Microsoft Is Force Installing PC Health Check In Windows 10 84
Microsoft has begun force installing the PC Health Check application on Windows 10 devices using a new KB5005463 update. BleepingComputer reports: PC Health Check is a new diagnostics tool created by Microsoft and released in conjunction with Windows 11 that provides various troubleshooting and maintenance features. However, its primary use has been to analyze a device's hardware to check if it's compatible with Windows 11. Microsoft says that users who do not want PC Health Check on their system can simply uninstall it using the Settings app. However, readers have told BleepingComputer that they have had to uninstall the application numerous times as the applications keep being reinstalled on the next check for updates. To make matters worse, when attempting to uninstall KB5005463, Windows 10 states that the update is not installed, when that is clearly untrue [...]. BleepingComputer has found a way to block the update from installing PC Health Check on your computer for those who do not want the application installed.
Remedy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Remedy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Remedy (Score:5, Funny)
It's true. I fire up Windows once a year to run TurboTax.
Actually I fire it up a week ahead so the updates can finish first.
Re:Remedy (Score:4, Insightful)
I fire up Windows once a year to run TurboTax.
Pay an accountant to prepare your taxes. No more problems with Microsoft.
Re:Remedy (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Remedy (Score:4, Interesting)
I've used TurboTax from their website for years without needing to touch Windows.
But definitely I recommend against using TurboTax. It's not a very good deal. Low quality tax preparation at a bait-and-switch price. It is very fast and easy though, so a good choice if you like paying Uncle Sam a little more than your fair share.
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FreeTaxUSA is way better and cheaper.
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It's true. I fire up Windows once a year to run TurboTax.
Actually I fire it up a week ahead so the updates can finish first.
You could just use a web browser and not worry about updates.
Re: Remedy (Score:3)
Re: Remedy (Score:4, Informative)
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Unfortunately, not a good solution to the folks out there who use software that exists only in the Windows universe.
Or who, like me, have been too lazy to make the switch. I have a few budget files in Lotus 123 (which runs fine on Windows 10), some Word/Excel files and a LOT of Publisher files that will be a PITA to convert to LibreOffice (and perhaps Scribus), so I've been putting it off. I have a Windows 10 VM on my Linux system, so I could use that instead of my standalone Windows system, but ... eh.
Re:Remedy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Remedy (Score:5, Informative)
I just ran it and it seems to do nothing that Windows 10 doesn't already do except put a bunch of things that used to be in different locations, or required the command line, into a single location. It doesn't even seem to be connecting to the internet unless you click on the related links at the bottom (at least that's the only way I can get my firewall to notice any activity).
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I just checked my updates and it says I'm up to date, then below that it says "This PC doesn't currently meet all the system requirements for Window 11. Get the details and see if there are things you can do in the PC Health Check app." It then gives me the option to download the PC Health Check app.
I already know I don't have a CPU that is supported and my BIOS doesn't have TPM 2.0. I really don't care to update to Windows 11 so I see no reason to install the PC Health Check.
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Re:Remedy (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Remedy (Score:5, Informative)
Back up your files & data then install your preferred flavour of Linux. No more problems with Microsoft.
Did this years ago. Even my gaming machine runs Linux Mint. Steam has a surprising number if Linux games, and if you add in Proton, it gets even better. I admit my gaming needs are not exactly hardcore but it works for me.
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^^^THIS.
Dump MS and all of their never-ending bullshit and install any popular flavor of Linux. You'll thank us later.
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The problem is that any modern desktop-oriented distro of Linux also installs a whole lot of software that I'll never use (Gentoo and Arch are probably the only exceptions to the norm and they're not aimed at the general public anyway). Sure, I could go ahead and uninstall the useless stuff that Linux installs, but why bother? And the stuff Linux installs uses a lot more disk space than the Windows 10 health check (about 900 KB including the start menu link) if that's a concern.
Re:Remedy (Score:4, Insightful)
Install Ubuntu Server [princeton.edu] and then you won't have quite so much software (and no default GUI). And Debian of course has a lot of choices when it comes to installing only the software you want.
Clicking through all the defaults on Ubuntu or Fedora is how you end up with the usual 5-10G of extra crap on your disk. But I think most people don't care, or even prefer to have all sorts of hidden gems to explore later.
