Honestly I like the new way better. Your PC should be perfectly able to differentiate between morgia (you know, an underground part of the plant with dirt all over it) and spenseweed for example (actual leaves, not). would upvote a suggestion to add different names for different herbs (as in "strange herb {visual description}").

Although, there are a lot of different situation which are handled differently. You will be able to identify Wyrmlance in the tile mode despite it being just a 50s halberd, because it's actually covered in runes visually. On the other hand, seven league boots might be "worn" or "greased" (I think?) but in the tile mode they will look like boots with little wings.

Ideally identification system (as well as inventory menu display) should be reworked so that both tile and ASCII modes work functionally identical to the player and follow two rules:
1) items that are unique when unidentified should be identified by a knowledgeable players (this will solve the long-standing problems of people never finding Nature's Friend, Protector and such)
2) items that can use several unID'd names should not be identifiable by any player (this will not provide an unfair advantage to the tile mode)