions because of the bs Satya Nadella and his team did, with COPILOT. I am just laughing imagining that day.
Bloat after bloat. Fuck em. Microslop.
Microsoft: I’m sorry you think you deserve an apology.
The sweepingest of changes to Windows?
Moving to Linux.
I encourage everyone to take a major dump on Microslop and move to greener pastures
It really is greener there. Been there for almost two decades, it’s so nice. Been tweaking my setup ever since and it’s still evolving all the time.
My last venture has been Niri + Noctalia shell. Works so great together.
Can confirm
Yep
Happy cake day!
Thanks!
I did the jump 3 years ago, now Linux is the “normal” for me. Couldn’t imagine having a Windows machine anymore. Not even a Mac.
I am a more recent convert, having switched last year to Bazzite on my desktop and Linux Mint on my laptop. I also installed Mint on the desktop computer at work.
No dual-booting, all Linux all the way.
Screw Microsoft and the likes of Apple.
Ye, I remember the first 3-4 months where horrible. Started out with kubuntu, and everything felt wrong and broken.
But I can say this: The past 3 years has been amazing for linux. It really went crazy with the amount of things you can use now but not before. The past 2 years I havent had anything in my household other than linux. Even my mother and brother got onbpard, who isn’t IT capeable at all! It’s really a special time for linux and easy for folks to get on-board now.
My tech knowledge is not at all current, recently got sick of windows BS and installed linux mint on my laptop. The whole process was really easy, didn’t have to use command prompt at all or understand any arcane technical terms. It was actually easier and more accessible than windows.
If I could have anything better than an iPad to sketch on that isnt windows or Mac, and was Linux based I would. So far all my other stuff is Linux aside from my phone. But soon. Soon I’ll have my fair phone … soon…
Have you tried another good drawing tablet you could boot linux on? Now, I’m no artist, but I have heard good things about krita?
Krita is awesome. Tablet options not so much. Many Intel based tablets are rather heavy and clunky comparatively, or have poor digitization. Touch screens aren’t the same as digitizer pen support. Some like the surface tablets are proprietary enough that you have to jump through many tech hoops just to set it up. And then there’s the cost. You can do it but its expensive in money and time. It has to be something you want to do for yourself. Because it will not make monetary or otherwise.
Android tablets are again loaded down with tech hurdles. Can they be unlocked? How hard is it? And what special hardware might you need to do it? Then you have to consider how hard is it to flash a different operating system onto it. And finally, how much of the proprietary hardware is just not going to work, and is that a deal breaker.
There is a version of Krita for Android. But the few devices I have that can launch it. The UI is unusable. Everything else works. You just have to fight the UI hard.
I got an older ARM based chrome tab for about 40 dollars. Went through the hoops to put postmarket is on it. Only the camera doesn’t work. But the 4GB of ram is the biggest bottleneck. CPU cores are fine. But just sitting idle at the desktop a little under 1/8 of the ram is already used up. Open Firefox or chrome and you are already swapping hard likely. Krita works well with the USF pen support. But the ram again is a heavy limit on document size. It’s definitely not for most people.
I desperately would love a good affordable Linux tablet platform. KDE plasma’s touch experience has been really good. Not perfect, but most of the hitches are edge enough cases in daily use. If someone would make a shell with just a full HD screen and pen support capable of using a compute module SOC. Raspberry pi or other compatible SOC. That would almost be ideal as long as they could meet a decent price point. Which is always the thing that tends to kill these concepts.
I have tried other tablets. The response is nothing like an iPad. Also I need to have at least one apple product just to use Apple TV (and validate anything Apple) which sucks hard.
It’s funny, because technically they are hurting themselves in multiple ways. They are investing loads of money in AI. Then using the same technology to produce crap that no one wants. People are starting to lose trust in their OS because of all the issues.
AI is now using up all the resources, making gpus and memory skyrocket. People are not going to be able to afford PCs for gaming. Most people that want to stay on windows are gamers. While Linux is getting better, it’s still a shit show when it comes to Nvidia cards.
With Apple releasing a budget computer, this opens the door for everyone else. These devices are also fast enough and last way longer on battery life. They can also be more powerful in other ways as well.
Enterprise is another big user of Windows, but we can already see Europe and other places moving away from Microsoft products due to privacy concerns.
