Windows will never again reach the pinnacle that was Windows 7. Win 7 was familiar, stable, powerful just get things done OS. RIP.

The pinnacle was Windows 2000; none of the releases since then really improved it. (And I say that as someone who thinks the Vista hate is overblown).

I take your point but I had way too much trouble with x64 driver support in 2000/XP. For me win7 was the one that got proper 64 bit driver support and "just worked" fine with a bunch of memory.

I think somewhere around 2K/XP was the pinnacle, Vista was too much graphical bling and bloaty, while 7 toned it back a bit, but 8 is when the decline really started being noticeable.

For UI yes, but I had way too much trouble with x64 driver support in 2000/XP. Win 7 nailed that and just seemed to work for me.

Don't remind me

The MS employees who “get” it and actually use stock Windows themselves stopped being in charge.

See also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30019307.

The key point in that thread is the UI/UX designers don't use Windows and use Macs.

...which explains the disturbing similarity between macOS 13's System Settings and the same in Windows 11.

I suspect the managers and execs also don’t, or only sanitized Windows Enterprise setups, or else they wouldn’t let the designers have free reign here.

Technically Windows 11 is an even release, since Windows 9 was skipped. I, for one, am looking forward to the revolutionary Taskbar with Titles in Windows 12!

I love digging into every new version of Windows to find an old NT-era dialog box on some low level setting

Perhaps they're making it worse for people on HN, but better for the average user?

That seems very doubtful. I know very few average users who think Windows is getting better, anyway.

But even if it's true, that doesn't make any difference to me. I'm still forced to use it myself.

Most average users complain just as much, and are just as unhappy with it. Only reason they stay is learned helplessness and lack of realistic alternatives.

I disagree, I don't see any evidence that regular users are unhappy at all.