How to manage both the Start menu and Start screen in Windows 10

Whether you plan to use the Start menu, the Start screen or both in Windows 10, Microsoft has continually been adjusting the Start area since the debut of the Windows 10 Technical Preview. Released last week, the latest 10130 build throws in yet more changes to Start.

The Start menu/Start screen is one of the most critical aspects of Windows 10. After killing the Start menu in Windows 8, Microsoft received a lot of flack from disgruntled PC users. Many gave a thumb’s down to the Start screen and urged Microsoft to bring back the Start menu. And that’s exactly what the company did in Windows 10, but with a twist. The new version of Windows lets you choose between a new type of Start menu with both shortcuts and tiles and the Start screen with just tiles. So how do you make your choice, and how do you control the overall Start area? Let’s look at the process in the latest Windows 10 build.

Choose the Start menu or the Start screen
First, you can choose whether you want to work with the Start menu or the Start screen. To do this, let’s assume that you’re already in Start menu mode.

• Click the Start button and then click the link for Settings.
• At the Settings screen, click the option for System.
• At the System screen, click the option for Tablet Mode.
• In the Tablet Mode screen, you’ll see an option that says: “Optimize the system for tablet and touch usage by enabling Tablet Mode.”
• Turn on this option and then click the Start button, and you’ll be transported to the Start screen. At this point, if you want to see the Start menu again, click the icon of the three horizontal bars, aka the hamburger icon, in the upper left corner. The left column of your Start menu now shares space with the Start screen. From here you can access both the Start menu and the Start screen.
• Click or tap the the Start screen, however, and the Start menu disappears.
• To re-enable the full Start menu, return to the Setting screen and turn off the option for Tablet Mode.
• In the Tablet Mode screen, you can also choose what you want to see when you sign into Windows. Click the drop-down box under “When I sign in” and you can opt to immediately enter Tablet Mode, aka the Start screen; go to the Desktop, which defaults to the Start menu; or return to your previous mode.

Even though it’s called Tablet Mode, the option to choose the Start menu or Start screen appears to work on any device. I tried it on a tablet and a desktop PC, and the process was exactly the same.

Resize the Start menu
Let’s say you prefer the Start menu but find it too small to hold all of the titles. You can resize it.

• Make sure Tablet Mode is turned off. Click the Start button to return to the Start menu.
• Move your cursor to the top border of the Start menu.
• Drag and move the cursor up to increase the height of the menu. On the flip side, you can decrease the height by dragging the cursor down.
• You should also be able to increase the width of the Start menu by dragging the right border to the right, or decrease the width by dragging it to the left. However, in my testing of the latest Windows 10 build, this capability didn’t work consistently. (Yes, Microsoft still has a bevy of bugs to fix.)

Color the Start menu and Start screen
Okay, now let’s say you want to customize the colors and appearance of the Start menu or Start screen.

• Click the Start button and return to the Settings screen.
• At the Settings screen, click the option for Personalization.
• At the Personalization screen, click the option for Colors. Here you can choose an accent color for your Start menu or Start screen.
• Scroll down the right pane and turn on the option to Show color on Start, taskbar, and action center.
• Now scroll up the pane. To let Windows 10 choose an accent color based on your desktop background, turn on the option to Automatically pick an access color from my background.
• Click the Start button, and you’ll see that the Start menu has adopted a new color.
• If you’d rather choose your own color, turn off the option to Automatically pick an access color from my background and click one of the colors from the palette.
• Click the Start button, and you’ll see the menu has adopted the color you choose.
• You can also turn Tablet mode back on to see that the Start screen is painted with the color you selected.

OK, maybe you’re prefer a less solid color for your Start menu or Start screen, one with a little transparency.

• Go back to the Settings screen for Colors. Scroll to the bottom of the right pane.
• Turn on the option to Make Start, taskbar and action center transparent.
• Click the Start button. You’ll now see that the Start menu is transparent.

Choose what you see in Start
You can also control which items you see in the Start menu.

• Return to the same Settings screen where you selected the color and transparency for the Start menu and Start screen. But this time, click the option for Start in the left pane.
• In the right page under Customize list, you can turn each of the three settings on or off to determine what appears on the Start menu. The first setting determines if you’ll see Microsoft’s suggestions for apps and content that should appear. The second setting controls whether recently opened programs appear on the menu. And the third setting controls whether a recently added apps group appears.
• Next you can establish which apps appear in the Start menu list. To do this, click the link to Customize List.
• At the Customize List screen, turn on each app that you wish to see in the Start menu.
• Click the back arrow at the top to return to the prior screen.
• Click the Start button. You should now see all of the apps that you selected appear as individual links.

Change the behavior of Start
Finally, you can change certain Start “behaviors.” The Start behaviors section offers another way to switch between the Start menu and the Start screen.

• Return to the same Settings screen and scroll down to the Start behaviors section.
• To use the Start screen instead of the Start menu, turn on the option to Use full-screen Start when in the desktop.
• Click the Start button, and you’ll now see the full Start screen.
• Return to the Settings screen. Turn on the option to Store and display recently opened items in Start and the taskbar. Enabling this setting simply adds recently opened items to both the Start menu and the taskbar.

Windows 10 is due to debut July 29. So at this point, Microsoft has less than two months to finish refining the operating system as much as possible. As such, you can expect the company to continue to tweak many existing features. That means the Start menu and Start screen options may go through further adjustments. But at this point, the above steps will allow you to control both the Start menu and Start screen as much as possible in the latest build.