The Windows 10 Creators Update Arrives
by Brett Howse on April 25, 2017 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Software
- Operating Systems
- Windows
- Microsoft
- Windows 10
Wrapping up and how to get it
This certainly is not a completely comprehensive look at the latest update, and there are many more features under the hood. Regardless, this is a much lighter update than the previous one, which included things like Windows Ink, Windows Subsystem for Linux, and Edge extensions. Still, it’s a solid update, with a lot of nice additions without forcing a re-think of everything. After several updates to Windows 10, it certainly feels like the old Windows servicing method of having a major release every couple of years is an out-dated model.
It would be hard to point a finger at the Creators Update and nail down a single feature that is the key one. Instead, it’s more a collection of smaller updates. There are still plenty of things to be worked on, and hopefully we will see some news out of the Redmond company soon, detailing their direction for their next update.
Really, the biggest thing they need to work on is improving UWP. With the loss of their mobile play, they need to re-focus their efforts on making this work better for the desktop, where the majority of Windows 10 installs are. Xbox is always going to be small by comparison, and even something which has a lot of potential like IoT is going to struggle to compete against the userbase of the PC right now. UWP needs to be improved for these scenarios, and developers need to be sold on why they should switch. This will bring benefits down the road for everyone, but at the moment it’s an untapped market.
Microsoft is going to continue to work on High DPI, and hopefully start to fix their color management woes as well, but at this point both seem like very difficult problems to overcome. This is one of the main issues where legacy application support can be such a burden, but removing this support isn’t the answer either. They are in a tough spot, and have more work to do here. Hopefully we will here some more news on this front soon.
One of the nicest changes with this update is how to get it. Microsoft started rolling out the update over Windows Update on April 11, but it will be a staggered rollout, only targeting known good devices first. That is what they have done in the past, but the big change this time is that you can easily update any computer running the Windows 10 Anniversary Update by running the Update Assistant.
Anyone wanting to force the update to come sooner can go to the Windows 10 Download page and download and run the Upgrade Assistant. It will verify the requirements are met, and trigger the download and install.
With the Windows 10 update model, eventually it will be pushed out to all machines of course, so waiting is always an option, but the new features have been a solid upgrade to Windows 10, if taken in their entirety. Whether you are a web browser, or web developer, there should be something here for you.
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evilspoons - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
Well, there was an extremely primitive registry in Windows for Workgroups 3.11 (not Windows 3.1), so it's more like 23-24 years :|lmcd - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
While Windows 10 Mobile looks dead-ish, I wouldn't say for the reasons you guys have selected. The list of phones there consolidates the list of different cores Microsoft is supporting down to A7 (why this made the cut I don't know), A53, and Kryo. The former will probably be dropped soon, and Microsoft will go to exclusively ARMv8 powered devices. I wouldn't be surprised if support for ARMv8 devices lasts far longer than projected here. Microsoft is still investing hard in new ARM-based platforms, and devices within the same scope as those platforms will likely keep evolving.danjw - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
Type: "Hopefully we will here some more news on this front soon." The "here" should be "hear".versesuvius - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
In a nutshell Win 10 is one big mess. Just about everything Microsoft is doing is fixing a problem or iterating on a solution to an unknown problem. The cost and time that needs to be put into installing and running and keeping a watch on what is happening to the computer that is running Win 10 is too prohibitive.Mr Perfect - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
The thing that bugs me in Creator's Update is the removal of the links to "Control Panel" and "Programs and Features" when you right click the start button. They've replaced them with links to the modern "Settings" and "Apps and Features", respectively. There are still to many settings that can't be adjusted in the modern apps, they're not ready to replace the legacy versions yet.On the other hand, they replaced "Command prompt" with "Power Shell" and Power Shell is absolutely ready to take over.
Samus - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
What I find interesting are the browser power consumption benchmarks.I don't agree with Microsoft.
Edge is undoubtedly more power efficient on my laptop for light browsing sessions, but Netflix is more efficient in Chrome. Also, for light browsing, I'd say Chrome is the least efficient. It's like a Honda Civic, no matter how hard you beat on it, it gets the same fuel economy; Chrome consistently uses about the same amount of power. It is occasionally bested by Firefox and almost always bested by Edge, except in Netflix where Edge seems to use more power.
These are my observations over the years I've been running Windows 10, and honestly the anniversary update didn't improve the Netflix performance for Chrome. My laptop is a Haswell Elitebook 810 G2.
Allan_Hundeboll - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
Like a Civic you say? I have Civic and it will do 15 km/l when I drive with a light foot. If I drive like I stole it it will only do about 10 km/l...Zeratul56 - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
Why don't you use the Netflix app? It is pretty nice actually. I don't have my tablet in front of me but I am sure the memory footprint for the app is at least half compare to running in the browser.I am sure running Netflix in chrome has some hardware excelleration not found in other browsers. It would behoove Netflix to do that given the large user base of chrome.
I don't get why people don't jump on the app bandwagon in windows. I use the slack app over the browser as it uses much less resources. That seems to microsofts problem, they can't get people to break their old ways.
Shadowmaster625 - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
I have yet to download, install, or otherwise use a single UWP app. Everything is still basically win32.mikato - Tuesday, April 25, 2017 - link
So there is no update or successor to Windows Movie Maker in this Creators Update?