Although the 'cool' background feature is OK, it dramatically increases the size of your chicklets, reducing the workspace screen real estate.
I manage a huge volume of databases across several customers, and hate to scroll to find a database icon on my workspace tabs (and I've run out of tabs).
It's OK though - You can disable the dynamic background by simply enabling the 'textured workspace'.
I wonder why the native viewers were removed? I noticed that as well, and thought I had done something wrong during the upgrade!
I was sure that I heard somewhere that there were going to be Excel filters added - Perhaps that's still to come (like Nomad)?!