There's a bunch of other stuff besides health check in Windows 10/11 that is kind of bogus garbage that no normal person wants. Welcome experience is one, and I think it's fairly large but don't know because I can't seem to uninstall it.
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Last time I tried Ubuntu I got stuck in dependency hell. One of the other devs was using V18 LTS and the build environment was completely buggered in V20.
Docker containers might help, but in the end it was easiest just to run Ubuntu 18 LTS in a VM. Hopefully I never have to maintain that code again because I don't want to deal with the EOL for that version.
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Installing docker and building from containers is probably easier than a VM when it comes to duplicating the build environment, but not significantly so. And either VM or containers are less work than trying to make a properly portable build system. Stuff like GNU autoconf/automake has been around for decades because building portable software on *nix has been a fair bit of work that most devs don't wish to undertake themselves. (I release binary packages for multiple distros and multiple versions. it's my
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Seriously? Windows installs a TON of shit that most people will never need. For example, MS Fax, email, maps, music player, photo viewer, video player, alarms & clock, calculator, calendar, camera, Cortana, Groove music, Solitaire, MS Money, News, OneNote, People app, Phone Companion, voice recorder, weather, XBox stuff (by default!), and so on...
Sure, I could go ahead and uninstall the useless stuff that Linux installs, but why bother?
Well if it's not a problem, then why is it a problem? Either uninstall it or don't. Besides, most distros let you skip or deselect much of what's installed by
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I don't think the extra 200MB for mahjong is really breaking the bank on your linux install.
Re:Remedy (Score:4, Informative)
If you can make our point of sale system run under WINE, I'll cheerfully take Windows out behind the barn and shoot it in the head, and pee on the burning corpse.
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Re:Remedy (Score:4, Insightful)
You act like finding "your preferred flavour of Linux" wasn't an odyssey in and of itself.
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The usual "Microsoft feature" question (Score:3)
Can you disable it and if, how?
Re:The usual "Microsoft feature" question (Score:4, Funny)
Well if you leave your TPM2.0 disabled, it'll report you can't upgrade to 11. Does that count? :p
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Can you disable it and if, how?
BleepingComputer has found a way to block the update from installing PC Health Check on your computer for those who do not want the application installed.
Nope, according to the summary, it can't be disabled and no one at all has figured out a way to do so...
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But if they dont use Windows anymore then what will they complain about? Linux? If there is a problem they will be told to file a bug report and either fix it themselves or pay somebody to fix it for them or to use a different distro. Windows is the cage people complain about the state of despite the cage door being open for them to leave at any time.
FWIW I interact with Windows about as much as I interact with Orbis in my Playstation: for gaming but its a matter of booting into it, loading game, playing ga
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I don't know how much you interact with "Orbis" whatever that is, but when I boot to Windows after not having it run for a while, it is perfectly unusable as everything installed tries to update while Windows tries to update as well.
Orbis is the OS for the Playstation and yes, if I don't use it for a while then when I turn it on it has to go through a series of updates just like Windows and macOS do. I tend to also do and update on Linux when I haven't turned it on in a while.
Obviously this only happens when they're connected to the internet but as a general rule I want updates on a machine connected to the internet because very often those are bug fixes and security updates.
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It's always slow in comparison to Linux (a "hobbyist" OS).
Linux is far from a hobbyist OS, it is contributed to and used by some of the biggest corporations in the world (including Microsoft).
I support hundreds of Windows workstations on my job, so abandoning it there is not feasible.
Ouch, what a job. But I guess you're always on the recieving end of Windows problems.
There are lots of people complaining. If there weren't, why would there be so many websites solely devoted to fixing Windows - a professionally developed and "supported" product - problems?
Of course there are lots of people complaining, just like there are for Linux which has not just one company supporting it but a great many that offer Linux support like IBM, RedHat, Canonical, etc.
Haven't you ever had a Windows machine that consistently chokes when "checking for updates" or tries to install the same KB over and over and continually fails?
I don't think so, but I've certainly had problems with Windows before just as I've had problems
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Not use it? Dude, I'm in security, that OS is my total job security 'til retirement and beyond, why would I not want to use it anymore?
I'd just like to continue using it the way I used to.
MS needs 2 license tracks: opt-in vs must update (Score:1)
Microsoft should have a home license that obligates people to update versions and a professional license that lets you opt-out if you want.
