Ask Slashdot: Would You Recommend Updating To Windows 10? 982
Plenty of users are skeptical about upgrading to Windows 10. While they understand that Microsoft's newest desktop operating system comes with a range of interesting features, they are paranoid about the repeated update fiascos that have spoiled the experience for many users. Reader Quantus347 writes: Whenever I think of Windows 10 these days I, like so many others out there, immediately feel a swell of rage over the heavy-handed way the "upgrade" has been forced on me and so many others. I had to downgrade one of my computers that installed windows 10 over a weekend I was away, and as a result, I have been fending off the update ever since. I find myself wondering if Windows 10 is actually that bad. With the end of the "free" upgrade period quickly coming to an end, my fiscally conservative side is starting to overwhelm my fear and distrust of all things new, and I'm wondering if it's time to take the leap. I've been burned too many times for being an early adopter of something that proved to be an underdeveloped product, but Windows 10 has been around for long enough that I'm wondering if it might have it's kinks worked out.
So I ask you, Slashdot, what are your experiences with Windows 10 itself, aside from the auto-upgrade nonsense? How does it measure up to its predecessors, and is it a worthwhile OS in its own right?
So I ask you, Slashdot, what are your experiences with Windows 10 itself, aside from the auto-upgrade nonsense? How does it measure up to its predecessors, and is it a worthwhile OS in its own right?
You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Informative)
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:4, Informative)
Direct X 12 ?
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Insightful)
It'll be a while before games fully take advantage of it. But that's probably the only one.
Compared to Win7, everything else Microsoft considers a "Feature" requires more phoning home, more data harvesting, and frankly -- Cortana is an ad for the ads on Bing, Live Tiles are just ads for the MS App Store, and whatever That Cloud Shit is called this year is just someone else's computer: for my use case, they're antifeatures and I'd disable them even if they didn't require a MS Account..
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Insightful)
this, exactly. most of the differences between Windows 7 and Windows 10 are anti-features that don't stop bugging you to use them.
Re: Upgrade (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple treats people like shit.
Apples is the least open and least compatible, even failing to work with earlier versions of products they made.
If you want openness, use Linux. Fedora, CentOS and Ubuntu are great.
If you want an OS that is most compatible with hardware and software, use Windows.
If you want to "feel cool" while paying a premium, then buy Apple.
Re:Upgrade (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Upgrade (Score:5, Insightful)
A person does not have to be a shill to simply have a rational look at an OS and see that a whole lot of the bullshit being spread around the internet about it is just nonsense. Also, spouting away about shills every time you see somebody say "hey windows 10 is ok", makes you look a little silly.
My desk at home is crowded with my windows 10 PC, a Linux box and a FreeBSD system. I expect that quite a few ./ people (the older and experienced portion maybe) have more than one operating system in use in their daily lives, and are not scared of experimenting and trying things out. These people are quite capable of comparing Gnome 3 with Windows 10 and saying what they think. Stop wanking away about "shills" every time you see a statement you don't like on here.
Re:Upgrade (Score:4, Insightful)
Fortunately, I occasionally remember despite the large number of comments like this, here, individuals don't really represent the group.
Re:Upgrade (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux is way more stable than windows on my laptop, for any purpose.
Yeah, my iPad is way more stable than windows too.
But I still use Windows on my Laptop, because iOS, just like Linux, is totally useless for doing any real work.
https://pics.onsizzle.com/yes-... [onsizzle.com]
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
You'll get some great info from Slashdot, but you'll also get misleading advice like the above.
Cortana is an ad for the ads on Bing
Google Chrome is an ad for the ads on Google. If you're ok with search engines and virtual assistants like Siri or Google Now, I doubt Cortana would raise any real concerns.
I'm not saying you should be ok with search ads or virtual assistant data sent to these companies. That's up to you.
Live Tiles are just ads for the MS App Store
Live Tiles have nothing to do with ads. They're content-focused widgets. The content is completely at the discretion of the developer. And you can turn the "live" part off if you don't like what it shows... or unpin or uninstall the app, you have several options.
Windows 10 does include ads for store apps (called Suggested Apps). They are not live tiles. You can turn suggested apps off via a setting: http://www.zdnet.com/article/h... [zdnet.com]
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
Two games using that that I hear. Big deal. Most customers are still on DX10, with large chunks on DX 9 or 11. Those are where most games are going to be targeting. Gamers aren't clamoring for DX 12 as there's nothing really new in it. It was created solely to migrate people to Windows 10. So it'll be like DX 10, gamers annoyed with it since it was only supported in Vista, but at least Vista was followed on by something better, whereas Microsoft has given no indication that it considers Windows 10 a mistake. Meanwhile others are moving away from Microsoft dependencies; Steam wants its own system and that's a massive chunk of PC gaming and customers.
So some people say don't get in the van with the creepy guy. And the kid says "but he's got DX12 candy!!"
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:4, Informative)
And do not forget to read about what other people might think of Windows 10.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
Honestly, and this is not scientific, but windows 10 'feels' faster on my PC than windows 7. I also find it visually more appealing. It also has a smaller footprint. Lastly the pace of change and some of the nice features coming down the pipe makes it worth it (ubuntu, path limits, etc). Server manager and powershell features are very nice as well as an admin.
