Windows is not bad...

[allan.nyholm]

I'm certainly in the group of having a UI-fixated relationship with my OS; macOS.

As an OS for a computer though, Windows 10 is quite ok. There is an OS for everyone. Microsoft just needs to step up their game.

Why does Windows still keep Control Panel around with the minimal options that the Control Panel has these days!? I hope that Microsoft makes one whole swoop of Control Panel and finally combines the options into Settings for 19H1. It bothers me that there's no UI-UX direction for either 3rd party developers or Microsoft themselves. In-between the 1803 and recent October update, Microsoft could have sat down and done a merger and clean up. Instead, they are dragging their feet by trying to find a look for Windows 10.

I have tried installing it and using it on many occasions. Nothing much has to happen to swing me right back to macOS. The interface on Windows is terrible.

It's the wild west with varying toolbar button symbols with no coherence and oddly small sidebar icons in File Explorer on 5K - in general, it's a huge turn off to see everything just giving the finger to each and every other program on Windows. If it's not alignment problems within the UI it's small blurry icons. PeaZip is/was a good example. Tiny status bar icons and blurry non-scaled icons. File Explorer Options: Why does that program have to have everything so tiny in fonts and checkboxes?

Setting each program to be aware of scaling is a mess. The programs in question don't ever comply. Try using GIMP on a 5K display in Windows 10 and you'll have a field day with its UI. I tried it recently and I wasn't pleased. People speaking about getting stuff done on their computer. That's all well and fine if the interface would comply. You'll need to see what the dang you're doing or else being productive is a moot point.

In my latest adventure, I installed 1803 first(issues getting 1809 onto a FAT32 formatted USB drive) and then decided to update to 1809 using Microsofts own updater for some Windows 10 releases. Was that scaled to fit my screen resolution? No. Not even Microsoft makes an effort getting things right; blurry fonts - graphics in the updater program all not sharp.

My main gripe is with scaling 450% - scaling in Windows 10 in general. I'm sure that on a 100% dpi non-5k display everything checks out fine.

I've attached a small image to tell the story of QTTabbar. Despite being a 3rd party program for Windows there doesn't seem to be any effort in the 4k+ department. I suppose it's because it's a free program!? The single screenshot is just a teaser - it gets worse with each category you enter.

Also, try installing multi-platform free duplicate file finder; DupeGuru, on a 4K or above monitor while you're using Windows 10. Good luck finding the separator cursor to adjust the columns. And if you scale this particular program the cursors that Windows uses isn't even scaled accordingly leaving a very pixelated cursor throughout the program.

Bring a broom, because it's a mess!

 

[LIVEFRMNYC]

I use Windows 10 on a 48' 4K TV and a Dell 27' 1440 monitor for my second display. I have no issues with scaling on most apps. But I understand we all don't use the same apps.

 

[Diazepam]

A lot of good points made by people here, but, as someone who just bought an MBP and uses both OS's (Mojave and Win 10) on it, I must note ...

It is far easier to run Windows on a Mac than the other way around Is it not ?

I thoroughly enjoy playing my Windows games on my MBP through BootCamp, and when it's time to do some development or anything else, I just reboot into MacOS. And I love it !

 

[LIVEFRMNYC]

A lot of good points made by people here, but, as someone who just bought an MBP and uses both OS's (Mojave and Win 10) on it, I must note ...

It is far easier to run Windows on a Mac than the other way around Is it not ?

I thoroughly enjoy playing my Windows games on my MBP through BootCamp, and when it's time to do some development or anything else, I just reboot into MacOS. And I love it !

But try partitioning the drive exactly how you want it. And it sucks if you already made a partition for storage(or whatever), only to have to delete it, in order to install Windows with BootCamp.

 

[maflynn]

I thoroughly enjoy playing my Windows games on my MBP through BootCamp, and when it's time to do some development or anything else, I just reboot into MacOS. And I love it !

