Well, I’m a brave guy, so I’ve already got Windows 11 installed on my computer. In fact, this is the very first time in my life that I’ve upgraded Windows from an old version to a new one “on the fly,” rather than doing a clean installation.
Here are my very first impressions.
Installation Process
- When starting the upgrade, the first thing it does is tell you to check if your computer is compatible with Windows 11. You’d think the installer would handle this itself, but no—it asks you to download a separate app, Windows Health Check.
- After running Health Check and confirming that the computer meets the requirements, the Windows 11 installer kindly agreed to proceed with the installation (apparently, a registry entry was updated to indicate the system is compatible).
- Next, the installation files began downloading, and the system started preparing for the upgrade. This is where I encountered the first issue. Everything downloaded and verified, and the installation supposedly began (you can continue working on your computer during this phase). However, at 71%, the app started glitching, throwing errors, and refusing to continue. After two attempts, I gave up. It kept directing me to a support site that offered no useful information.
- Fine. I restarted my computer, closed nearly all apps, and tried the installation again. This time, everything went smoothly, although progress slowed significantly at 71%. Eventually, another window popped up, now labeled “Installing Windows 11”. What was it doing before, then?
- This stage took longer. At 81%, I thought the process had frozen entirely, but since I was working on documents on my tablet anyway, it didn’t bother me. Finally, the progress moved forward and reached 100%.
- And then, the system informed me that it couldn’t continue the installation because I had Start10 installed (a replacement for the default Start menu that resembles Windows 7). This is a paid add-on I’ve been using for years. It strongly recommended updating the app, as the installation couldn’t proceed otherwise.
- I opened the app, but it refused to update, claiming it was already the latest version. However, the developer’s website offered a new version, Start11, now compatible with Windows 11 (visually, it looked nearly identical, by the way). Fine, I decided to upgrade—luckily, they offer a discount for owners of older versions. Unfortunately, the developer refused to accept any payments: none of my cards or even PayPal worked. Unable to purchase the new version, I gave up and simply uninstalled the app. And, to my joy, the installer agreed to continue. The system asked to restart the computer, warning that it would reboot several times during the installation. However, it couldn’t restart on its own, so I had to do it manually.
- From there, it seemed like standard updates were being applied during boot (as usually happens with Windows). I didn’t notice any multiple reboots—it all completed in one go. At the first startup, logging in took slightly longer than usual, but everything launched as expected after that.
Notable Changes
What changes were immediately noticeable?
The taskbar now resembles macOS, with icons centered. However, they are smaller than in macOS and don’t change size when hovered over:
Icons can also be aligned to the left edge, which is one of the very few customization options. The rest of the settings are limited to choosing which icons are displayed. That’s it.
Annoying Features of the New Taskbar:
- Officially, the taskbar can now only sit at the bottom of the screen. As someone who has kept it at the top for over 15 years, I found this extremely frustrating. There was no apparent way to drag it elsewhere, and online sources suggest no straightforward solution exists. However, a quick conversation with support revealed a workaround to move it to the top (albeit in a clunky way). I’ll share the solution below for those interested. Hopefully, this will be fixed in the future, allowing users to adjust the taskbar’s position properly.
- No Option to Disable Window Grouping. Previously, you could configure it so that multiple windows from the same application (e.g., three Excel files) would display as separate tabs unless there was insufficient space, in which case they’d group together. Now, there’s no such option. All windows from the same app are grouped automatically, regardless of available space. Switching between them—whether with the keyboard or mouse—feels unintuitive. For example, here’s what happens with multiple Firefox windows:
The language layout indicator seems to work as usual. However, now, every time you switch layouts, a small popup briefly appears, showing the selected layout, and then immediately disappears. What’s annoying is that, even though I moved the taskbar to the top, the popup still appears at the bottom of the screen, as if the taskbar were still there. It’s quite frustrating, although after about 10 minutes, you stop noticing it—humans can adapt to any annoyance, it seems.
Some taskbar elements are now grouped together. For example, Wi-Fi, volume, and battery status are combined into a single interactive element:
No matter which icon you click, only one settings window opens. And it still appears at the bottom (even though the taskbar is at the top), plus there’s a bug—the top part is cut off:
Windows are no longer perfect rectangles; they now have rounded corners. See the popup above and the image below:
Additionally, some icons in the Explorer window have been changed. For example, the icons for the Desktop folder and Downloads folder:
For everything else, so far, it’s just Windows as usual. I’ll keep observing.
Update: How to Move the Taskbar
Moving the taskbar is currently only possible by editing the registry. This solution was officially provided by Microsoft Support. Here are the steps:
- Click Start > Run > type in
regedit> press Enter. - Navigate to:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\StuckRects3 - Find the fifth value in the second row and change it from
"03"to"01":- Delete
03and type in01. - Click OK.
- Delete
- Close the Registry Editor.
- Click Start, search for Command Prompt, then right-click and choose Run as Administrator.
- Type the following commands one at a time and press Enter after each:
taskkill /f /im explorer.exestart explorer.exe
The taskbar should now be moved to the top.