I really like windows 10. Before this I was a die hard OSX guy simply because linux on the desktop still required me to tinker too much to keep my laptop happy. I got a surface pro 3 with windows 10 for work and it and now I'm hooked.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Insightful)
For a fair comparison you need to reinstall a fresh copy of Windows 7.
Your Windows 10 installation will slow down over time, just like every other version of Windows. Guaranteed.
Re: (Score:3)
Large pieces of Windows have been rewritten to improve performance and responsiveness between Windows 7 and Windows 10. If you compare fresh installs, you'll find that MS, regardless of how you feel about them as a company, has done a pretty good job at reigning in how resource heavy Windows has been in the past.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:4, Informative)
I tend to prefer AMD, and, from what I understand, using the GPU is better integrated with more desktop tasks using Windows 10.
My own personal opinion? I install "Classic Shell," so I have not seen too much difference between 8.1 and 10.
The only REAL problem is that I have an 8.1 machine as a media center, and Microsoft killed Media Center with 10, so that machine is stuck on 8.1.
Re: (Score:3)
A better answer to your question is that I haven't found any features of Windows 10 that would warrant my updating from Windows 7.
If you use PowerShell a lot you get a better console host, with syntax highlighting and command history across multiple sessions, among other things that should have been standard years ago.
Re: You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
Once I explain the options, the security requirements and the Windiws 10 privacy issues, most of my Windows 7 customers opt to upgrade to OS. X.
Re: You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:4, Insightful)
...assuming anyone uses any of those either.
Office in particular is also something that legacy users like to hold onto.
Plus two of those are just more Microsoft. So you're argument basically comes down to "Microsoft is going to abuse you anyways, so you might as well think happy thoughts and pull your pants down".
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Insightful)
A more insightful question is one you should ask yourself: "With a company almost as anti-consumer as Sony, why are you still doing business with them?"
A better question regarding windows 10 is: "If I have to learn all this technical crap just to retain some privacy, perhaps I should look at an alternative OS. I've heard about Macs and Linux, maybe they aren't so bad".
secure PC... no Win10 (Score:3)
GWX is the first in a long line of insults and privacy breaches. I no longer trust MacroShit.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Find and change the default privacy/security setting and use a firewall to block all the outbound "telemetry" and you'll be fine.
In terms of performance, Microsoft definitely made improvements "under the hood". However, there are still a lot of things to dislike. The UI is horrendously ugly, lots of changes just for the sake of making things different and Windows 10 is still very buggy.
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
I would really like to inject false information into the telemetry instead, wild and crazy enough to mess up things completely and render the telemetry useless.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:4, Funny)
BOFH and PFY both recommend 'Squid' for their transparent proxy needs.
You'll need to custom compile it. Once you do it you should post your mods, so the community can grow it. Who knows the number of unchecked buffer overflows microsoft has on the server side of the snooping...
Re: You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Informative)
Just a note on this: A firewall running on your local machine WILL NOT WORK. Microsoft has configured the kernel so that telemetry effectively ignores firewall rules and hosts configuration. The only way to block it is if it runs on an external (preferably non windows) device.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Informative)
When you go through the upgrade process just make sure to select a custom installation and uncheck all the defaulted check marks of SEVERAL PAGES of privacy-breaking agreements and spyware permissions (some of which are downright chilling to read).
And don't allow that bitch Cortana anywhere near your computer. She'll screw you over just like she did Master Chief.
Re: (Score:3)
... or just search the interwebs for an "unfuck" script that will do all of that for you, like such as:
https://github.com/dfkt/win10-... [github.com]
But a lot of this is just as applicable to win7 , win8.x , iOS, Android, etc.
I have Win10 on a few devices at home. It's nice. The new touchscreen UI/features can be annoying, but the gestures do make sense if you have a touchscreen. M$ has been trying to do tablet pen/touchscreen devices longer than anyone, so it's funny to watch them play catch-up now. But I remember bein
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Insightful)
I tried upgrading on my secondary laptop as an experiment.
"All your files are right where you left them!"
Nope. I was assigned a "temporary account" when I tried to login and all my files had vanished. Luckily the process for going back to Windows 7 seems to work.
Next: I go on the net and read about how Microsoft is busy turning the start menu into a big advertising platform. How you can't turn off automatic updates. etc., etc.
I can't wait to see what Windows looks like six months from now after the free upgrade period is over and Microsoft starts doing all that _other_ stuff they have planned. Stuff they're holding off on at the moment because nobody would ever upgrade if they knew the truth.
By that time Microsoft will own your PC. You won't be able to turn off the updates, it'll be too late to go back to Windows 7.
Suckers!
Me? I'll give it a miss. Windows 7 is working just fine.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
All the security of a Microsoft OS combined with all the security of using torrented/cracked apps! GG skiddies.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:4, Informative)
The "Pirate Bay Edition" of Windows is actually an improvement over the official release - they remove all the crapware/adware and tweak a few settings for you.
Try it some time.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
From what I've seen of Windows 10 the whole thing is just designed to wrestle search results, etc., away from Google.
Pretty soon it will download an update to emulate all of Apple's iTunes/app store and constantly nag you to use it.
