More details in our story:

Tested: Windows 11’s ‘faster’ File Explorer (preloaded) is still slower than Windows 10. On a 4GB RAM test machine, File Explorer used ~32.4MB of RAM without preloading. After turning on preloading, Windows quietly adds ~35MB more. So Explorer now sits at ~67.4MB in memory

Microsoft confirms a Windows 11 bug is accidentally making the 'password icon' invisible on the lockscreen login page. If you have multiple sign-in options (like PIN, fingerprint, face, password), the password icon in “Sign-in options” might disappear. However, the password

Some of you asked: What happens when you disable system-wide animations, transparency effects, and set File Explorer's default location to a folder or "This PC"? Result: It's way faster now with preloading enabled. However, it is still a bit slower than Windows 10.

I recommend reading our in-depth analysis for more videos, benchmarks:

Microsoft’s preload trick works for launch speed.... but it just doesn’t fix the deeper performance problems users have been shouting about since Windows 11 shipped. Watch the before-preload and after-preload comparison of File Explorer on Windows 11. It's faster. Video in slow

And it's clearly not Windows 11's fault... look at the comparison below. Third-party app File Pilot, made by @vkrajacic, loads instantly, while File Explorer (preloaded) takes time. File Pilot is equally modern and better (actually), but it still loads faster. Why? This video

So is preloading “worth” 35MB? For launch speed alone: yes. But is Windows 11’s File Explorer now “fixed”? Not even close. The app still feels sluggish once it’s open, and that’s where people spend most of their time. Let's compare the context menu on Windows 11 and Windows 10.

In a light-load test, we had to slow the recording to 0.25x to clearly see the benefit. The preloaded Explorer opens, closes, and reopens in less time than the non-preloaded one takes to close. So yes, it is quicker. But File Explorer on Windows 10 is still much faster, and

Tested: Windows 11’s ‘faster’ File Explorer (preloaded) is still slower than Windows 10. On a 4GB RAM test machine, File Explorer used ~32.4MB of RAM without preloading. After turning on preloading, Windows quietly adds ~35MB more. So Explorer now sits at ~67.4MB in memory

More details and analysis of Dell's earnings call in our story:

Adoption of Windows 11 is slower than Windows 10, as Microsoft bets big on AI. Dell says, "We have not completed the Windows 11 transition...." "In fact, if you were to look at it relative to the previous OS end-of-service, we are 10 to 12 points behind at that point with

Full analysis/benchmark of the new WhatsApp in our story:

This new WhatsApp reflects the sorry state of the Windows Store / Windows Marketplace. WhatsApp UWP was not exactly perfect, but it at least worked. Now, we've this new memory hog app that adds another Chromium instance to your PC. Notifications are broken, and we are often

And yes, the new updated UI is beautiful. Perfect use of screen space, right?

Left side: old WhatsApp (UWP/WinUI) and right side: new WhatsApp (Chromium/WebView2). Do you see the obvious performance issues here? The reason is simple: the old app was a native Windows client. The new one is basically web whatsapp com locked inside WebView2, with multiple

However, compared to regular PCs, this new WhatsApp feels slightly faster on Intel's Copilot+ PCs (Lunar Lake) that we tested. It could be because of the better hardware, but it's still a garbage app. Also, how is the new "WhatsApp" optimized for Copilot+ PCs?! See the second

I tested Meta's new Chromium-based WhatsApp for Windows 11, and it's a performance nightmare 🧵 This new WhatsApp is based on Chromium (WebView2), and it replaces the original native app, which was based on WinUI/UWP. The new WhatsApp feels like it's running at 10FPS. For

More details in our story:

Microsoft admits File Explorer is slow in Windows 11, and it’s going to preload it in the background to help improve launch performance. “This shouldn’t be visible to you, outside of File Explorer hopefully launching faster when you need to use it,” Microsoft confirmed. If you