Is Windows 10 your daily driver?

It’s been almost two weeks since Windows 10 was made available for download as a Technical Preview, and according to a new post on Blogging Windows, more than a million early adopters have already joined the Windows Insider program and downloaded the latest version of Windows to be. The post goes on to reveal that 64% of those installs are on actual PCs, as opposed to running Windows 10 within a virtual machine. Microsoft is receiving lots of feedback from the Insiders, some 200,000 pieces of “UIF” (user initiated feedback), further evidence that users are not only trying out Windows 10, but actively using it.

In my own case, I started out installing Windows 10 on an old laptop, but after I found that it was fairly stable (a long way from the early days of Longhorn, where you were lucky to get a build to run, and couldn’t do much with it if it did!), I took the plunge and installed Windows 10 on my main home machine as a “daily driver”. I’ve been running it that way for 10 days or so, and so far so good. Sure there are glitches, mostly with apps, and a few annoyances (I miss the ability to close OneDrive, especially when syncing new machines or moving the OneDrive folder), but so far it’s been a good experience.

Now, granted, this is coming from a 95% desktop (as opposed to “Modern”) user, and that part of Windows 10, the “Windows 7” part, is and should be the most stable experience. There just aren’t many “Modern” apps I’m compelled to use, other than Mail, and in my “daily driving”, I stick pretty closely to the desktop. Given that experience, the jump from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 actually introduced more in terms of an upgraded user experience than Windows 10 does. Sure, the Start Menu is nice, but I don’t “start” that many apps anyway.

How about you? Have you installed Windows 10? Are you using it in a controlled environment, or like me did you take the plunge and just install it over Windows 7/8? What do you think so far? And are you actively participating in the Windows Insider program? Are you answering the feedback questions that pop up (maybe I’m pre-conditioned to ignore any and all popups, but I tend to ignore these, too)?

It’s going to be a while before we get to “the good stuff” with Windows 10 – sometime next spring when Microsoft starts actively talking about new consumer experiences. Until then, I’m happy to be kicking the tires on Windows 10, are you?