Add some constantly dancing monkeys in the start menu, MSN news feed as your desktop background, and that will be your entire Windows 10 experience.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Informative)
Microsoft claimed they could not disconnect IE from Windows, until a court told them that they had to. Then they reluctantly (and belatedly) rolled it out, only for EU users. Which all means that you can't believe Microsoft when they say they "can't" do something, if they ever say they "can't" remove cortana it means they really can if they wanted to.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
Want fun supporting Windows 10?
Find and clear a printer queue. Using search the default answer is the Windows 10 settings which is for device not printer queue. You need to go into the old control panel and find it there.
How basic of a feature is the printer queue? How is that missing from Windows 10 settings?
Overall I like the general direction of Windows 10. However the privacy, and missing features lists are a huge downside. I only use it at work and at work it is used to Remote Desktop into the server anyways. So for us it isn't a big deal. But damn it's default shortcomings are massive. What gets me is in July Microsoft will start charging for Windows 10 upgrades. What happens when Microsoft rolls out major feature changes? Will they be forcibly installed and billed to you?
Re: (Score:3)
Time to get an Apple . . . (Score:5, Interesting)
The company who I currently work for used to give us Lenovo SchtinkPads as work machines. Recently, they are now offering Apple stuff, as well. I never thought that I would be forced to leave the Windows platform.
Well, Windows 10 has done it for me. My next box is going to be an Apple.
Re:Time to get an Apple . . . (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Time to get an Apple . . . (Score:4, Informative)
I always tell folks . . . I have Windows 7 installed on my system. With VMware. For serious work, I use Kali Linux. But there is a bunch of management crap that I have to do, which only runs on Windows . . . but now it runs on Apples, too!
Re: You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Informative)
A note on Microsoft accounts: ALWAYS configure local authentication and NOT Microsoft account authentication. If you do the latter, Microsoft retains a copy of your encryption keys on their servers, limits your password length to 14 characters and reduced complexity, and they (not you) ultimately hold the keys for unlocking your own system. Almost needless to say, this dramatically reduces your security and privacy, especially considering that Microsoft's public cloud may very well be your weakest link. And before a Microsoft apologist mutters something about Google and/or Apple, note that they don't do any of the three things that I mentioned.
Re: (Score:3)
Oh yes, for sure, never a Microsoft Account EVER. People get confused on installation and think they need one, but you don't. Of course many of those built in apps refuse to run without a Microsoft Account but that's actually a good thing as it prevents you from using some of the most buggy parts of Windows.
Re: (Score:3)
Uh dude, Windows 8.1 was trying to make me log into microsoft; it took me 20 minutes to realize there was a skip button, and then the next screen tried to pitch me onto creating a microsoft account AGAIN.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Interesting)
Would you recommend using this too?:
https://www.safer-networking.o... [safer-networking.org]
Yes. I upgraded all of my systems and my parent system to Windows 10 and used the Spybot tool to enable all of the privacy settings. While this may not completely shut down all telemetry, it does disable the most troubling pieces. The rest, as I understand it, is OS information on errors, etc., used to fix bugs and improve the product.
As for whether Windows 10 is an improvement, it has better support for SSD and instant on, it has Direct X 12 support, and it supports all of the newer processors coming from Intel. In fact, if you need to run windows on new hardware (Kaby Lake processors and later), you will have to install Windows 10. Windows 7 is no longer supported.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:5, Insightful)
Yep think about that, an operating system still in it's supported lifecycle can no longer be used on new hardware, not for any technical reasons but because Microsoft wants to make more money by having your OS serve you ads.
Re:You have to know how to secure a Windows 10 PC (Score:4, Insightful)
"if you need to run windows on new hardware (Kaby Lake processors and later), you will have to install Windows 10" Yep think about that, an operating system still in it's supported lifecycle can no longer be used on new hardware, not for any technical reasons but because Microsoft wants to make more money by having your OS serve you ads.
Microsoft has to do this. Not to make "more money" but to make money at all.
Being the PC OS maker has been Microsoft's bread and butter from day one. It's how they got their start in the DOS era, and Windows has carried them through the rest of it. They've had some other profitable products, but everything else has been a sideshow... and most of those sideshows (e.g. Office) have been built on the back of that OS engine. They've made their money by selling copies of Windows to OEMs.
This was possible, and very lucrative, because as the dominant PC OS maker, Microsoft Windows was the platform targeted by all of the app developers, which meant that everyone had to run Windows, which meant that hardware manufacturers had to ship their machines with Windows, which they could only get by paying Microsoft. But most applications today live on the web. ChromeOS has become a perfectly reasonable substitute for the majority of users, and the pain involved in switching to an alternative like OS X has largely evaporated. Windows still has some of its lock-in power left, but not much. In the consumer space, the one remaining bastion has been gaming... but it's clear that SteamOS is going to take that away. The enterprise space has lots of tie-ins with Active Directory and other services, but Microsoft needs more.
So, they realize that their business model is rapidly heading towards obsolescence. Their lock-in is moribund and their competition is all free. The only way to compete with free, in the long run, is also to be free, so Windows has to be free. But how do you make money with free? It's possible to do it with support and services, but not on anything remotely like the scale Microsoft needs. That route means taking a massive revenue cut. Plus, Microsoft is already exploiting the available revenue there; it's in the enterprise space.
