Jim Salter
Microsoft made early Home windows 11 builds obtainable by way of its Home windows Insider program the week after its first main announcement, and we have spent fairly just a few hours kicking the tires. When Home windows 11 publicly releases, it is prone to be a fantastic working system—however proper now, it is an unpolished, unfinished mess.
In fact, this isn’t surprising—Home windows 11 remains to be solely obtainable within the Dev channel of the Insider program. The three Insider channels are Launch Preview, Beta, and Dev; Dev roughly corresponds to a software program alpha, and Microsoft itself describes it as “the latest code,” with “tough edges and a few instability.”
Home windows 11 is improve solely (for now)
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You possibly can’t carry out a pleasant, clear Home windows 11 set up but, sadly—you will want to make use of Home windows Replace to mangle an current Home windows 10 set up as an alternative.
Jim Salter -
There’s one thing grimly acceptable about your first take a look at Home windows 11 being the “engaged on updates” display.
Jim Salter -
We have now lockscreen! A really macOS-esque lockscreen, between the desert wallpaper and the selection of extra-rounded sans serif font.
Jim Salter -
Most of Home windows 11’s built-in themes and wallpaper are as enticing as you’d count on. We’re undecided what occurred with this “Captured Movement” theme, although…
Jim Salter -
Jaggies? JAGGIES. No, this is not an artifact of a foul graphics driver or one thing—copying the precise file out of the Home windows 11 VM and onto the host, then opening it in Shotwell seems no completely different.
Jim Salter
The primary disappointment we encountered with Home windows 11 is a puzzling one—it will possibly’t (but) be cleanly put in as a brand new working system. To put in Home windows 11 Construct 22000.51, you could start with a totally patched and up-to-date Home windows 10 set up, then flight it into the Dev channel, then improve it to Home windows 11 by way of Home windows Replace. (In case you’re not already on Home windows 10 20H2 or newer, you will must get via that improve first.)
We had no actual issues updating both a well-used Home windows 10 VM or a brand-new one—however we strongly advise in opposition to upgrading to Home windows 11 on a machine or VM that issues to you, until you’ve a assured methodology of restoration you each belief and are ready to make use of. Though one in every of our take a look at VMs is a “day by day driver” we depend on, it is sitting on prime of a ZFS dataset—and we took a guide snapshot previous to the improve, for simple rollback.
Mockingly, the primary look anybody will get at Home windows 11 itself proper now’s the dreaded BSOU (Blue Display Of Updates)—after flighting our Home windows 10 VM into the Dev channel and one very fast obtain, it rebooted. Throughout the reboot, we get the standard “do not flip off your laptop” message—however it’s in a brand new font and probably on a barely completely different shade of blue background.
Though the preliminary obtain in Home windows Replace is over relatively shortly, the “engaged on updates” part will not be. This part took about an hour on every of the Home windows 10 VMs we upgraded—one fairly well-used, and one model new.
Alpha means alpha
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It did not take lengthy to seek out our first Home windows 11 bug—the DNS resolver stack was weirdly damaged. Nslookup works, however ping would not!
Jim Salter -
The second bug did not take for much longer—we had been unable to get the “IP Settings” dialog to simply accept legitimate configuration data.
Jim Salter -
With Settings damaged, the subsequent query was whether or not the Management Panel—theoretically deprecated years in the past by Settings—remains to be obtainable. Fortunately, it is nonetheless there—and its adapter configuration dialog nonetheless works correctly!
Jim Salter -
Though Management Panel labored, altering my IP configuration did not repair the DNS drawback. Bizarrely, altering community “card”—from VirtIO to Intel e1000—did repair the issue.
Jim Salter -
In bizarro world, you possibly can repair issues with DNS decision by utilizing a DNS resolver on the opposite facet of a WireGuard tunnel. Enjoyable!
Jim Salter
It took nearly no time to seek out our first and second nasty Home windows 11 bugs—the DNS resolver was unusually and inconsistently damaged, and the community configuration dialog underneath Settings was damaged as nicely.
You possibly can see the DNS resolver points within the first screenshot above. We will ping 8.8.8.8—Google’s anycast DNS supplier—with out situation, so we all know that normal connectivity is okay each contained in the LAN and out of doors of it. However makes an attempt to ping google.com fail! The confusion solely will get worse once we use nslookup to question our DNS server straight—it solutions our queries simply fantastic. Nonetheless, making an attempt to ping the identical hostname straight fails, as do most makes an attempt to browse with Edge or Chrome.
The second bug got here whereas attempting to troubleshoot the primary—making an attempt to set IP tackle configuration straight utilizing Home windows 11’s Settings dialog fails miserably, with a cryptic message to “test a number of settings and take a look at once more.” There’s nothing really improper with the settings—the dialog is simply damaged. Subsequent query—is Management Panel nonetheless there?
Fortunately, Management Panel hasn’t but been accomplished away with in Home windows 11, and its tried-and-true community adapter configuration dialog works simply as anticipated. Sadly, that did not resolve the unique DNS situation—which seems to be some battle between Home windows 11 and the VirtIO community driver we’re utilizing.
Altering the VM’s community adapter to emulated Intel e1000 resolved the DNS situation—as does, hilariously, leaving the NIC as VirtIO and simply utilizing a DNS server on the far facet of a WireGuard tunnel. (WireGuard has its personal digital NIC, so we’re technically not utilizing our “actual” community card to entry the DNS server on the far facet of the tunnel.)
Over the week or so we have been taking part in with Home windows 11, we have additionally had your entire VM lock up and require a tough reset a number of occasions. Did we point out that that is nonetheless alpha software program, and no person needs to be working something they care about on it but?
