Windows 8.1: 8 Things I Hate About You

Is Microsoft's Windows 8 experiment drawing to a close? Recent reports claim the next major release of Windows, code-named "Threshold" and expected to arrive as early as next spring, may bring good news to those who hate the colorful, tile-laden Modern interface, the operating system's most notable and controversial feature since arriving in 2012. In fact, the Modern UI may go away altogether, at least on conventional desktop and laptop PCs without touchscreens.

Win 8's touch-oriented Modern UI, which Microsoft bolted on top of a crippled edition of the venerable Windows desktop, has never caught on with Redmond's enterprise clients, many of whom are either sticking with Windows 7 or are still in the process of upgrading from Windows XP. In a recent blog post, Gartner analyst Stephen Kleynhans wrote that his research firm expects most organizations to bypass Windows 8 altogether, leapfrogging from Windows 7 to a "future version of Windows (perhaps Windows Threshold or even a release after that)."

To be fair, Microsoft has improved Windows 8 over the past 18 months. Windows 8.1, for instance, brought back a less-capable version of the Start button. It was missing from the original version of Win 8, much to the consternation of befuddled upgraders who couldn't seem to find their apps on the new Start screen. A second Windows 8.1 upgrade soon followed. Released just four months ago, it offered more interface tweaks designed to make the OS a bit more palatable to the mouse-and-keyboard crowd.

But even with these changes -- some of them quite good, in fact -- Windows 8's inherent clunkiness shows through. It seemed an ambitious, if misguided, attempt to build a single UI for touch tablets, conventional PCs, and hybrid devices.

If the rumors of Threshold are true, it appears that even Microsoft realizes it's time to pull the plug on Window 8's dual-interface design, or at least relegate it to a niche market and give PC users what they've wanted all along: a faster, better, more secure version of Windows 7.

For some time now, critics have derided Windows 8 as Microsoft's "New Coke," a snarky reference to Coca-Cola's ill-fated 1985 decision to change its cola recipe. Public backlash was so great that Coca-Cola executives soon backpedaled, reintroducing "old" Coke, and eventually dropped New Coke altogether.

But Windows 8 isn't New Coke. It's pretty good, actually, but only on a tablet where its touch-oriented design shines. With a keyboard and mouse, however, it blows. Microsoft shouldn't junk the Modern UI, but rather relegate it to mobile devices where it belongs.

That said, here are eight notable annoyances of Windows 8.1.

The Windows 8.1 Charms Bar may have seemed like an enhancing idea for touch tablets -- and for those devices, it works well -- but its magic quickly fades for PC users. When you swipe in from the right edge of the screen, out pops the Charms Bar, providing quick links to popular features like Search and Settings. With a mouse, however, the process is clumsy: Point to the upper-right corner and move the mouse pointer down. You can turn off this feature, but the Charms Bar still has an annoying habit of popping out when you'd rather it didn't -- like when the pointer is parked in the lower-left corner of the screen. Microsoft reportedly may remove the Charms Bar from the next version of Windows, or at least from those editions tailored for PCs without touchscreens.

Why, oh why, does the Windows 8 version of Internet Explorer 11 have the address bar and tabs at the bottom of the screen? Perhaps there's some sort of aesthetic or ergonomic advantage to this browser redesign, but its exact benefit isn't clear. This design choice seems particularly odd when the desktop version of IE 11 retains the address bar and tabs at the top of the screen. And then there's the bizarro fact that Windows 8.1 comes with two versions of Internet Explorer.

Windows 8.1 returned the venerable Start button to the desktop, but all is not as it seems. The new Start button, in fact, is like a back-lot facade on a Hollywood studio tour. Click it and you're transferred over to the tile-laden Start screen to find your apps -- yes, the very place you wanted to avoid! A better solution: Bring back the Start menu as well -- or perhaps a modified version of it -- which may occur in the next major Windows release.

Windows 8 apps, even ones of limited value, open in full-screen mode. Why? Do we really need a giant-sized Alarm or Clock app with loads of wasted space? Again, this approach speaks to the tablet-centric design of the Modern UI: On a 10-inch display, a full-screen calculator makes sense. But on a desktop, it's just wasteful. Yes, you can split a Windows 8 app to the left or right side of the screen, but the tools for resizing app windows are rigid, clunky, and generally a pain to use.

Windows' colorful and dynamic Live Tiles work quite well on a phone or tablet. They're dandy touch targets for fingers of all shapes and sizes. But for mouse and touchpad users, Live Tiles are overgrown icons that waste valuable screen space. And while Windows 8's optional Apps view does pack in a larger number of smaller tiles -- click the down arrow on the Start screen to find it -- the Modern UI clearly was built for taps, not clicks.

Windows 8's search tool, accessible via the Charms Bar, shows results from "everywhere," including files and settings on your device, as well as online videos, images, page previews, and links pulled from Bing. It searches files in your OneDrive account too. What it doesn't do, at least by default, is search external hard drives connected to your PC. This is easily remedied, however: Type "index" in the Search box, and select "Indexing Options" from the column of results. Click "Modify" at the bottom of the Indexing Options window, and then check the box next to the external drive -- e.g., "Seagate Slim Drive (F:)" -- to add it to the list of indexed locations.

A recent Windows 8.1 update added right-click menus. Right-click a Live Tile on the Start screen, for instance, and a context menu appears. In earlier versions of Windows 8, right-clicking a tile would have pulled up an options bar at the bottom of the screen. This minor change made Windows 8 a bit friendlier to mouse-and-keyboard users, but the operating system's use of right-click remains inconsistent. In the Win 8 versions of Skype, Calendar, and Weather, for instance, a right-click reveals additional features or options at the top and bottom of the screen, but not a context menu next to the spot you clicked. Not a major shortcoming, perhaps, but a bit inconsistent for an OS focused on user-friendliness.

Again, rumors suggest that Microsoft won't abandon the Live Tile UI, but rather surgically remove it from traditional laptop and desktop PCs. But the Windows 8 look-and-feel would live on in tablets and phones, where it's a good fit. Hybrid devices like Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 would retain the dual-UI design that's proven so controversial since its launch. Whatever its master plan for Windows may be, Microsoft will likely announce its intentions long before the arrival of Threshold, which is rumored to ship in spring 2015.

Again, rumors suggest that Microsoft won't abandon the Live Tile UI, but rather surgically remove it from traditional laptop and desktop PCs. But the Windows 8 look-and-feel would live on in tablets and phones, where it's a good fit. Hybrid devices like Microsoft's Surface Pro 3 would retain the dual-UI design that's proven so controversial since its launch. Whatever its master plan for Windows may be, Microsoft will likely announce its intentions long before the arrival of Threshold, which is rumored to ship in spring 2015.