What else works? Well, Apple makes lots of money selling hardware, but Microsoft doesn't really do hardware and the only place to make really big money in hardware is in the premium niche. Below that, hardware is already commoditized. Margins are razor thin and competition is fierce. And the premium segment isalso tough to break into, and Apple has most of it sewn up.
What's left? Advertising. There are lots and lots of billions in advertising, and it is and has always been the way to make money on the creation of mass market free content.
Windows 10 is Microsoft's first big step towards an advertising-based business model for Windows. Will it piss people off? Sure, some of them. Will it work? That's hard to say. But the alternative isn't to continue business as usual, the alternative is to cease to exist, mostly. The alternative is to gradually lose market share to Linux (including ChromeOS) from the bottom and OS X from the top.
So Microsoft can't care if it loses 10% (to pick a number without any basis) of its user base because it pisses them off by forcing an "upgrade" to an ad-supported model, because it's going to lose users by not forcing an upgrade. Different users, perhaps, and maybe a bit slower, but it's going to lose that 10% and more if it continues business as usual.
By switching to a model that is services-supported for enterprise operations and advertising-supported for consumer operations, Microsoft Windows has a future. Without that switch, it doesn't. So, they're going to take their lumps and do it.
Nope (Score:3, Insightful)
I wouldn't. The UI is a mess in many places, and many programs that ran well under Windows 7, don't under 10. Especially games. 10 offers very few benefit at all.
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Nope (Score:5, Informative)
No (Score:4, Insightful)
It hosed my Win7 machine. YMMV
Re: (Score:3)
I tried up do a clean install on a machine that was new when Windows 8 was recently out. Works fine with 8. 10 gives a black screen on boot when Bitlocker is enabled.
Upgrading older machines seems to be hit and miss.
I've seen more BSODs with W10 (Score:5, Interesting)
While my two main machines are Macs, I manage around 15 Windows VMs and touch every new employee laptop deployed in our environment.
Through this, at least on the hardware we use here and the VMs managed under Hyper-V, I have personally witnessed more BSODs on W10 than any version of Windows after the Windows2000 days.
When Windows is required and when it's up to me, we don't use any W10 images and disable the upgrade paths for the users and based on this experience, I recommend no but YMMV.
Re: (Score:3)
If we're going to be anecdotal, I've been on W10 since the early days, and have seen precisely two BSODs, both directly related to sleeping after suspending a VMWare VM. Other than updates, my restarts -- VM or otherwise -- are simply rare, and I hammer the hell out of my machine between developing and gaming.
Re:I've seen more BSODs with W10 (Score:5, Informative)
In general... (Score:5, Informative)
Yes I would - its a much better OS than either Win7 or Win8.
However, my frustrations centre around Windows 10 updates (not upgrades to Windows 10 but updates of Windows 10).
The number of times I have opened my laptop for a quick 5 minute task, only to be greeted by "we are installing a system update" and have the next half hour wasted, or the number of times I have rebooted and run into the same thing - oh, and while MS have added a "restart" option as well as the "install updates and restart" option, it doesnt work, updates are installed anyway.
For all the immediate frustrations I have with Windows 10, I wouldnt go back.
Re:In general... (Score:5, Insightful)
It should happen NEVER. Its frustrating as hell to be presenting to a client on my Surface and we have to wait for it to update. Its MY machine, it should update when I say, but because we allowed morons to operate computers for 2 decades, now everything is force fed to us and locked down.
Re: (Score:3)
Its a Surface Book, so the SSD comment isnt valid - all it has is an SSD, and Im still out half an hour on average. Yes, I leave it on and available - indeed, more than once its said "updates will be applied at 8.29" (10 minutes in the future) so Ive put it down (turned on, powered up and logged in) and ... its gone past 8.29 without any action at all. But the next morning, its installing updates on wake up as its got halfway through updates at some point in the night and promptly given up for some reason a
Avoid "Metro" apps: The legacy of Windows 8... (Score:5, Informative)
From an end-user perspective, avoid the "Metro" or "Universal" apps (or whatever the full-screen touch-friendly keyboard/mouse-unfriendly apps are called these days). The built-in PDF viewer and Photo Viewer are awful. The Edge browser is clearly a browser for a phone or tablet, with lots of absolutely basic options missing. But this advice applied to Windows 8 as well, and somewhat to prior versions, so this isn't really new.
Depends on what you have (Score:4, Interesting)
If you have a touchpad, then yes.
If you have a desktop, then no. It's not really suited as a desktop OS.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
If you have a touchpad, then yes.
If you have a desktop, then no. It's not really suited as a desktop OS.
Clearly you haven't used it - it's not Windows 8 with the metro start menu rammed down your throat. There's nothing wrong with using it as a desktop computer, and I do so on all of my machines.
Re: (Score:3)
I have to use it. The start menu is the same clusterfuck as Windows 8 was. Huge, colorful tiles of which you can maybe 8 or 10 display at a time, aimed at illiterate idiots rather than a nice list of programs as it used to be.
Yes, you have to be able to read and be able to aim with the mouse instead of pushing it about with your foot. My best guess so far is that Win 10 is the illiterate thalidomid child edition of Windows.
