The Windows 10 Review: The Old & New Face of Windows
by Brett Howse on August 25, 2015 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Operating Systems
- Microsoft
- Windows 10
Digital Inking gets a Promotion
Microsoft launched the Surface Pro with a Wacom stylus, and the Surface Pro 3 switched that up to a N-Trig model. Microsoft ended up buying the N-Trig pen technology outright, and they now offer pen support in the smaller, less expensive Surface 3 model.
They have had a good response to the stylus input support, and some of their first-party apps like OneNote and Fresh Paint have great stylus support. Using the rest of the operating system with the stylus was more for easier selection of items, and navigation. That is of course still there, but the stylus has gotten a big promotion in Windows 10.
With this release, the system now supports pen input for any text field. Let me say this again. Any text field now supports pen input. Even desktop apps like Skype can be written to with the stylus now, and that is a big change over previous versions of Windows.
And, the text support is really good. I have, well let’s be honest here, I have atrocious handwriting. Windows 10 consistently had no issues knowing what I was writing and getting the right word added. It also offers a text correction box so you can tap on a word to correct it if it wasn’t right, much like a touch keyboard offers.
Some 3rd party tools have tried to emulate this, but it is really hard to compete with built in tools, and this addition to Windows 10 really moves the operating system forward for anyone who loves to use a stylus as an input tool. Before, you had to use in in combination with the touch keyboard, but now you can drastically increase text input by using a pen.
If you look ahead, you can see that this may also be a big feature of Windows 10 Mobile, coming to smaller tablets and phones in the near future. This should be a nice benefit to those devices, and the rumblings are that the new flagship Windows 10 Mobile devices from Microsoft are going to come with stylus support.
To a big chunk of users, adding pen support as a first-class citizen may not seem like a big deal, but going forward it may end up as one of the differentiators for the platform. For those that do have a device with pen support already, you are going to find it to be a big change that is very welcome.
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Rickkins1 - Wednesday, September 2, 2015 - link
Well of course they do. The entire business model of windows10 relies on the gathering of data relentlessly to serve up ads.Lerianis - Thursday, October 1, 2015 - link
Well great, because Windows 10 does not keylog either, ddriver. That whole "Windows 10 keylogs!" thing was debunked after someone realized that the 'keylogger' was for Touch Keyboard improvements.Touch Keyboard SHOULD be keylogged so that they can find out if it needs improvements.
Brett Howse - Wednesday, August 26, 2015 - link
If you go through and click express settings during install, this is all going to be turned on. If you do custom, which I assume anyone as concerned as you are would do, you can disable almost all of this during install, and the remainder can be disabled in settings.The one exception to this is diagnostic data which can't be completely disabled.
There seems to be a lot of confusion in the comments where people are overlaying Microsoft's Services EULA with the Windows 10 EULA and maybe I should have spelled that out better in the privacy section. They are not the same thing, and using Windows 10 does not mean Microsoft has access to your local files. If you use OneDrive, of course they do.
The Privacy FAQ that I linked to in the privacy section actually does a very good job of explaining all of this data, what it does, and what it is used for. If you will never move beyond Windows 7 because of this, well then honestly it's your loss because there are a pile of great features in Windows 10 that I already don't want to live without. But my guess is you don't run your own email server with PGP encryption, so your email is already in the cloud.
This is not 1995 anymore when Windows 95 came out. People use cloud services already. Windows 10 ties into them, which is what most people want. If you don't want that, you are not forced to use them.
althaz - Thursday, August 27, 2015 - link
You are going to be blasted for ads regardless, targeted advertising just means you might actually be interested in what's being advertised - it's squarely a win-win.ddriver - Friday, August 28, 2015 - link
So M$ is for people who don't have an idea what they are interested in? And thus need ads to steer their interest? Or in short, M$ is for idiots? Sounds about right.A good product doesn't need advertisement. A moderately intelligent person would do his own research before a purchase, rather than be guided by a "we paid to say our stuff is nice" publications.
Alexvrb - Monday, August 31, 2015 - link
After reading your raving- I mean, your posts, I realized something. You must not use any Google or Apple products either then, right? You know Google is an ad firm, right? And Apple sales are largely predicated on skilled marketing and other perception control?"A good product doesn't need advertisement" You're delusional. A BAD product can outsell a good product purely as a result of advertising.
lordken - Friday, September 4, 2015 - link
@Alexvrb: I guess that's what he (ddriver) meant saying "M$ is for idiots" and "A moderately intelligent person would do his own research before a purchase"So unfortunately today's world reflect this, as you said any shit-like product can be sold much better than really good product based on the fact that sheeps are served adds and making decision on impulses/emotions etc.
So he is not delusional. However it is delusional to think that things like you say are normal.
sheeple - Sunday, September 27, 2015 - link
You are indisputably correct with everything you have stated, there's a good reason M$$$ is offering 10 "freely", and the reason may not be in the best interest of "we the sh-eeple"hupowat - Tuesday, November 7, 2017 - link
Windows 10 is awesome. I installed the OS yesterday and activated it with KMspico software (https://kmspicoinfo.com) The Windows 10 is very fast and beautiful.hupowat - Tuesday, November 7, 2017 - link
Windows 10 is awesome. I installed the OS yesterday and activated it with KMspico software: https://kmspicoinfo.com The Windows 10 is very fast and beautiful.