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Comment by beagle3 | Hacker News Reader

Could you give your opinion on Win8/8.1/Metro/Modern ? How would you rate its effect on your proficiency?

My situation is almost identical to recursive. I upgraded to Windows 8, right when it came out. Hated the jarring dual interface. But the only thing I had to do was install Classic Shell[0]. And I was back to the familiar Windows. Practically nothing else changed from the UI perspective. The same with Windows 10 as well. I'm addicted to the Win32 based Start menu and the ability to right click files and folders from search results. So I installed Classic Shell over the new Metro based Start Menu and everything is back to normal again. Plus, I don't miss out on the speed and security improvements.

[0] http://classicshell.net/

Thanks. Does it totally kill metro? Everytime I work on a Win8 computer, I manage to do something that brings metro up (e.g, press the network icon in the notification area on the right, or press the "Windows" key on the keyboard), and start cursing ....

I'd say upgrade to 10, not as nice as 7, but way better than 8/8.1 ... just disable the two bing search options (they're annoying).

Also used ClassicShell on Win8.. if you lauch a metro app it will go metro mode.. but that's the only case.

It does not quite kill metro, but it hides it really well. Pressing the Windows key or the Start button gives you the Old school menu. If you want the new Metro Start screen on Windows 8.1 or the menu on Windows 10, you have to press Shift+Enter. So unless, you specifically or accidentally press Shift+Enter you will never see Metro again.

The only time I had to go to the Metro Start Menu was to find the Universal Apps like Mail and Edge browser. These don't show up on the Classic Shell results for some reason. Once I pinned them to the taskbar however, I haven't needed that Metro screen again.

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