Re:Depends on what you have (Score:5, Insightful)
There are absolutely no tiles in my Windows 10 start menu.
You ARE aware there's a text menu to the left of the tiles, and you can right-click the tiles and Unpin them and they go away, leaving you with just an old-style all-text-with-little-icons Start Menu, right?
There are some things about 10's start menu that I don't like, but 'huge colorful tiles instead of a list of programs' is absolutely invalid.
Re:Depends on what you have (Score:4, Informative)
you can right-click the tiles and Unpin them and they go away, leaving you with just an old-style all-text-with-little-icons Start Menu
...and a lot of unused menu real estate to the right of it... And even then it's not even close to what the Win7 menu used to be.
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Re: (Score:3)
Ok, how do I customize it to behave like Win7?
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How about letting me have TEXT? You know, the NAME of the program that I can READ instead of having to memorize whatever quirky, cute little image its maker thought would represent it best.
If you're a masochist (Score:3, Insightful)
Let's ignore all the under-the-hood badness of Windows 10. Here are the reasons to stick with Win7:
It's like Microsoft fired their (formerly excellent) user interface and usability personnel, and hired a college grad hell-bent on design. Windows 10 may be good under the hood, but the spyware and shitty UI make everyday use a constant irritation.
When I downgraded my workstation from Win10 to Win7 I felt like I went forward in technology. It's uncanny that Microsoft would screw the pooch so bad.
Does the submitter even read Slashdot? (Score:5, Informative)
Does the submitter even read Slashdot?
Over, and over, and over, every time Windows 10 comes up in Slashdot stories, there are multiple, +5 Insightful posts pointing out that Windows 10 comes loaded with telemetry. Just LOADED with it. I can't accept that a person submitting a question to Slashdot would not know this, and also would be okay with this notion of data collection ingrained so deeply in an operating system.
Regardless of the options a user chooses in Win10's Control Panel, the user is not TRULY opted-out of all the data collection. This has been discussed ad nauseam, and I have yet to see someone post a solution to block all telemetry collection while still allowing security updates.
Also, you can't infinitely defer reboots after updates are applied. You are going to be forced to reboot at some point that is not of your choosing, and that's a legitimate problem for many people. (Like, the ones who use computers as productivity tools.)
Windows 10 wrests control away from the user in ways that are unacceptable. I cannot compromise on these things. I will not use Windows 10.
Re:Does the submitter even read Slashdot? (Score:5, Informative)
I cannot compromise on these things. I will not use Windows 10.
If you are using Windows 7 or 8 you should know that the bulk of Microsoft's telemetry has been backported [extremetech.com]. Unless you've prevented Windows Update installing this stuff then avoiding Windows 10 isn't protecting you.
On the other hand there are actively developed tools [oo-software.com] to control at least those parts of Microsoft's telemetry that can be controlled.
Re:Does the submitter even read Slashdot? (Score:5, Interesting)
Not even that. The machines come with features--some of which go back as far as Windows 2000--that people are now freaking out about.
Debugging data for program crashes goes to Microsoft. That's happened since forever; Watson always pinged Microsoft to ask about Program X and what it should log about it, then asked the user what to do. If you tell Windows 10 to look for a fix, it'll send data to Microsoft, same as if you report the issue on Windows 2000, XP, Vista, 7.... These days, it also might say, "Hey, Firefox is fucking up, what do?" and Watson says, "At a guess, tell the user to enable Windows 7 Compatibility Mode," and the user can say "Send data to Microsoft" and it'll send the whole dump.
The start menu has a search feature that SEARCHES THE WEB. We freaked out about this with Ubuntu once; we ignore it when Chrome and Firefox do it. Likewise, Windows since XP has asked Microsoft Windows Update how to view arbitrary filetypes when opening unknown files.
Microsoft Windows Defender now comes built-in. The default setting since XP has always sent minimal data about specific files to Microsoft; an advanced setting sends a *shitload* of debugging data, but it's off by default. People are panicking because it's in Windows 10 and Windows 10 is spyware.
Cortana. I don't fucking use it. My Android phone talks to Google a lot; so does Siri.
Updates, constantly pinging Microsoft to ask about updating software. People are like, "Well Linux doesn't tell Debian what software you have installed! Windows 10 tells Microsoft EXACTLY what you have installed!" That works until you actually run apt-get upgrade and a series of HTTP GET requests hit the servers to get specific package names and versions.
Come on, people.
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But if i want to ON MY FUCKING PROPERTY I should be able to, I certainly don't want some people on the other side of the country deciding for me. That is my major problem with most modern OS's, they have stopped being operating systems for a general purpose computer, and started to turn my computer into an appliance.
It's my computer, no one should have access that supersedes mine.
it's ok, but that comes with a dozen qualifiers. (Score:5, Interesting)
i mean ... it's fine, i guess. it's stable, anyway. it runs all the programs i've tried so far. HOWEVER:
do your research and make sure you disable all the keyloggers and adware and "data sharing" features that come bundled with it, which are turned on by default. make sure you're ok with having an operating system that will basically constantly advertise at you, trying to steer you towards the MS store. be prepared to have the thing constantly try to link you up with your "Microsoft Account" and use that as your desktop login. Oh, and hope you like ads on your Start menu.
the good news is you can remove the advertisements from Windows Solitaire for just $1.50 per month! what a deal!
