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[Cato]

I’ve used Classic Shell for a long time on Windows 7 to improve on the start menu, and its successor is Open Shell, which works pretty well on Windows 10.  Very customisable, free and open source (like Classic Shell from which it’s derived) – https://github.com/Open-Shell/Open-Shell-Menu

Stardock is commercial, not sure of the price.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 4 months ago by Cato.

One of my first posts here… hi all.

It’s not just the Linux community who should be concerned about this – it affects Windows users too, particularly if you like the idea of new low-power ARM tablets with Windows 8. (More coverage here: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/01/18/windows_8_linux_secure_boot/ )

Any power user who has ever installed Windows themselves (maybe to get rid of pre-installed junk, or recover space used by a recovery partition on a laptop), or used a live CD to boot an antivirus toolkit, recovery toolkit, etc should also be concerned. There will be significant extra hassle on Intel / x86 hardware.

More fundamentally, when ARM laptops arrive (which will happen though tablets are the focus now), do you want to have a completely locked down system like Apple’s iOS on iPads, or do you want an open system where you can install any application you feel like? UEFI controls which OS can be installed, and Windows 8 will be the only option on an ARM laptop/tablet that has the “Designed for Windows” logo, which is likely to be 99% of them. Windows 8 on ARM will be Metro only, it seems, meaning the locked down, app store only, sandbox only part of the OS.

If Windows users are not very careful, the freedom to install what you want, and build your own PC, will eventually disappear… A bit like having a car with the hood (bonnet) welded shut, so you can only go to authorised repairers.

UEFI Secure Boot is a promising technology – the critical thing is who owns the signing keys that authorise a particular OS to be installed and boot. If the user owns the keys, all well and good – there is more security against rootkits and UEFI is technically better than the ancient BIOS. If Microsoft or the PC manufacturer owns the keys, you can wave goodbye to building your own PC, trying Linux (sometimes it’s used to recover Windows), using recovery/antivirus CDs, etc. A whole area of PC flexibility is about to disappear…

I use Windows (a lot) like most people, and also Linux for home servers etc, and build my own PCs – I really don’t want 30 years of PC flexibility disappearing, as is likely to happen with UEFI Secure Boot and Windows 8, particularly on ARM.