Scott Riley

11 Things You Need to Know about Windows 11!

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Windows 11 has launched and if you’re considering the upgrade here are 11 things to know about Windows 11.

1. The taskbar is in the middle.

The taskbar has moved!! The taskbar is now in the bottom – middle of the screen instead of the bottom – left, not everyone seems to be happy about this BUT you are able to change it back if you want to. Personally, I think It looks great like this.
It is now optimised for touch devices and made it a lot easier for that type of user.

2. In fact there’s a whole new user experience.

Windows 11 has had a crisp overhaul of the interface. Everything is now looking a lot more modern, cleaner and with larger icons which are designed for touch devices. You are seeing new rounded edges to the applications and having bigger buttons, bigger menus, again these are all optimised for touch swell as the traditional desktop experience. In the past year we have seen many applications allow you to chose your preference of light or dark mode. This is also a new a feature in Windows 11.
For power users, using multiple desktops is also much easier to work with than before.

3. There are new options for splitting windows with Snap Layouts.

You now have different options for creating snap layouts, they now have a selection of predefined layouts for you to pick from and make working a lot more easier for you.

AND when you use snap layouts on an external monitor it puts them back where they were when you plug your laptop back in again.

4. The search bar has become a search button here with a magnifying glass.

I have to be honest, I’m not sure why it still exists. The search button is located next to the windows button. You will notice that there is a search bar at the top of the windows button, and also a search bar at the top of the search button.

In fact, it’s basically in the exact same place and whenever I’m searching in Windows, I wouldn’t use either of them (more about THAT in a moment)

5. Microsoft Store will now let you install Android apps

This means you can now install TikTok!

Hooray I guess? Time for some Berries and Cream maybe?

6. There are widgets!

You will be very familiar with widgets if you use Apple iPhone, iPads or Mac OS. These widgets pop up showing you the weather, things going on in your calendar, sports and even the news. Everything is very customisable, so you are able to chose what you are interested in.

I have to be honest I haven’t used it huge amounts, but there is some great information being shown here, so it may be something you use a lot.

7. It’s not that big of a change.

For MOST people, it’s more of a face-lift to Windows 10 than it is a complete change. For the technical users and the IT Techs there is a lot going on behind the scenes. But for day to day users it is still as easy as Windows 10 to use, maybe even more simpler as they have made the options more streamlined for the users.

In fact, Microsoft have their App Assure program which means that any applications which worked on Windows 10 will still work on Windows 11.

8. There are a few changes which might be frustrating for power users.

The right-click menu has been heavily simplified for touch, most of the options has now been limited, I then need to click ‘show more options’ if you want to do some common tasks like unzip, share files in OneDrive. It works most of the time, it may be because I do some more advanced things, so I am needing to click on that ‘show more options’ to get that original menu.

The system tray has had an overhaul, which you can customise

Changing Audio devices takes a few extra clicks, I usually flip between using my earphones and using the speakers on my device, In Windows 10 there was just one button but now I have to go through a few more steps to flip between them.

The Settings App has changed again and whilst I don’t doubt that it’s better. The buttons and options have all moved around again so we need to go and learn all of the locations again.

Also if you’re used to right-clicking the task bar to get to Task Manager, well that’s gone too. But the shortcut of pressing CTRL, SHIFT, ESC still works – yay old skool!

9. Windows key is your friend.

You are able to Power Search for anything…

Want to update windows Hit the Windows key and type ‘Update’.

Want to launch an App, Hit Windows and start typing the name of the app (e.g. Word).

Want to find a recent document you were working on, Hit Windows and just start typing the name of the document

Want to search the Internet, Hit Windows and start typing whatever you want to search for.

It really is that simple.

10. It’s designed to be online.

So all that Windows Key search that I just talked about is awesome, but… if you’re offline it’s a different story. There can be a huge delay in actually returning any results even if you just want to search for documents on your local machine.

In our testing, if Windows KNOWS that it’s offline then it works great, search is nice and snappy.

But if you’re device is connected to a Wifi or Ethernet network in your office and the Office Internet goes down then Windows 11 search is painfully slow. Windows thinks it’s online so it waits and waits and waits before actually searching on your local machine.

11. You don’t HAVE to upgrade.

Windows 10 is supported until October 2025. It’s entirely you’re choice between now and then if and when you choose to upgrade. Windows 10 will not automatically be installed, you get to choose.

Check out the YouTube video above to watch how it works!

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Check out the YouTube video above!