Yes, without reservation (Score:3, Informative)
...for most people.
Sure, there are going to be some people who'd be better of with *nix and who could cope with it, but they're not the ones asking. It's my grandma, uncle, cousin, sister, neighbor - all who care NOTHING about the "politics" of OSes, just want something that works.
So my advice is this:
YES, I wholeheartedly advise upgrading to Win10. It is a robust, stable, modern OS. I've been running it on probably a dozen systems since January, and not one BSOD. That's pretty good. It's miles better than XP or 8, and reasonably better than 7. If you're running anything else (shudder, Vista, ME, 2000, etc) it's not even a question.
HOWEVER, *actually* read and attend the install process. TURN OFF shit that you don't need.
As a last resort, I'd rather come over and spend 10 mins cleaning out the Win10 settings cruft and then knowing you're running a decent OS than keep having to try to remember how the hell to do X in XP or Vista when your system goes down, again.
Re: (Score:3)
> but they're not the ones asking. It's my grandma, uncle, cousin, sister, neighbor - all who care NOTHING about the "politics" of OSes, just want something that works.
So, people you should care about, and should probably help to educate.
Is this a trick question? (Score:5, Interesting)
aside from the auto-upgrade nonsense? (Score:4, Insightful)
Works fine for me (Score:4, Interesting)
I never upgrade machines; I just wait till a new machine comes with the new OS. That said I went to Windows 10 on new machines at work and home all at the same time, and I have no real complaints, as long as I have:
These are the programs that have made Windows tolerable for me since NT, and as long as I have them, the specific version of Windows has never been too much of a problem.
By the way, I like Windows 10 much more than Windows 8.
When the Stupid Bugs are Squished (Score:3)
I've been greatly annoyed by a number of issues which haven't been fixed (a big one for me is the inability to simply delete/free up no longer used com ports using Device Manager). Network set up for laptops which are moved around to different locations (and will be used with different WiFis) is something which doesn't work as well as with Win7 and Win8. And, there is the bullshit with having to install "WIndows 10" versions of software which works fine under WinXP, Win7 & Win8.
The upgrade process for Win10 seems broken at best with some upgrades being put in regardless of the desires of the users while others need to be explicitly allowed - but Microsoft should know this because they're tracking everything done on Win10 anyways.
I have altered our agreement. Pray I do not.... (Score:5, Informative)
Windows 10, from a purely technical perspective, is great. It's fast, clean, stable, and relatively secure. Heck, it's the first ever Microsoft OS I've seen that is able to upgrade the average computer without turning it into goat vomit. Prior to Windows 10, this was practically a guarantee.
From a policy perspective.... To quote Darth Vader, "I have altered our agreement. Pray I do not alter it further."
That is basically Microsoft's slogan for Windows 10. Unless you are willing to drop $500 for the Enterprise edition of Windows 10, Microsoft has dictated very clearly that you do NOT have control of your machine. They *will* pull telemetry at their pleasure. They *will* force updates onto your machine whether you want them or not. Hell, they even have the power to copy any data you have on your machine. They will not permit you to block them, at least not at the OS level. If you want to block their shenanigans, your only realistic option is to either buy Enterprise or put a hardware router between your computer and the internet, and do your blocking from there. Or just use it as is and hope Microsoft doesn't continue to alter their agreement further. (Fat chance)
And we all know that Microsoft is far from perfect when it comes to releasing stable updates that don't brick people's machines.
Whether you are fine with this, is up to you. As a sysadmin who is ultimately responsible for the productivity of the employees under my charge, this is completely unacceptable, and we're going to be sticking with Windows 7 as our desktop standard.
What pisses me off the most is that Microsoft's obnoxious behaviour is forcing me to set up a WSUS server, because I now need to vet every single update Microsoft release.
Whatever. (Score:4, Informative)
I have it installed on a whole bunch of PCs and tablets. I haven't really had any major problems with it.
Do I have any reason to be excited about it? No, not really. I don't think anything significant has been added to the OS since Windows 7, at least not that I've ever found occasion to use much. Since Windows 8, it's pretty much been about getting the new stuff out of my face.
I find the UI to be clunky and inconsistent. The incessant updates can be annoying -- we're told they're "automatic," but when they actually get installed seems to be anybody's guess, except that it usually seems to happen when I've just switched on the machine to take care of some 10-minute task.
Windows Store/Universal apps are generally to be avoided. Few of them seem to have much value, particularly in a desktop computing scenario. They're either a repurposed version of a web page with an inferior UI (eg Wikipedia), or they're just the usual app store cash grab.
Performance-wise everything seems fine, and maybe a little improved from Windows 8.
If it doesn't sound like I'm really selling you on the upgrade, I guess it's because I'm not. But having taken the plunge, it's not like I have any major regrets. If anything, what's done is done and whether to install Windows 10 is one less thing I need to worry about.
Decide for yourself (Score:5, Informative)
Then the answer should be obvious.
Absolutely (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, if you aren't on a 7" tablet (Windows 8 still works best on a small touchscreen). There are numerous improvements to the kernel under the hood and from a user perspective:
- It boots way faster.
- It uses less battery.
- Command line and powershell are dramatically improved.
