The original name is StartIsback but since the version comes for each OS in a separate installer the author decided to split the name, which means StartIsback is for Windows 8 only while StartIsBack+ is for Windows 8.1 and the StartIsBack++ version is only for Windows 10. The decision here is in my opinion here to separate the product name so that every user easily identify the product and know then which version is for what OS – I also assume it’s done because size reasons, theoretically one Installer would be possible but it would include things which you might not need.

There not much options to mention here, if you like the Windows 7 or 8 Start menu you will love this program because you can customize it the same way. The program itself does a fantastic job and if you liked the Windows 7 Start menu you will be able to bring it ‘back’ with this fantastic little program.

Because of the fact that the program is small in size you not need to care much about system resources, because StartIsBack++ doesn’t waste any resources in my case it’s around 127 MB max in memory so you won’t even notice it.

This feature shown on the picture above is unique, some other Start Menu programs copied it later but preventing the original SearchUI.exe and ShellExperienceHost processes are special, it should in theory prevent to launch the original Start Menu, sadly this option never worked for me. I’m not sure if it is on my end or not, but the programs are still running maybe because of the fact while some Windows services want constantly these programs running in the background and traditional stopping these services won’t work, they simply restart. SearchUI is a part of Cortana/Windows File indexing and the ShellExpirenceHost is a part of the Windows Security Center among other notification. The ‘Remove Pin to Start from shell context menus’ option also never worked for me, hopefully the developer will fix this but it should’t be a big deal. All other functions are functional and you can customize everything like you want.

The program needs some updates here and there because with every new Windows Update or major release the developer have to add workarounds within the program source code to ‘fix’ the broken functions – I don’t blame the program here, it’s simply because Microsoft change something over the time – this is normal and the program simply need to address those changes more frequent.

I remember when the project started and a lot of other programs basically copied the program more or less and it’s functions. What I love on StartIsBack is that the program is simple, small in size and does it’s job. You get a program which doesn’t cost much, it gets updates regular and you can manually control everything – What is missing? – Well in my opinion nothing but I’m not the hardcore Start Menu ‘freak’ I simply like the look and it’s functionality because I simply don’t like the integrated Windows Start Menu.