Microsoft updates the Windows 11 Start Menu
- Reference: 1746621131
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/05/07/microsoft_updates_the_windows_11/
- Source link:
The [1]revamped Start Menu is probably not what former Windows boss Mikhail Parakhin had in mind when he said [2]"Make Start Menu great again" in 2024, yet it is a step in the right direction. The page feels roomier and has more options for customization and organizing apps. Microsoft also added an all apps category view to automatically sort based on the categories used most.
Although the changes are unlikely to appease users who miss the Start Menu of Windows 10 and earlier – you'll need to install one of the third-party tools to get close to what was taken away in Windows 11 – the addition of a panel for Phone Link will be welcomed.
When Microsoft made the Windows as a Service pivot [3]READ MORE
Microsoft has been evolving its Phone Link tool into a useful app for iOS and Android devices. Giving it an optional panel on the Start Menu provides easy access to calls, messages, and device information such as battery level. That's assuming it all works: Phone Link can be a bit hit and miss (certainly where messages are concerned, where iOS functions such as group messages are [4]not currently supported .)
Give 'em what they want
Microsoft also wrote, "We set out to solve one of the most common frustrations we hear…"
Mm. What could that be? The stream of buggy updates? An end to shoveling unasked-for AI functionality into places that didn't need it?
[5]
No. According to Microsoft, one of the most common frustrations is "finding and changing settings on your PC."
[6]
[7]
Rather than hunt for the required option, users can describe what they want to an AI agent. Microsoft gave the example "how to control my PC by voice" to bring up the relevant settings. "With your permission and at your initiation it can even complete the actions to change your settings on your behalf."
Considering the occasional AI mistake, we're not sure we'd trust an AI to run riot over the Windows settings app. We would have to look very carefully at what the agent proposed to do before letting it begin making changes to the operating system.
[8]Microsoft lists seven habits of highly effective Windows 11 users
[9]Windows 7 lives! How to keep your favorite fossil running
[10]Microsoft will kill Remote Desktop soon, insists you'll love replacement
[11]Ad-supported Microsoft Office bobs to the surface
The settings agent will be coming first to Windows Insiders on Snapdragon-powered Copilot+ PCs, with Intel and AMD-powered devices following.
Other updates on the way include lighting controls for images – Copilot+ PC required – and object select. Notepad also gets an update – and will now allow users to generate text from a prompt, thus taking the application further and further from the original simplicity of the text editor.
[12]
The Start Menu update should reach Windows Insiders during the coming month before eventually rolling out more widely. The other updates will likely follow suit, although many will require Copilot+ PC hardware. ®
Get our [13]Tech Resources
[1] https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2025/05/06/introducing-a-new-generation-of-windows-experiences/
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2024/01/03/windows_11_start_great_again/
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/23/when_microsoft_made_the_windows/
[4] https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/troubleshooting-for-messages-in-the-phone-link-818c988d-a3b3-5ae1-39b2-095763da5a0f#id0ebf=ios
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/oses&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aBuDoABpX0ATvI-CtBlQmQAAANg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/oses&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aBuDoABpX0ATvI-CtBlQmQAAANg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/oses&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aBuDoABpX0ATvI-CtBlQmQAAANg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/09/microsoft_windows_11_tips/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/03/01/running_windows_7_2025/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/03/11/microsoft_remote_desktop_support/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/25/adsupported_microsoft_office/
[12] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/oses&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aBuDoABpX0ATvI-CtBlQmQAAANg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[13] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Re: Hey, Clippy
Powerpup:
https://images.app.goo.gl/FAFtr5VUREQygsNz5
Moving the task bar to the edges
Moving the task bar to the left or right edge seems to be annoying quite a few people, but Microsoft feels it's not enough of them to care.
"Make Start Menu great again"...
That implies it was great once... and now it isn't...
Re: "Make Start Menu great again"...
My KDE alternative menu is pretty much, but better, version of the Windows 2000 menu. A layout imho logical, compact and dead easy to use.
You clicked on 'Settings' to get settings. Not difficult for even human intelligence. That was the pinnacle. Whether Bronze, Silver or Gold I'll leave to you.
