Windows 10 “Sun Valley” will do away with Windows 95 era icons

• 

  In this image, courtesy of Windows Latest, we see new icons from a Sun Valley preview build on the left versus production icons on the right. [credit: Windows Latest ]

Back in January, we reported on Sun Valley-a coming "sweeping visual rejuvenation" of Windows 10's user interface. This week, Windows Latest leaked new detail about the upcoming makeover: There's a new set of icons in C:\Windows\System32\Shell32.dllreplacing classic Windows icons that date back to the Windows 95 era.

The changes are surprisingly subtle. Most of the new icons are extremely similar to the nearly 30-year old versions they're replacing. Elderly symbols such as floppy disks and floppy disk drives persist in the new icon set-the visual style is updated on these venerable references, but that's about it.

• 

  The floppy-derived icons in Windows now (right) look like 1990s-era hardware-the Sun Valley refresh replacements (left) look more like late 1970s/early 1980s equipment. [credit: Jim Salter ]

Ironically, in the case of the floppy disk related icons, the equipment looks older. The drives in the older icons took styling cues from then-current 1990s-era equipment, but the replacement icons look more like equipment from the late 1970s or very early 1980s.

Read 1 remaining paragraphs | Comments