I'm sure it's just a thing with the preview, but to be perfectly honest, I never used Win8 after the initial dev release, so it's entirely possible this was something I would have hated in Win8 as well.
Basically, the search is covering up the ability to click "All Programs" and most of the icons in the tray when I click on the Start button. If I have the Taskbar set to not auto-hide, the issue is not as bad, but only because that raises the position of the Start Menu by about 30-40 pixels.
It would also help if the start menu wasn't partially hidden behind the taskbar when it's set to auto-hide.
Is there any setting or registry modification I can change to either move it to the side, resize it so it's not taller than the taskbar, or remove it completely?
Thanks
Just simply right click on task bar, then find the drop down list with search bar on it.
That would be for the taskbar search option, which is what I would use instead of the Start Search. Disabling it did not remove the Start Search appearance at all though.
What build are you on? It's was a bug in the past... Solved Menu - all apps hidden by the Windows logo - Windows 10 blog
On the desktop it shows 10041, but I swear I got the Spartan update with 10049.
The thread you linked is for turning off the auto-hide to keep the taskbar from covering up part of the start menu, but that's more of a workaround than a fix/solution. For some of the things I am testing, I need for the taskbar to auto-hide. The Start Menu being partially covered by the taskbar is not nearly as much of an issue as the massive search box. Truly, just being able to shrink the Start Search so that it's not taller than the taskbar would be a fine workaround. Fixing the Start menu so that it "pops" above the taskbar would be helpful also, but I figure that's something the MS team is still working on.
It still happens for me on 10049. I'm sure it went away... Either I dreamt it or it has come back.
The search box the exact same size as the taskbar if you don't have Use small taskbar iconsticked so that could be another workaround (except it makes the taskbar bigger not the search box smaller of course). There are a few reports in the feedback app for this.Presumably, yes.
Try clicking on the vertical scroll bar. When I click (left click) on the scroll bar the AllApps icon replaces the Start button.
The vertical scroll bar is hard to see because of the colors............. click where it should be!