Windows 11 Preview – Fresh start should give OS new impetus

So it can go that fast. We wrote a year ago that the end of Windows 10 as Windows-as-a-service was not yet in sight , but that end has now been ushered in. On October 14, 2025 , support for Windows 10 Home and Pro will end, Microsoft writes on product pages. Back in 2015, when the OS came out, Microsoft referred to Windows 10 as the last version of Windows , and combined with the as-a-service designation, it looked like no new major Windows versions would come out. after Windows 10.

In March, Windows CEO Panos Panay suddenly announced a ‘new Windows generation’, followed by comments from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in May, about ‘one of the most significant updates to Windows of the past decade’. He also talked about a new generation of Windows. Those comments coincided with rumors of a visual update to Windows 10 coming later this year, known internally as Sun Valley .

Microsoft will reveal more about what it’s hinting at at an event on Thursday, June 24, starting at 5:00 PM. Based on the teaser for that event, there was already speculation that it would not simply be an update, but Windows 11. Because where is that center line in the shadow of the logo? Doesn’t that look like an 11? Those predictions came true.

This week, a build version of Windows 11 appeared online , no doubt to the chagrin of Microsoft. The early release puts an end to speculation and shows the new generation of Windows in all its glory. That doesn’t mean that all the details are out there and the final release may just contain the necessary changes, but it does give you an idea of ​​the direction Windows is heading. Tweakers booted the virtual machine and started working with it.

Hi, we’re getting things ready

The file is an iso with build number 21996 and with a size of 4.53GB. We run it on a virtual machine and we recommend that consumers do not install this version due to possible insecurity, instability and the fact that it is not an official release and clearly unfinished.

When installing, you first choose the version. This still concerns Home, Pro, Enterprise and Education, and yes, the N versions without Media Player are still available. Windows 11 does not differ from Windows 10 in this way. Only when selecting the country or region, choosing the keyboard settings and connecting to the Internet, it is visible that it is a different version than Windows 10. This selection window has no sharp corners, as with W10, and the color gradients and colorful animations in the selection menus also stand out. It can be concluded from this that one of Microsoft’s goals is to at least give Windows a visual refresh.

After entering your name and setting three security questions, it’s time for privacy settings, including whether you want to activate Find my Device and whether you accept Advertising IDs with apps so that they can show personalized ads. It is striking here that the scroll bar is not visible by default. It only appears when we hover over the options with the mouse pointer. Everything is checked by default and there is no toggle to deactivate everything at once. Then we get the familiar ‘Hi, we’re getting things ready for you’ message, this time with some colors on the black background.

A fresh start

Inveterate Windows users will be a bit surprised at the first image Windows 11 presents. The start menu floats and is now pontifically in the center. This shows pinned and recommended apps by default. Pinned apps can be dragged to reorder, and a right-click menu shows options to unpin, move all the way up, or pin to the taskbar, among other things.

If you choose ‘all apps’ at the start menu, you will see a long list of all available programs, similar to how Windows 10 showed them. Users can set the start menu to also show frequently used apps or certain folders, such as those for documents. Remarkably enough, they appear next to the off button. This actually creates a kind of second taskbar with direct access to the personal folders. Just like those for the off button, those icons consist of black lines, so that the start menu does not get too busy. The start menu also contains the user account.

The Live Tiles, the colored app tiles of the start menu, are not visible in this view by default. The tiles first appeared in Windows 8 and Microsoft tinkered with them for a long time, but the concept never really became popular. The old Windows 10 start menu cannot be recalled in the settings, but it is not completely gone either. If you still prefer it, you can reactivate it with an adjustment in the registry .

The start menu cannot be dragged or resized. It appears after a click on the Windows icon with a quick animation from the bottom of the screen and disappears again when clicked away. There is a lot of space between the items on the start menu, making this very useful on touchscreens. Furthermore, it is a somewhat basic menu, especially next to the busy W10 start menu. Not everyone will appreciate that the menu pontifically covers the desktop.

Those who have looked at Windows 10X will find this rendering of the Start menu familiar: that scrapped lightweight OS for laptops with or without two touchscreens featured a similar Start menu. It is clear that Microsoft has implemented many elements of Windows 10X in Windows 11, albeit mainly in terms of visual and interface properties. For Windows 10X, Microsoft greatly simplified the shell, user interface, and all apps ran on that OS in a container. At first glance, Windows 11 seems to have inherited parts of that shell, but combined with Windows 10.

