So, the great day is here; Windows 10 has been unleashed.

Microsoft is in full Dr. Pangloss mode at the moment, trumpeting that Windows 10 is the best of all possible worlds.

Forgive my cynicism, but from what I have seen so far, I think it’s more of a curate’s egg.

The one saving grace is that it might improve over time, but going on Microsoft’s past performance, I’m not holding my breath. Having said all that, I will be updating all our windows devices to Windows 10, but not without regrets.

Just a couple of days to go before the launch of Windows 10, and Microsoft has blogged about the built-in apps present in the new operating system. Microsoft describes the apps as “great”. I think many of us would beg to differ; we are finding that the media apps in particular are a step backwards from those that are in Windows 8.1.

Barb Bowman goes into detail about the shortcomings, and, if using Windows to play back your media is important to you, you should definitely check out her post.

In addition to these shortcomings, the Windows 10 Photos app is pretty abysmal. You can’t browse individual folders of pictures, it will only display pictures arranged by date. Interestingly, browsing by folders was originally in the app, but it has now been removed by Microsoft. I notice that the advert in the Microsoft blog post still shows the older version of the app, with folder browsing present:

Either Microsoft are being disingenuous here, or someone’s been sloppy, because the Folder view is missing from the latest version (and has been for some months now):

So where has the Folders view gone? I need it back – it makes it impossible to find stuff without it (and there is still no possibility to search photo metadata tags in the app).

Frankly, with the current state of this app, I find it next to useless, and use other photo apps in preference. However, Windows 10 will force you to use it in certain circumstances. For example, if I want to add someone’s picture to their contact details in the People app, Windows 10 will bring up the Photo app so that you can select the picture you want to use. Without a folders view, I have to use File Explorer to find out the date taken of an image, and then use the Collection view in the Photos app to scroll to the date of the image to copy it into the People app. This is extremely cumbersome, and far from fast and fluid.

It almost gives the impression that Microsoft teams don’t actually test out the use cases… I am not impressed.

We are just three weeks away from Microsoft launching Windows 10 on the 29th July. The tech media has plenty of articles discussing the pros and cons, and now the “should I upgrade to Windows 10” articles are starting to appear in the mainstream press. Here’s one from the UK’s Telegraph. It’s actually surprisingly positive:

Windows 10 for desktop is a massive improvement over Windows 8. It builds on the more intuitive aspects of Windows 7 and Windows 8, combining the familiarity of the Start menu with a number of new features that genuinely seem to improve user experience, such as Edge and Cortana.

It’s also surprisingly accurate (I’ve begun to despair at the quality of what passes for technical journalism these days, even in the tech press), although in some places I would have a different take. For example:

When used on a tablet or smartphone, Windows 10 is not hugely different from Windows 8; most of the changes are under the hood. However, small improvements in usability should make learning the system less of a chore for the uninitiated.

As a user of Windows 8.1 on various tablets, I would disagree with the first part of this statement. There are substantial changes, and the changes are not under the hood, but very much in your face. The Charms bar of Windows 8/8.1 has gone and been replaced by the Action Centre, which holds notifications and is the entry point to Windows settings. Windows 10 also introduces the dreaded “Hamburger” button. These and other changes represent a major shift away from the design language pioneered in Windows 8/8.1 and in Windows Phone 8/8.1.

So for those of us that use Windows 8.1 and are completely comfortable with it, the move to Windows 10 is going to mean changes, and the relearning of our muscle memories. People who use Windows 7, on the other hand, are, I think, going to find it easier to adapt, because Windows 10 is very much closer to what they are used to.

After trying out the previews of Windows 10, I wrote, back in April, that I just didn’t like it. There seemed to be too many features of Windows 8.1 that had been removed or changed.

Now, twelve weeks and several preview builds later, I am somewhat less anxious. I have moved three PCs over to Windows 10. A laptop, a tablet and lastly, and most recently, my main workhorse, my Desktop PC. I have left my Surface 3 tablet running Windows 8.1; I will wait until the official release of Windows 10 before upgrading it.

I still miss the Smart Files feature of Windows 8.1, and the new version of this feature probably won’t appear in Windows 10 until late 2016. I will also be going through a period of relearning how to use my tablets.

Will the pain be worth the gain? In some areas, definitely yes. Windows 10 introduces native support for the FLAC audio and MKV media container formats. Both of these are important to me for the future of my music and home cinema systems. However, what Microsoft gives with one hand, it taketh away with the other. The “Play to” feature of Windows 8.1 is renamed to “Cast to” in Windows 10, and this function will have fundamental changes.  It appears as though Microsoft has removed DLNA DMR devices from system-level control (e.g. the Devices item in the Win 8.1 Charms bar), and demoted that function to needing to be controlled on an app-by-app basis.

That’s all very well if app developers actually take account of it. I note that Microsoft’s Music app does not do this, and I also note that the Microsoft spokesperson uses the qualifier “eventually” in the context of support by the Microsoft app. That could mean it will be available on July 29 or it could mean in five years time. That does not give me a warm feeling.

The Music app has recently been rebranded by Microsoft as the Groove Music app. It’s still primitive, and does not even have the capabilities of the venerable Windows Media Player, Microsoft’s Windows desktop application that last had an update back in 2009. For example, as a lover of Classical music, I want to be able to search and sort my music collection by composer. I can do this in Windows Media Player – in Groove? No, not yet – and I suspect not ever.

Microsoft keep saying that their media applications will have a constant stream of improvements, but they’ve been saying this for a very long time now, with precious little result.

So in summary, the underlying platform of Windows 10 is good, with new features that promise much. It remains to be seen whether Microsoft and other players will exploit that platform with a new generation of apps that deliver value and delight.

Over the past few months, I’ve been playing with Microsoft’s technical previews of their forthcoming Windows 10 operating system. It’s the version of Windows that is supposed to marry the best features of Windows 7 (which was designed for traditional PCs with a mouse and keyboard) and Windows 8.1 (which is designed for both traditional PCs and devices such as Tablets that use touch for input).

It’s safe to say that Windows 8.1, and Windows 8 before it, has had a poor reception in the market. Acres of newsprint have been spread with the cries of pain, and vitriol, from many users of traditional PCs. Personally speaking, I singularly fail to see what all the fuss is about. I use Windows 8.1 on both my PCs and Tablets, and am perfectly comfortable in both environments. I took to the new operating system like a duck to water, and could not countenance ever going back to Windows 7.

Nonetheless, perception is reality, and Microsoft have realised that their challenge is to introduce a new version of Windows that keeps as many users as possible happy, no matter which camp (PC or Tablet) they are in.

So, as I say, I’ve been playing with the previews of Windows 10, and I’m coming to the dismaying conclusion that, as a user of a Windows 8.1 Tablet, I just don’t like it…

While the Desktop side of things has improvements, from my perspective as a Windows Tablet user (Lenovo ThinkPad 2 and Lenovo ThinkPad 10), the UI experience in Windows 10 is significantly worse than that delivered by Windows 8.1.

From what I’ve seen so far, Microsoft is bending over backwards to pander to traditional desktop PC users. They are removing valuable UI features (the Charms bar has gone) from the Tablet experience, or poking desktop features into the Tablet UI (I do not want the Desktop Taskbar to be present in the Tablet UI, but there it is, whether I want it or not).

Now I know that it’s a Technical Preview, but if Microsoft are going to deliver the final version in summer 2015 as promised, then it’s more than likely that the major features are now locked down, and all that remains are bug fixes and minor tweaks (e.g. improving the Toytown icons in File Explorer).

It seems to me, on current evidence, that Microsoft are throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I am not impressed, and I’m not the only one.