Hi Logan & co., Have used and resold a few copies of StartisBack and it has instantly made W8/8.1 instantly 100% better so massive thanks for the recommendation; but I am concerned that an auto roll-out of the forthcoming Microsoft update to reintroduce a full feature hybrid Start Menu might conflict horribly with StartisBack. [email protected] confirms that "most likely there would be issues". No surprise there then! I guess my biggest concern is that if StartisBack is installed when the MS update for the Start Menu happens that you could be locked out of the GUI even in safe mode because the Start Menu is used in both safe and normal startup modes. Either MS needs to detect the presence of StartisBack (or any of the other 3rd party Start Menu solutions) and give the option of retaining it or using the new hybrid Start, or StartisBack needs to provide a bootable uninstaller, or am I missing something? Not so much bothered about my systems but need to have a plan for customers - any ideas or should I just chill! :) Cheers, Paul - Macclesfield, Cheshire, UK.
It's been while since I tested this, but if I remember correctly, when you boot into safe mode, start is back doesn't get loaded, or at least, I had no start button whatsoever. I'm on 8, not 8.1, haven't done the upgrade yet.
Speaking of 8.1 - I'd imagine that an update which has that big of a UI change wouldn't be a normal update but instead one more like that, in other words, a bigger update that would have news circulating before it was released so you'd have fair warning.
If you're very concerned about it, I'd just switch off automatic updates for now, just set it to download them automatically and ask you to install them, then you can skim through the list of updates and look for it first.
Hope that helps.
[Edit]
I just thought about this too, even if explorer isn't working properly, you can still run programs from the task manager (control + shift + escape), or boot into safe mode with command prompt, and attempt to run the uninstaller that way.
None of these solutions(previously mentioned or in this edit) may be ideal, but at least, hopefully, some of them should help you out. :)
Many apologies for this super-slow response to your comments Thanks! All helpful stuff, and now of course we know that MS didn't release the new hybrid start as an update to W8 and don't intend to - it's rebrand time! Hello to W10 :/
Why do I fail to get excited about this? Truth is I think the last time I felt any 'excitement' about a Win release was in '99 for XP. Boy was that a long time ago!! Oh the years are passing! :)
Thanks again and have a good day/evening/night...