- Bash in Windows is incredibly useful.*
- God menu on the start menu through right click to directly go to all of the "deep" settings that are hard to get to in Windows 7 like "network Connections".
- Snap with rescale. If you snap a window to the left. It will automatically ask you what you want to snap to the right. And when you rescale a snapped app of the left it scales the app on the right to fit.
- Most consumer software is targeting it now as the primary OS for bug fixes and QA.
- The new Store deployment and update system is far superior to install/uninstall and when I start up a new system I just hit "Download" instead of tracking down installation media etc. I hope that all of my software migrates to the AppX deployment system. Also cross buy is nice when available. I bought my first game that runs on the Xbox and PC.
- I love being able to get text message notifications on my PC so that I can read texts without getting out my phone. And then even reply.*
- If you have a touchscreen tablet like a Surface it's nice to be able to mix touch apps with mouse/keyboard apps easily.
- Cortana is working well. It sucks in flight and package tracking information automatically which is nice from emails.
- Task bar icons have notifications so my mail app has a little (3) circle right on the taskbar.*
- Native multiple desktops.
- Miracast to PC. You can mirror your desktop to another PC's desktop as a window like teamviewer. Handy for presentations if you want to view on your own computer without huddling over their shoulder. *
- Notification center is just generally nice to finally have on Windows. I look forward though to the summer update when they add universal dismiss so that if I look at an email on my phone it doesn't have the notification at home.
- Lots of new HyperV functionality.
- native Photos app supports animated gifs and mp4s and webm.
- Windows Hello identity management is awesome where it's supported. I only have it on my phone but I want it desperately on my laptop and PC. Death to passwords. You just look at the screen and it unlocks and can (with developer support) even log you into your bank app etc.
- System wide spell checker.
- Vastly improved calculator app.
- Cortana will answer easy questions. "100 cm in inches" right in the task bar.
- Clock on multiple screens.*
- Calendar on taskbar has actual events and appointments since it is a real calendar not a generic date/time widget.*
- Screen capture. Integrated screen/video capture is a hotkey away.
- You won't have to worry about it unexpectedly upgrading.
- It's a rather stable development target. I like it as a developer because I know everybody on Windows 10 is on Windows 10 or Windows 10+6months. Mandatory updates means everybody supports the latest APIs within 6 months so it's not horribly fragmented.
- Updates are super easy. The guy who was playing CS:Go and had his system reboot wasn't upgrading from 7 to 10 he was upgrading from 10 to 10.1 and you can see how relatively painless that process was. It usually takes me about 15 minutes to upgrade to the latest OS with new features. Windows used to take 2-3 years to get a new feature, now they regularly add new things (the summer update is pretty substantial and has a lot of things I already miss not having on my "stable-branch" work machine. They've really streamlined the build and release system so that Windows can be iterated on quickly. I know internally how huge of a deal it can be for development to have a great automatic build and deployment system for accelerating feature development, I'm excited that windows has it now so that Microsoft can focus on add features going forward. It's generally just a new k
Yes and no (Score:5, Informative)
Pros:
Cons:
So yes it's worth upgrading, but no it's not quite ready yet. But you don't have to decide by July 29. You can upgrade to it, and r
It Stores More to the Cloud than You Might Think (Score:5, Interesting)
I was initially a little wary of Windows 10 but when I started using it I was all right with it - for a while. It seemed to be stable, it ran the applications I needed (Pinnacle Studio and PaintShop Pro) and it seemed to be faster than Windows 7. Seemed like a good move for me.
But then I got a new computer with Windows 10 pre-installed. I thought, "great, now I can move my old computer to Linux like I planned and still run my important applications on the new one." Things were fine, until I realized that I was connected to the network without having entered my network password. And it knew my passwords on various websites that I had accessed with Edge. It knew how to access my bank, my social media - everything. Now, I am not a big fish by any means, but I do not like the idea of my passwords and keys being stashed on a server over which I have zero control.
Do I believe Microsoft will do Bad Things with that information? No, I don't. It's convenient to have it know what I need for me so I don't have to look it up. But, it's unnerving that they harvested that info without my knowledge. It also is unsettling to think that it's on a network computer somewhere.
On this basis alone I hesitate to recommend Windows 10.
Re:Spyware (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact, prepare for nothing useful.
That pretty much sums up your entire post.
Re: (Score:3)
Re:Spyware (Score:5, Insightful)
To be fair, you're replying to an AC, so "nothing useful" should be the expected norm. That said, his point over "concerns" seems valid. I've certainly seen people complain that they can't see the contents of the telemetry because it's all sent over secure connections. Of course, if it was sent in the clear, these same people would complain about that, so...
Do you not think it ridiculous that you have to play guessing games as to what of your personal information is being transmitted to the 107 domains that Windows 10 connects to whenever you do anything?
Instead of dismissing the people concerned about spyware by saying 'nothing will please the complainers', why don't you take note of the fact that millions of people use FOSS every day because they DON'T want to be spied on? The fact that Microsoft's clients and subsidiaries are getting their surveillance over a secure connection does nothing to sway us.
