What's new in Win 8.1?

I see lots of visual and presentational changes but was wondering what really new features might be lurking within. Well I've found at least one - you can right click an ISO file and mount it just as if a disk was in the drive. In Win 8 I've been using VirtualCloneDrive for this but that it seems is no longer necessary.

Please post more finds.

EDIT - it also seems very compact - a working system with email client, Chrome, and a few other bits of software is just 14.5GB

 

lol:-D

Windows 8.1 might turn out to be another ME or vista the more they come out with Operating Systems the more it my be another junk system.

lol:-D all so seems they kinda went back to basics a little the task bar is now back in 8.1 i would say about time.It was really really dumb of them to get rid of the task bar to begin with.

 

It looks to me like they may have actually listened to the comments and concerns of their customers/users.

A lot of the complaints I see about Win 8 are regarding the lack of a taskbar/start menu. Users were not fond of the inherent clunkiness of the OS when used on a traditional PC. I have found the OS to be somewhat intuitive and pleasant to use on a tablet.

8.1 seems to address these concerns and make the OS more user-friendly on traditional PC's.

 

Windows 8 has that iso feature as well.


New things: Revamped search, start button (not menu) an easier way to get to all programs, revamped background feature for start screen (looks kind of launchpad-ish now), IE 11, a couple new metro apps.

Those are off the top of my head.

 

There was always a taskbar in Windows 8. There was no start button or menu.

Now there is a button, but no menu. That screenshot is misleading and is not indicative of what Windows 8.1 has to offer.

 

I did wonder about that. It's not in my 8 but I guess VirtualCloneDrive disabled it.

 

It probably changed the file association.

If you change it back to explorer, it should show.

 

More headaches. If find if ironic that today Microsoft announced that they would be closing Technet subscriptions, and that they have started adding a .1 after the OS, instead of calling it a Service Pack.

The writing is on the wall, days of Microsoft are numbered. I give them about another two or three years, and they will no longer be known as what they were five years ago.