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Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by squarefoot on Friday August 23, 2024 @03:43PM (#41332390)
> But... don't the control panel windows have more functionality (and usability) in practice?

Yes, and they're not alone even in the FOSS world (cough ...Gnome... cough).

My take on this is that someone decided that everything must either run on a cellphone or conform to its UI, therefore GUIs are slowly moving to the mobile touch screen model, which translates into leaving lots of unused space because of the bigger size of finger tips compared to mouse pointers that could trigger errors with smaller and more dense controls, and of course less controls because smaller screens with comparable resolution to much larger monitors would make them much harder to operate.

I can understand the reason, however all comes from the 1st mistake which is the attempt to unify everything to a mobile UI, probably to save on development time. It's unnecessary and it's wrong.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by exe34 on Friday August 23, 2024 @04:19PM (#41332745)
> save on development time

thank you, I needed a good belly laugh!

Windows 95 was built in 3 years and its user interface is still superior to anything they've come up since then - instant redraws, buttons respond to clicks, information was laid out as needed, not to look good in a theoretical sense, etc.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by cyberax on Saturday August 24, 2024 @12:12AM (#41335565)
IMO, the apex of Windows was WinXP.
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by flohofwoe on Saturday August 24, 2024 @05:48AM (#41336921)
WinXP was just a reskinned Windows 2000... which was the actual apex of Windows UIs ;P
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by skydhash on Saturday August 24, 2024 @12:12AM (#41335569)
Windows XP and Windows 7, although with a lack of consistency (compared to macOS) was great for getting things done and powerfull on even low hardware (I liked how it disable areo effects if you did not have the GPU for it).
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by mkl on Saturday August 24, 2024 @12:44AM (#41335716)
I remember it very differently. You could often watch interfaces be drawn line-by-line and box-by-box, with many pixels getting redrawn multiple times before it was finished. Buttons responded to clicks, as long as you waited. The information layout was good though.

I would say your comment makes more sense for Windows 2000.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by _ZeD_ on Saturday August 24, 2024 @01:13AM (#41335816)
what were you using as pc? a moka pot?

windows '98 - even on a semi decent machine - was fast

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by mkl on Saturday August 24, 2024 @01:20AM (#41335840)
Windows 98 was quite a step up in polish and performance from Windows 95, even on the same hardware. Windows 2000 was an even bigger step up in polish, but more resource hungry.
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by Maken on Saturday August 24, 2024 @05:35AM (#41336858)
Exactly, Windows 98. Windows 95 was like the beta version, where all the functionality was there but did not work most of the time.
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by keyringlight on Saturday August 24, 2024 @06:29AM (#41337107)
Remember that was the era of single processor PCs, if you had a really demanding CPU hog you generally had to forget about trying to multitask as the experience would be painful. If you had something like file compression happening (which could also occupy the HDD) it'd leave little for the UI redrawing, and this is also long before that aspect was accelerated
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by exe34 on Saturday August 24, 2024 @09:24AM (#41338139)
right, but you can also bring a modern system to its knees with a high enough load. the new systems suck by default. keyboard response time is much higher than ever because of the accumulation of abstraction strata.
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by wizzwizz4 on Saturday August 24, 2024 @10:14AM (#41338469)
> You could often watch interfaces be drawn line-by-line

On a CPU system fast enough to render it within a frame, you could switch that animation off. I think it was mostly there to preserve UI compatibility with potatoes.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by Narishma on Saturday August 24, 2024 @10:34PM (#41343862)
> You could often watch interfaces be drawn line-by-line and box-by-box, with many pixels getting redrawn multiple times before it was finished.

Maybe if you ran Windows 95 on a 386 with 4MB of RAM.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by binkHN on Saturday August 24, 2024 @12:46AM (#41335732)
This is a major part of why I switched to Linux! Microsoft is literally killing the desktop by turning Windows into a tablet OS! There are still many great DEs on Linux that are actually DEs!
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by mewpmewp2 on Saturday August 24, 2024 @03:53AM (#41336425)
The only reason I use Windows is the gamezz.

Work is macbook, but I hate macOS settings and everything as well. Can't easily configure mouse acceleration or disable it is crazy to me.

On personal I use WSL for dev, but maybe I should just dualboot Linux.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by urxvtcd on Saturday August 24, 2024 @09:46AM (#41338288)
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by mewpmewp2 on Saturday August 24, 2024 @09:57AM (#41338344)
Yes, this is the method that I have been always using. But I have had many cases where it seems to reset or bug out in some other way, and the Logitech MX Master 3S does still does not work well. There's definitely something weird about movement, it doesn't feel linear and accurate even after running this command.

The mouse feels perfect on Windows/Linux, but it's off in my Macbook. Sometimes also loses bluetooth connectivity, where it kind of starts to skip and/or stops working completely. And I have to take the bluetooth usb, put it back in for it to work normally again.

Maybe I should try another mouse, if you have any recommendations for a similar, ergonomic wireless one. Definitely don't want the magic mouse.

Ergonomically I think the Logitech one is perfect for me.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by urxvtcd on Saturday August 24, 2024 @10:36AM (#41338633)
I do own a device I'm very fond of, Ploopy Mouse, but it's not likely to match your criteria. It's quite big, 3D-printed, open source, wired, and runs QMK. Loads of character :)

https://ploopy.co/mouse/

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by mewpmewp2 on Saturday August 24, 2024 @10:44AM (#41338690)
Well, the sales video on the page starts immediately with a person ditching the MX Master mouse, so I do feel targeted, I will continue with the video.
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by card_zero on Saturday August 24, 2024 @01:23AM (#41335853)
But why? Windows phone died. What's going to run these phone-apps-for-Windows-desktop, other than Windows desktop, where they have the ergonomics of a rubber unicycle?
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by namdnay on Saturday August 24, 2024 @01:33AM (#41335886)
Maybe those windows laptops with touchscreens?
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by axitanull on Saturday August 24, 2024 @02:16AM (#41336061)
I wonder how much % of windows are Surface tablets, that they think going with this decision is wise.
Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by hulitu on Saturday August 24, 2024 @12:36PM (#41339414)
> Windows phone died.

But the mindset lives on.

Re:Microsoft formally deprecates the 39-year-old Windows Con... by OvbiousError on Saturday August 24, 2024 @03:20AM (#41336281)
The settings panel of kde plasma on the hand is bonkers good.