Running windows on a Mac is a convenience. Its not without its share of headaches but overall I found the experience to be ok. The problem with MBPs and windows is that apple didn't provide any sort of power saving features and battery life in windows is horrible. Plus if you have a touchbar there's little to no control over it. I'm not down on running windows, but I would prefer a windows machine if I'll be running windows primarily

 

[xraydoc]

I'm certainly in the group of having a UI-fixated relationship with my OS; macOS.

As an OS for a computer though, Windows 10 is quite ok. There is an OS for everyone. Microsoft just need to step up their game.

Why does Windows still keep Control Panel around with the minimal options that the Control Panel has these days!? I hope that Microsoft makes one whole swoop of Control Panel and finally combines the options into Settings for 19H1. It bothers me that there's no UI-UX direction for either 3rd party developers or Microsoft themselves. In-between the 1803 and recent October update, Microsoft could have sat down and done a merger and clean up. Instead they are dragging their feet with trying to find a look for Windows 10.

I have tried installing it and using it on many occasions. Nothing much have to happen to swing me right back to macOS. The interface on Windows is terrible.

It's the wild west with varying toolbar button symbols with no coherence and oddly small sidebar icons in File Explorer on 5K - in general it's a huge turn off to see everything just giving the finger to each and every other program on Windows. If it's not alignment problems withing the UI it's small blurry icons. PeaZip is/was a good example. Tiny statusbar icons and blurry non-scaled icons. File Explorer Options: Why does that program have to have everything so tiny in fonts and checkboxes?

Setting each program to be aware of scaling is a mess. The programs in question doesn't ever comply. Try using GIMP on a 5K display in Windows 10 and you'll have a field day with its UI. I tried it recently and I wasn't pleased. People speaking about getting stuff done on their computer. That's all well and fine if the interface would comply. You'll need to see what the dang you're doing or else being productive is a moot point.

In my latest adventure I installed 1803 first(issues getting 1809 onto a FAT32 formatted usb drive) and then decided to update to 1809 using Microsofts own updater for some Windows 10 releases. Was that scaled to fit my screen resolution? No. Not even Microsoft makes an effort getting things right; blurry fonts - graphics in the updater program all not sharp.

My main gripe is with scaling 450% - scaling in Windows 10 in general. I'm sure that on a 100% dpi non-5k display everything checks out fine.

I've attached a small image to tell the story of QTTabbar. Despite being a 3rd party program for Windows there doesn't seem to be any effort in the 4k+ department. I suppose it's because it's a free program!? The single scrreenshot is just a teaser - it gets worse with each category you enter.

Also, try installing multi-platform free duplicate file finder; DupeGuru, on a 4K or above monitor while you're using Windows 10. Good luck finding the seperator cursor to adjust the culumns. And if you scale this particular program the cursors that Windows uses isn't even scaled accordingly leaving a very pixelated cursor thorughout the program.

Bring a broom, because it's a mess!

I agree that screenshot is a mess, but I use a 13" Surface Book 2 -- 200% scaling when I use the laptop's screen (3000x2000) and 150% when I connect to my 27" 4K desktop monitor. I've never seen anything that looks remotely like your screenshot.

 

[maflynn]

I hope that Microsoft makes one whole swoop of Control Panel and finally combines the options into Settings

Agreed, the issue is they (MS), started going in one direction, but kept the legacy control panel around, heck MS is still rolling out win32 as opposed to UWP.

scaling in Windows 10 in general.

That's been one of my gripes as well, with an inbound 4k display, I am a tad concerned about how well that will work with some of my apps. Scaling on my iMac when I ran windows on that was horrible for some of my remote apps that I use for work

 

[Diazepam]

Running windows on a Mac is a convenience. Its not without its share of headaches but overall I found the experience to be ok. The problem with MBPs and windows is that apple didn't provide any sort of power saving features and battery life in windows is horrible. Plus if you have a touchbar there's little to no control over it. I'm not down on running windows, but I would prefer a windows machine if I'll be running windows primarily

True. I did make it sound like I use it for Windows primarily. Nah, I actually mostly use MacOS, and when I take a break from programming, the convenience of being able to boot seamlessly into Windows to play a few games is great !

