First experiences of Windows 10

I finally conceded to upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10 (Dell Precision M4700 Laptop) and… it’s not terrible, but I’ve had a few issues:

  • CDRW drive vanished. Fortunately restored by downloading drivers from Dell.
  • SD card reader vanished, required new Dell drivers and manually enabling some devices in device manager. I’ve still not got to the bottom of this one: every time I need to use my SD card, I have to open Device Manager and manually enable “Intel(R) 7 Series/C216 Chipset Family PCI Express Root Port 8 – 1E1E”. Still a major annoyance!
  • Takes an inexplicably long time to shut down, with a black screen. However, this seems to have to improved since a recent Windows update.
  • PDF files are associated with Edge by default. Which is odd, given that Edge seems incapable of opening PDF files. Fortunately, it is easy to change the file associations to fix this. Why on earth does it do this?
  • OpenGL quad-buffer frame sequential stereo no longer works properly (NVIDIA Quadro K2000M / 368.86 drivers). Either it displays the left stereo channel only, or works but with terrible performance (1 fps). Workaround: using the “Virtalis applications” profile seems to fix this (but restricts the 3D settings available). Solution: this one finally seems to have been resolved by Windows updates, and currently working OK on 369.09 drivers.
  • OpenGL stereo also causes issues with double images on the lock screen (below), and remnants of the lock screen are visible when returning to the desktop.quad_buffer_lockscreenThere is a temporary workaround: starting a stereo application and exiting it again temporarily fixes the desktop flicker, until the PC is locked again, at which point the problem returns. The only way to fix it otherwise is a reboot. Solution: this now seems resolved on 369.09 drivers.
  • When OpenGL stereo is enabled (on NVIDIA card/driver above), the display brightness increases to maximum, and it is not restored when the stereo application exits. Afterwards, the brightness controls in Windows no longer seem to work. Workaround: using the “Virtalis applications” profile seems to fix this. Solution: this one was eventually resolved by Windows Updates and/or 369.09 drivers.
  • The sound sometimes randomly stops working. Uninstalling and reinstalling audio drivers and fiddling with settings doesn’t seem to fix it. Then mysteriously, just after I’ve given up, it starts working again all by itself… spooky.
  • Windows Explorer often seems to respond really slowly and displays a blank page for a few seconds when initially browsing the local hard drives (which are both SSDs!) Solution: I disabled “Quick access” under: Quick access.. Options… General… Open File Explorer to: “This PC” (instead of “Quick access”). This eliminated the problem.
  • Recently (after an automatic update) every time I log into windows, I can briefly see a progress bar showing two files relating to the touch pad drivers being deleted (!) Still haven’t got to bottom of this issue.

In the interests of balance, some positive things…

  • The “Movies & TV” video player is much smoother at seeking in video.
  • The notification sounds remind me of Zelda / Wind Waker… which is cool.

2 thoughts on “First experiences of Windows 10”

  1. You did a upgrade from windows 7 to windows 10?

    or did you do a clean install with windows 10?

    Cause i have the same laptop but when i install windows 10 the lock screen flicker???

    1. It was an upgrade from Windows 7 to 10. Many of my problems (but not all of them) were resolved by updated drivers. I’m using NVIDIA 377.11 drivers currently.
      I still have an issue with the SD card reader.. to use that I have to go into Device Manager and manually enable it every time!

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