You can easily manage apple devices at an enterprise level. You can also do the same with Linux, albeit it’s a little harder. The only other thing people are missing in enterprise are the collab tools. But tbh, Google stack is actually good enough for that. Then people use slack for chat, which is way better than teams, even if it’s now owned by Salesforce. Then zoom for video calls. Even on this stack, it’s typically around the same price, if not cheaper than Microsoft anyway.
Because of all these things, Microsoft is literally choking themselves out.
Personally, I already use a MacBook for work. It’s a good balance between Linux and Windows and makes my life easier. I use Windows right now because of gaming and using an Nvidia card. If it wasn’t for that, I wouldn’t be using Windows right now. As soon as AMD releases their next gen gpus, I’m gone.
Microsoft dug their own grave and are slowly lowering themselves into it.
While Linux is getting better, it’s still a shit show when it comes to Nvidia cards.
Is it? Ive had exactly zero issues with my Nvidia card since converting to Mint 2 years ago.
Most people that want to stay on windows are gamers.
You reaaaaly need to reflect on the bubble you live in because this isn’t even remotely close to reality.
They mean because games mainly work on windows first, not so much that gamers specifically want windows.
I see that photo and i think.
When I read that paragraph, I was gobsmacked. They “spent months analyzing feedback”? Seriously? They needed charts and graphs to figure out that people just want Windows to work?
Should they have not analyzed feedback? Out of everything you could complain about Microsoft, complaining about them taking their time to get it right this time wouldn’t be one of them. I mean, they aren’t going to get it right this time, but that seems like a different complaint.
I suppose my question is why did they need to spend months analysing the feedback? Couldn’t they just point copilot at the data and have it instantly analyse it for them?
The editor’s name is Ed Bott?! As in Editorial Robot?! You can’t make this shit up.(well, i kinda did)
Did Copilot write this whole thing?
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This is marketing speak for “We realized that we could lose market share if we further don’t listen to our users”.
Didn’t they already announce such a change for gaming when the steam deck comparisons came out?
Yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it
I believe the MacBook Neo was a real wake-up call for management. Apple dominates the high-budget market. Now that Apple has entered the low-budget market, it could threaten their market share, as well as Copilot’s.
I agree. They’re getting attacked on three fronts - Linux for the gaming user base and now macOS for the student, education and casual user base; and all the while, the professionals and creatives get tempted by Apple hardware increasingly running faster, cooler and melee energy efficient than anything in the Intel/AMD world. It’s Microsoft’s game to lose and boy they sure seem to want to lose it.
I would never have believed it a few years back, but a world where Linux and Mac collectively have a higher market share than Windows could actually be possible. It’s the perfect storm of M-series chips kicking ass, Valve investing so much in Linux, and Microsoft giving the finger to their customers.
And m$$ demanding user hardware that’s flat out unavailable because chipset cash machine go brrrrrrr
Low… lol
Sub 500 dollar laptops are low budget for new hardware.
Imo $500-700 is squarely midrange when it comes to laptops, the low end is populated with the e-waste that is shitty $200-300 HP laptops
If you can find a mid range in that price range your living in bullshit land of nonsense and rainbow unicorn farts.
The ai bubble has ass fucked laptop pricing.
Even the second hand market is fucked.
Most 500-700 dollar laptops are the ewaste crap now. Anything below that price point is out of date Chromebooks at best.
I can’t agree that there are none, there are just few. If I was in the market for a midrange laptop at the moment I would probably go with this idea pad which should be good for the basics and should be able to do productivity tasks, albeit slowly: definetly not what I would call e-waste
They start at $730 where I live, there are way better alternatives for less.
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I’m sorry, but you don’t sweep windows, you wipe or squeegee them. It also helps if the manufacture doesn’t fill the gap between the panes with actual feces.
Nothing but lip service. MS did not “analyze your feedback” because it was never about what you wanted, they analyzed their income (most likely from enterprise customers) and realized they may have boiled the frog too quickly. Windows will never improve because they do not want it to improve, they want it to make as much money as humanly possible, and they will eternally push that envelope to find out just how much bullshit their customers will tolerate.
They’ve had feedback for years and ignored it.
Then they asked copilot to write a blogpost to get adoption of win11 up.
