Hi there, long time MPU listener here. In addition to my Mac, I recently built a PC (just to play Flight Sim 2020 - don’t judge me! haha) … Anyway, Windows 10 is driving me nuts not having access to any of my contacts or photos etc. I am wondering about installing the iCloud Control Panel for Windows. Does anyone have any experience with this? How well it works? Is it reliable? Any advice?
Cheers 
Mike
I set iCloud for windows a few years ago for a coworker. She was primarily interested in syncing her photos and that worked well. Contacts, email, etc. should never be an issue since that is handled by the email client.
I use both Mac and Windows. You can download the iCloud app from the Windows store and it works pretty good. The first sync after signing in can take some time (depending the amount of data), so be a little patient.
Not answering your question but how do you like the new Flight Sim? I’m considering doing the same thing to run either FS or X-plane. Can’t do any real flying anymore so thought I’d give the virtual a try.
There are two parts to answering that question. 1) The world - absolutely incredible, incredible detail. The entire world is mapped, AI draws fairly realistic buildings based on the satellite imagery, the weather and volumetric clouds are stunning - it is unparalleled in detail and look and feel. However, 2) the airplanes… If you do GA / light aircraft flying, it’s fine. However I do the airliner flying and the aircraft supplied (A320, B747, B787) are just not up to scratch - in some cases either un-flyable or they just do weird things for no apparent reason. Most of the functionality of them is also missing with most switches and knobs inoperable… There is a freeware mod for the A320 by FlyByWire that makes the A320 a dream however and adds SO much back into it, so you MUST get that if you’re flying the airliners… 
Is awesome!!! 20 characters
I had a weird experience with iCloud for Windows recently.
I too built a Windows machine for occasional gaming, as well as a Plex server. But the pandemic has caused our 2015 MBP to be used full time for work between the two of us. So the ‘Plexbox’ gets used more often, and I wanted to see how iCloud handled bookmark syncing. But I encountered a weird glitch after installing iCloud for Windows (this was maybe 3-4 weeks ago). Something weird was happening in Explorer, where any actions I did, like creating a folder or deleting a file, would show. But if I did the action, left the folder, and came back the action did happen. After pulling my hair out trying to figure out how to fix it, uninstalling iCloud did the trick.
All my flying is GA. Used to own a Piper Lance. Have also flown the Navy helicopter sims since son is a helicopter pilot in the Navy. I’m used to a six pack panel so trying to fly a glass panel is challenging.
I had to give up flying about 30 years ago due to work, but am hoping to get back into the air this year. Flying a glass panel is challenging? Trying to understand the new radio terminology I hear when I watch cockpit videos on YouTube, that’s “challenging” for me 
X-plane can run on macOS. 
You can import your contacts into the People app.
Here is a tutorial on how to do that: https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/113315-export-import-contacts-people-app-windows-10-a.html
In order to sync your calendar events and emails, you can sign into the built-in calendar and email client.
Any other data you have (such as photos and videos) can be brought over to your Windows computer using a flash drive or a cloud storage service.
Cheers Patrick - I will check it out
I am having a hard time setting up and running iCloud on Windows10. The app installs, but when I fire up, the app shows up this dialog “We are setting things up…” This goes on forever. I have tried to uninstall/re-install but no luck. Current status - cannot use iCloud on Windows PC!
It can take a long time. How much data and files do you have in iCloud?
It is running days together! I have waited for 3 days but it seems to go no further… No help thus far from Microsoft or Apple either.
FWIW, I ran iCloud for Windows for a couple of months in 2020. While the sync of my files and photos “completed”, the count reported by Windows was never correct.
Last month Apple released a new app for iCloud on the Windows Store. I believe the old app was long neglected and this was the new and improved app.
It was working great, but I noticed my fans spinning up on my Windows laptop when not in use. I would check Task Manager and it was iCloud. Then looking at Task Manager’s App History, iCloud was on top of the list, by miles. Most apps all had a few minutes of CPU usage. iCloud had over 100 hours in a month. So I went to my desktop Windows 11 machine. Exact same thing.
Anyone else use it and notice this behavior? Since it’s both computers, I just uninstalled it. I don’t need iCloud on Windows anyway. So this post might just be a word of warning for others.