Re: "Make Start Menu great again"...
But wait until you get to the new KDE settings as on Debian testing.. They've rearranged to top-level menu.
Re: "Make Start Menu great again"...
It was decent. It allowed those of us with little used software that had unhelpful names to find it when we needed it - because we'd grouped it according to function (Windows 3.1 fashion, and it was a sensible concept then, which carried into the Start menu until some fuckwit decided it has to be in an alphabetical and you aren’t allowed to move it).
So my TDMore programme that I use once in a blue moon and would never remember its name is found in a group called "DVD sound and video stuff" and so on.
Re: "Make Start Menu great again"...
The name implies that Mikhail is a Putinist, and wants Windows 11 and its surveillance to be a tool of the fascist state.
I can't wait
for ClippyPilot AI to decide for me what my monitor resolution and scaling should be, or indeed where it thinks my monitors are on my desk as opposed to where they actually are .
Settings
I still use the control panel.
Anybody that needs AI to change settings probably shouldn't be using a computer.
Re: Settings
95% of users should never be allowed to touch a keyboard and the other 5% should be tested first.
Re: Settings
My understanding was that the AI isn't to change a setting but to find the setting that you want to change.
Because it's much easier to teach an AI to do that than it is to rationalise where settings are hidden. Apparently.
Re: Settings
Maybe it could be used to teach the developers where to put the settings.
Re: Settings
Will that AI find the setting to permanently turn off all those "helful AI features" wherever they are (group policy, registry, ...)?
> According to Microsoft, one of the most common frustrations is "finding and changing settings on your PC."
In fairness, that is one of the most common frustrations. Although my suggestions for addressing it would have been to (1) stop adding functions nobody wants, (2) stop changing the settings GUI with every version.
Oh, and (3) fire whoever came up with setting screens that are mostly negative space with a few settings here and there. I've just opened the screen settings; it's a grand total of 2 buttons, 5 combo boxes, 3 check boxes, and the monitor arrangement thingy, and yet somehow I have to scroll to see them all. At fullscreen 4k. While three quarters of the screen is empty space. That's insane.
Oh, and (3) fire whoever came up with setting screens that are mostly negative space with a few settings here and there.
I imagine the justification for that is touchscreens - fat fingers and the likes of a 12" Surface tablet requires that the controls be spaced out rather more than a mouse user might like. I do actually appreciate that on my own 2-in-1, although other annoyances of Windows as a tablet OS do tend to balance out such positives.
In which case I'll amend that to: fire whoever decided that touchscreens and mouse+keyboard must share the same GUI.
Do Not Want
That is all.
>> We would have to look very carefully at what the agent proposed to do before letting it begin making changes to the operating system.
And then hope it does what it proposed it would do...
Improve Start Menu
Add a link to Distrowatch...
Take my hat off to MS
>> Phone Link [...] provides easy access to calls, messages, and device information
SInce MS abandoned the cell phone business, they were missing on all of this delicious, delicious data. But now they found a way to syphon it even from iPhones, and beam it to the mothership.
I really have to commend them for the effort
Re: Take my hat off to MS
Why does the operating system need to provide a phone link anyway? If I wanted a phone link I'd install one. Admittedly I think my Mac does have a phone link program of sorts, which allows me to control my phone on the laptop, but you need to have the phone with you in order to uinlock it and accept the connection, so that seems pointless too. Why can't operating systems just be that, an operating system?
Re: Take my hat off to MS
Agreed. I have one special need for a link from the phone to the PC, to enable texting using the PC and its real keyboard rather than the phones screen, which I am not able to use well. Google Messages for Web does that well enough for my Android phone. Google also has an app for texting to and from Google Voice numbers, and my VoIP provider supports an app that again mirrors the phone's text messages on a web page. The rest of the phone keeps to itself, albeit with a lot of help from DuckDuckGo, which blocks trackers in the apps.
"You don't hate me enough. I must try harder."
I think, at this point. M$ is just trolling us. This is more unnecessary futzing about. Never can leave well enough alone, can they? The crowd of the clueless continue.
I'll move to Windows 11....
...when they pry Windows 10 from my cold, dead fingers.
Hey, Clippy
STFU!