I rarely find the need to use the touch bar other than for brightness/volume in the midst of gaming. And when I say gaming, it's not anything hardcore or resource-intensive. Just some Command and Conquer Zero Hour

It works out really well for me coz I can't afford two separate machines.

 

[Mikael H]

True. I did make it sound like I use it for Windows primarily. Nah, I actually mostly use MacOS, and when I take a break from programming, the convenience of being able to boot seamlessly into Windows to play a few games is great !

I rarely find the need to use the touch bar other than for brightness/volume in the midst of gaming. And when I say gaming, it's not anything hardcore or resource-intensive. Just some Command and Conquer Zero Hour

It works out really well for me coz I can't afford two separate machines.

..And here I am hoping for Steam to port their Proton effort to the Mac too. There's not a lot on my game list that doesn't work well or at least fine on my Kubuntu gaming computer right now, while the Mac only library view is woefully short..

 

[cajun67]

I switched to Windows because I'm a hardcore gamer who got tired of waiting for A-list games to get ported to the Mac.

Windows isn't as beautiful as Mac OS, but for the most part it does what I need it to do.

One thing Windows 10 has utterly failed at is peer-to-peer networking. Windows used to be great at that, and now it's a nightmare. I literally cannot open my Windows 10-based Plex server share to transfer files. It's 2019, and I have to effing sneaker-net them over.

 

[LiE_]

That's been one of my gripes as well, with an inbound 4k display, I am a tad concerned about how well that will work with some of my apps. Scaling on my iMac when I ran windows on that was horrible for some of my remote apps that I use for work

I wouldn't be too worried, pretty much all premium laptops run hiDPI displays these days with no issues, there is a lot of support for it. Major apps all play nice with scaling. I use Adobe, Chrome, Spotify, Office 365, WhatsApp desktop, Sublime text editor and Atom text editor. All of these apps run perfectly scaled. I think windows handles non 2 x scaling better for text. I'm running 125% on a 1080p 13" screen and it looks very good.

When I ran 150% scaling on MacOS it didn't look very good.

 

[maflynn]

Major apps all play nice with scalin

As I said, I have apps that don't play nice with scaling. For instance Gotomypc; when you remote in the guest computer's cursor can be difficult to see, depending on the scaling factor - the higher the scale the smaller that cursor is. I had similar issues with RDP as well

 

[YaBe]

Switched to Windows 2 years ago, it took some getting used to but it ain't 1990 anymore, Windows 10 is on par with OS X.

Microsoft made huge leaps and OSX actually took some backstep (actually standed still for too long i guess that it looks like back steps).

All in all it is down to the apps, and the only one i am missing on Windows is Logic X

 

[LiE_]

Switched to Windows 2 years ago, it took some getting used to but it ain't 1990 anymore, Windows 10 is on par with OS X.

Microsoft made huge leaps and OSX actually took some backstep (actually standed still for too long i guess that it looks like back steps).

All in all it is down to the apps, and the only one i am missing on Windows is Logic X

The biggest thing I miss from OSX is the number of polished apps available from 3rd parties.

Spark/Airmail are great mail apps on OSX, on Windows the built in Mail app lacks but alternatives aren't much better.

Bear is an awesome note taking app, you have evernote on Windows but it lacks the polish especially when it comes to code blocks.

Paste (https://pasteapp.me/) is such an amazing and useful app, on Windows the options are bleak in comparison for clipboard managers.

 

[YaBe]

The biggest thing I miss from OSX is the number of polished apps available from 3rd parties.

Spark/Airmail are great mail apps on OSX, on Windows the built in Mail app lacks but alternatives aren't much better.

