The Start Menu of Windows 7 (and Vista)
Windows 8 Start Menu
The Start Menu in Windows 8
Much has been written about the missing Start Menu in Windows 8, the little orb that would usually sit in the bottom-left corner of your Windows desktop and offered you quick accessto frequently used software programs, documents, search and other parts of Windows.
The Start Menu has been around since Windows 95 [the original design was rectangular] and is probably one of the most-used features of Windows. People aren’t therefore feeling very happy about the demise of Start Menu in Windows 8.
Want the Start Menu back? There are third-party utilities that recreate the Start Menu in Windows 8 but you don’t need them – there’s a hidden menu in Windows 8 that offers most of the Start Menu functionality and you can activate it by right-clicking in the bottom-left corner of your Windows 8 desktop.
The menu provide one-click access to Windows Explorer, Run box, Desktop Search, Control Panel, Command Prompt and other “power” features. The only thing missing is a list of your frequently used programs which are anyway replaced by tiles in Windows 8.