Re:Spyware (Score:5, Interesting)
The complaint I keep seeing is not that the information is sent, but that we can't see what information is sent. There are two solutions to that problem:
A) Send the information in plaintext. Of course, then (as I already mentioned), people will complain that the data is being sent in plaintext.
or
B) Store a plaintext log of the telemetry data for the user to review. Of course, then, people will point out that, because it's sent over an encrypted connection, there is no way to verify what's actually being sent.
For examples of (B) in the FOSS community, look at the crash reporting used by Firefox and Ubuntu. Yes, Ubuntu, the entire distribution. Sure, they show you what they're supposedly sending, if you're interested to look, but the data is sent over an encrypted connection so, well, unless you compiled it from source (using a trusted compiler you also wrote yourself) from code you've fully reviewed, you're putting your trust in whoever provided the binaries, compiler, and/or source code.
So, you choose to trust a platform vendor serving thousands or millions of systems and collecting a much smaller amount of data (easier to sift through) rather than a vendor serving billions of systems and collecting a much larger amount of data (more difficult, to the point of impossibility, to sift through). You're still giving up telemetry data to your vendor and you're still relying on trust. The tradeoff you make is that you can't reliably deal with graphic designers (who use Adobe tools as a standard) and video production studios (who use Adobe, Apple, Sony, and Lightworks software as standards), nor can you sell well-tested software for Windows or OS X. Of course, if you don't need to work with designers or video studios and you don't sell software, yeah, Linux can be a workable desktop solution; and yes, that covers a rather large portion of the population. However, it also fails to cover the majority of high-paying professions.That's why people with money use Windows and/or OS X; not because they can afford to use them, but because they can't afford not to.
Careful you don't fall off that high horse, friend, you seem to be losing your grip.
Re:Spyware (Score:4, Insightful)
A friend's Dell that uses bluetooth for everything was hosed beyond repair, because it killed the keyboard and mouse functionality even in the bios. He closed the popup for weeks and was caught by the latest "update" that made the red X mean "yes, please fubar my box."
Telemetry? Canonical, Redhat and others have been collecting telemetry on various issues for years. However, Microsoft is a closed box - so you really believe telemetry data from a corporation that is opaque and has already agreed to aid law enforcement by essentially fishing for untoward activities, is not a big deal? This is literally allowing LEA an open window into your home.
How's that for FUD? Facts, Uncertainty, and a Dubious product.
Re:Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
...Yes the HARDCORE FOLKS will cry "SECURITY! MALWARE! INVASION OF PRIVACY!!11!" and more nonsense. The average person who asks me if they should upgrade I say yes....
When I have been asked by "average persons" about the upgrade, I explain the data harvesting that Microsoft will be doing to them and their family. These are not the HARDCORE FOLKS you seem to look down upon, but regular computer users. I showed them Microsoft's comments on the data that are being harvested. I did not add my opinion, I just showed them what Microsoft was saying about the data harvesting.
.
So far, not one has said they wanted to go forward with the Windows 10 installation.
Re: Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
Gee, you'd almost think there was a difference between the operating system on my computer and a third-party website I don't have to use.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Gee, you'd almost think there was a difference between the operating system on my computer and a third-party website I don't have to use.
You think Google and Facebook only track when you're visiting their websites?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
When I have been asked by "average persons" about the upgrade, I explain the data harvesting that Microsoft will be doing to them and their family.
And depending on how you ask this question, the answer will be what YOU want it to be. The "data harvesting" is well documented and is on the same level as Facebook, Google, DuckDuckGo, etc. This telemetry has been common place in software since XP (at least). Any "user experience" reporting, crash feedback, or online knowledge base/help system is gathering the same data that Windows 10 is.
You seem to be a little misinformed. DuckDuckGo advertises itself as "The search engine that doesn't track you. Learn More [duckduckgo.com]."
Telemetry may be common, but not by an Operating System. Users can easily choose not to use Facebook or Google. Choosing a different operating system, however, is much more complex.
Re: (Score:3)
the integrated video recording is WORSE than useless. the bitrate is so terrible (even at its highest quality setting) that the video is completely unusable. literally every other solution i've tried, including free ones like Bandicam, and the free one that came bundled with my video card, do the job far, far better.
Re: (Score:3)
Not always more features, those running Media Center Edition are gravely hosed.
Microsoft OS upgrades have rarely worked well, a fresh install is usually a lot better and more stable.
Uploading files to the cloud - so that everyone can grab them as soon as the cloud service is hacked.
Re:depends (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
If I start detecting scans from the windows box doing things it should not, you'll certainly hear about it. I don't think even Microsoft would do something so blatant, and wind up in the news as installing what would effectively be a bot-net on windows 10 machines.
I don't know anymore what people feel is blatant. The search feature designed explicitly to force anything you look for on your computer to be leaked to Microsoft?
The fact default telemetry settings allow Microsoft to take whatever data they want from your computer whenever they want without your knowledge or permission as described by Microsoft? There is an honest to god remote access Trojan installed with Windows 10. Does this count?
What does Microsoft need to do to piss you off?
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Slackware or bust!
Re:Depends on Your Needs (Score:4, Insightful)
For us running Cygwin that's hardly a motive to transit to Windows 10.
Re:Yes (Score:4, Interesting)
It People should get over their OS obsession and focus on doing some actual work.
I haven't obsessed over an OS since I installed Linux years and years ago; that decision enabled me to focus on actual work.