Bear is an awesome note taking app, you have evernote on Windows but it lacks the polish especially when it comes to code blocks.

Paste (https://pasteapp.me/) is such an amazing and useful app, on Windows the options are bleak in comparison for clipboard managers.

I use mostly Affinity stuff wich are both mac and PC and Brakets for html and stuff wich again is cross platform. Cross platform is usually one of the main thing i look into a software (after the reason i am gettin git of course) because you never know when you might need to change computer.

The biggest thing I miss from OSX is the number of polished apps available from 3rd parties.

But really, it is more a "developer" issue than a Microsoft fault

 

[Mikael H]

From my perspective, I really appreciate the under-the-hood improvements in Windows over time, but the interface (and most applications - even Microsoft’s own ones) way too often have a tendency to break the principle of least astonishment, way too often are unnecessarily bloated, and way too often keep me wondering what could possibly require literally billions of (missed?) CPU operations to finish up what they’re doing.

To me personally, the Unix way of doing things simply makes more sense than the Windows way of doing them. Luckily, each new version of Windows seems to inch its way closer to a Unixy approach, but I frankly usually don’t see why I should bother when there are fully usable Unixes (and unix-like systems) out there already.

Many days I spend the majority of my working day in a Windows environment via RDP or via Citrix. I’m pretty much OK with that, because the frustrations of dealing with weird hickups and stuff that does unexpected things happen on the other computer. My own machine is seemingly always responsive and just does what it should without getting in my way.
But when I have to sit first-hand on a Windows machine as a ”daily driver”, I can’t abstract all these idiosyncracies as ”not my problem” and in that situation I have a much harder time to deal with them impersonally.

So yeah, macOS is pretty much Unix Done Right, and nowadays I can even do a lot of the things that used to require access to a Windows machine straight from my Terminal app by invoking PowerShell. If I was forced to hand in my work laptop and replace it with a regular PC, I would definitely run a Linux distribution on it (Debian, Ubuntu, or CentOS, in that order) rather than running Windows on my primary work tool, but I would certainly miss a lot of the deep integrations I benefit from as a deeply entrenched fanboi with an extensive set of Apple products.

As I’ve grown older (relatively speaking) I game a lot less, and when I do I mainly fly X-Plane or play older games, meaning that I’m completely fine with Linux+Steam+Proton for that part of my computer needs.
I’m aware that as my son grows up I may need to have (and support) a Windows machine again at home, but I’m savoring the time when I don’t have to bother running that system at all privately...

 

[Cape Dave]

Switched to Windows 2 years ago, it took some getting used to but it ain't 1990 anymore, Windows 10 is on par with OS X.

Microsoft made huge leaps and OSX actually took some backstep (actually standed still for too long i guess that it looks like back steps).

All in all it is down to the apps, and the only one i am missing on Windows is Logic X

I agree. Windows has moved ahead, MacOS has stayed back.

 

[kazmac]

The biggest thing I miss from OSX is the number of polished apps available from 3rd parties.

Spark/Airmail are great mail apps on OSX, on Windows the built in Mail app lacks but alternatives aren't much better.

Bear is an awesome note taking app, you have evernote on Windows but it lacks the polish especially when it comes to code blocks.

Paste (https://pasteapp.me/) is such an amazing and useful app, on Windows the options are bleak in comparison for clipboard managers.

Outside of more pricey art apps, I cannot seem to find a procreate substitute in Windows. Concepts looks amazing for Vector art, but I work in raster.

Maybe I’ll try Corel, and/or Art Rage when I am ready to attempt using a Wacom tablet. First things first.

 

[jrichards1408]

I agree. Windows has moved ahead, MacOS has stayed back.

Yup agreed

 

[maflynn]

I agree. Windows has moved ahead, MacOS has stayed back.

macOS seemed to add polish and refinement to existing features, but has not really changed much since Yosemite. Maybe even Mavericks.