Taskbar: center to left

The taskbar is centered by default, but the alignment can be adjusted. However, he can only move to the left and the icons on the bar then slide in an animation to the left corner. A funny side effect is that the start menu also opens more on the left, to be able to keep that old start menu feeling a bit.

By default, the taskbar contains the apps for Search, Explorer, Edge, the Microsoft Store, Task View, and Widgets. The icon for Task View is new and the function has also been slightly modified, because it only offers the possibility to create virtual desktops. In other words: the Timeline function, which was used to scroll through a history, has disappeared. The Widget function is also partly new. The display of widgets is linked to your Microsoft account and by default this section shows personalized information about the weather, news and stocks. It is therefore a kind of successor to the News and Interests function that Microsoft recently added to Windows 10.

The search function is basically the same function as in Windows 10 but the search bar has moved to the top of the window. The Microsoft Store is also unchanged, although rumors are circulating that Microsoft will announce major changes for its store. Where early versions of Windows 10X still had a very stripped-down Explorer, that is not the case with Windows 11. It’s just the explorer we know from Windows 10, with all its functionality. Another relief: right-clicking the Windows logo, or WIN + X, still shows the shortcuts to commonly used settings like Task Manager and PowerShell. Of course, the apps that Microsoft puts on the taskbar can be unpinned to put your own selection there.

One of the menus not inherited from Windows 10X is the Quick Settings, which allowed that OS to access settings such as volume control, airplane mode, and screen brightness with a simple menu. At the bottom right of Windows 11 is the Action Center with notifications and buttons for, among other things, Focus Assist, network, VPN, Screen Snip and Night Light. So no changes here compared to version 10.

We didn’t find much new in the settings menu, but we did come across a section called Device usage. Here, users can specify whether they use the OS for gaming, family applications, creation, school, entertainment, or business. Microsoft would then provide “suggestions for tips, tools and services.” We didn’t get any such suggestions, so maybe the company is still working on it. Users who link their Microsoft account during installation will already see these options during that installation.

Visual Snap

Windows 10 has a Snap function, which allows windows to be placed on one side of the screen or a corner. This can be done with the shortcuts WIN + arrow key. Windows 11 adds functionality to that by visually displaying the Snap choices. This Snap Options window appears when a user hovers over the maximize button of an open window. For example, you can choose whether a window should take up half or a corner. When using multiple windows, this is useful for keeping an overview and multitasking. If you hover over a ‘snapped’ app on the taskbar, the thumbnail view also shows the group of apps that are together in the Snap overview. By the way, these new window management functions can be turned off in the settings.

The eye wants something too

There are six themes, three light and three dark, with their own background images and color schemes. Microsoft applies its Acrylic design style to the start menu and elsewhere, the blurry translucent view of windows the company used early on as Aero Glass with Windows Vista. In addition, the company uses its Fluent Design principles even more than with Windows 10, such as simple icons and interface elements that follow the mouse pointer with changes in hue. There are new icons again, but Microsoft is already using many of them in the Insider Builds of Windows 10 and in fact the company has been working on bringing the collection of new icons to its OS since last year .

Visually, it is also noticeable that more animations are used, for example when opening and closing windows. Many windows and buttons no longer have the sharp corners, but a rounder appearance, which looks nice. Microsoft has applied this quite rigorously to just about all windows, including older parts of the operating system.

In any case, this build lacks consistency and probably will remain so, because with Windows 10 that is still the case. You can still find features in many places within the OS that look like they are from the Windows XP era. Moreover, the dark mode only shows frequently used parts in the black view and there is a good chance that you will still be surprised by light windows. And the settings are still divided over a ‘new’ settings menu and ‘old’ control panel.

Finally

It is, of course, too early to draw conclusions. The leaked build may give an incomplete picture of what the OS will eventually look like. It does seem clear that Windows 11 builds on Windows 10 and mainly brings visual changes. In that regard, it could also have come out as Windows 10 October 2021 Update or something similar. In addition, some optimizations for tablets have been implemented, although we have not been able to test that yet. With the failure of the Windows 10S and Windows 10X forays, Microsoft thought it was time to refocus on its core software for PCs, no doubt aided by the growth in PC sales last year. That renewed focus should give Windows new impetus and eye-catchers such as the new start menu and the taskbar should help with that. Nevertheless, plenty of questions remain. Will Windows 11 be a free upgrade? When will it appear? Is Microsoft going to focus on dual-screen laptops with Windows 11, as it wanted to do with Windows 10X? We’ll probably know more on June 24.