MS has tried to add new features into windows, some of those attempts has failed and they're wildly inconsistent especially with the UI. Apple though imo, hasn't done much with each version of macOS. I mean the biggest feature of Mojave is a dark theme?

I'm not down on macOS, I love the UI, the interactions, but I've not upgraded to Mojave on any my machines. Even my 2012 MBP is on sierra and hasn't been updated, not enough improvements to offset any possible performance hit of running a newer OS on an old laptop.

 

[hemon]

macOS seemed to add polish and refinement to existing features, but has not really changed much since Yosemite. Maybe even Mavericks.

MS has tried to add new features into windows, some of those attempts has failed and they're wildly inconsistent especially with the UI. Apple though imo, hasn't done much with each version of macOS. I mean the biggest feature of Mojave is a dark theme?

I'm not down on macOS, I love the UI, the interactions, but I've not upgraded to Mojave on any my machines. Even my 2012 MBP is on sierra and hasn't been updated, not enough improvements to offset any possible performance hit of running a newer OS on an old laptop.

… and I find this dark theme of macOS to be just ugly!

 

[Cape Dave]

macOS seemed to add polish and refinement to existing features, but has not really changed much since Yosemite. Maybe even Mavericks.

MS has tried to add new features into windows, some of those attempts has failed and they're wildly inconsistent especially with the UI. Apple though imo, hasn't done much with each version of macOS. I mean the biggest feature of Mojave is a dark theme?

I'm not down on macOS, I love the UI, the interactions, but I've not upgraded to Mojave on any my machines. Even my 2012 MBP is on sierra and hasn't been updated, not enough improvements to offset any possible performance hit of running a newer OS on an old laptop.

I think the UI of MacOS is due for a serious refresh. I find this to be much more important than added "features" that for the most part, I will never use. Maybe they could make those silly three colored dots even smaller and harder to click on (yes, that is my pet peeve with MacOS)

 

[TSE]

macOS seemed to add polish and refinement to existing features, but has not really changed much since Yosemite. Maybe even Mavericks.

MS has tried to add new features into windows, some of those attempts has failed and they're wildly inconsistent especially with the UI. Apple though imo, hasn't done much with each version of macOS. I mean the biggest feature of Mojave is a dark theme?

I'm not down on macOS, I love the UI, the interactions, but I've not upgraded to Mojave on any my machines. Even my 2012 MBP is on sierra and hasn't been updated, not enough improvements to offset any possible performance hit of running a newer OS on an old laptop.

I haven't used MacOS in all honesty since like... 2014.

I recently updated to Mojave and checked it out... It's the same old MacOS that everyone loves. Which is, honestly, not a bad thing. I mean, how much more can a desktop operating system improve? If you really think about it, even the core fundamentals of Windows hasn't changed much since, what, Windows 2000?

But I was entirely taken by surprise how honestly, honestly bad & ugly dark mode is. I always liked the idea of a dark mode, but after playing around with MacOS's version of it, that curiosity has left me and isn't coming back.

 

[sunapple]

I switched to Windows because I'm a hardcore gamer who got tired of waiting for A-list games to get ported to the Mac.

Yeah, I'd imagine waiting 5 years is no joke...

 

[ADGrant]

I agree. Windows has moved ahead, MacOS has stayed back.

Sorry, I couldn't disagree more. Windows has always been a bit of a mess and Windows 10 is no better in that regard. MacOS is far more coherent. The command line experience is so bad on Windows in comparison to the Mac, Microsoft added the WSL Linux command line. It's not exactly seamless to use though. Dev tools like git are much nicer to use on a Mac. The built in apps like mail, calendar and notes are much nicer on MacOS. The iMessage integration is not available on Windows 10. I am unaware of a Windows equivalent to the keychain app. Home networking seems much easier on MacOS too.

Windows has two major advantages, games and much better hardware choices. The Pro version also has the built in ability to run Linux in a VM which is what I will do if I switch from a Mac.