Re:MS needs 2 license tracks: opt-in vs must updat (Score:4)
Microsoft should have a home license that obligates people to update versions and a professional license that lets you opt-out if you want.
Bull. No one should be forced to upgrade/update if they don't want to, nor before they are ready to upgrade/update.
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Microsoft should have a home license that obligates people to update versions and a professional license that lets you opt-out if you want.
Bull. No one should be forced to upgrade/update if they don't want to, nor before they are ready to upgrade/update.
Then don't use a proprietary operating system. Seriously unless you have just discovered computers it should be as clear as can be that pontificating about how Microsoft "should" operate is a worthless endeavour. Spend that time and effort on a free operating system instead.
Thing is I suspect this isn't actually causing anybody any issues and it's just something to complain about because some people just really like complaining which is why they're still using Windows even after Me, Vista, 8, 10, etc
Re: MS needs 2 license tracks: opt-in vs must upda (Score:5, Interesting)
They have. It's called Windows 10 LTSC. You need a Windows 10 Enterprise license to install it, since it's an alternate version of Enterprise.
Windows 10 LTSC is fundamentally what Windows 10 would have been had Microsoft continued the path they were going in up to Windows 7. It's Windows 10 minus all the BS, having nothing from Cortana to the Windows Store, no ads, and none of the spyware. And only absolutely required security updates are provided, nothing more.
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Just grab a copy from bittorrent. No MS store is installed which can bite you when it’s the only way to get certain programs.
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Windows server OSs are now merged with LTSC. I got the latest version running now on my work computer. I still disabled a ton of stuff with NLite, but it's nice to have the hope I'll get no more 'feature' updates for five years. Very helpful for a complicated situation that must not change without my approval. (not too worried about security as it only gets online once every few months for application updates...) And it's free for 180 days. So far so good, so guess I'll buy a license...
OTOH, my win 10
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If you want to license your software in some restrictive way, then you need to avoid licensing it with anything that looks like a shop, because it you make it look like a shop, people are going to think they're buying it, and if you make people think they're buying it, but they're not getting the ability to use it freely, that's fraud. If you're going to license something and charge money for it, then the license signing and the money exchange needs to happen at the same time, and the licensee needs to genu
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They....do [wikipedia.org]?
More annoyingly ... (Score:4, Interesting)
I'd like to configure Windows Update to stop displaying the little red "X" and "This PC doesn't currently meet all the system requirements for Windows 11". Forget "currently", nothing's going to change the fact that my system is a 14 year-old Dell XPS-420 with an Intel Core2 Quad, no TPM, etc... (that I got free from a friend) and will *never* meet their stupid Windows 11 "requirements". It runs Windows 10 just fine and I'll keep using it until Win10 support expires in 2025 and then make the switch to using my Linux system full-time.
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Have you tried Windows Update Blocker [sordum.org]?
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This BS is why (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: This BS is why (Score:4, Insightful)
I run Linux on the desktop, and that makes me smug. But I blindly accept all the apt upgrades, which makes me no better than a Windows user.
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Into the vm ya go! (Score:2)
But only because I enjoy a good train-wreck like everybody else.
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Totally agreed. There's plenty of good reasons to hate on Windows, but this isn't one of them.
So Windows Update installs a new utility, which you can run if you want, or not. Even if you run it, it doesn't do anything but give you some information, which you can pay attention to or not, as you choose. And this is an example of the evilness of Microsoft?
It's a good thing Linux updates never install new utility packages. That would be a terrible thing and a scandal, and we'd never hear the last of it.
Re:"Force Installing" (Score:5, Insightful)
So what the hell is the problem?
The last time Microsoft pushed a compatibility appraiser, people woke up in the morning with Windows 10 installed. People remember, and reputation matters.
Also, we increasingly live in an age where "including" makes some features go away forever. I swore off buying Apple products forever when an update to my Mac removed one of the features I needed to do my job, and updated firmware wouldn't allow me to re-install the original version of the OS that came with the machine. It was the first computer I ever owned that was explicitly built to prevent a factory reset.
Fuck forced updates.
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The last time Microsoft pushed a compatibility appraiser, people woke up in the morning with Windows 10 installed. People remember, and reputation matters.
Don't worry, the primary purpose of PC Health Check seems to be to tell you that you can't install Windows 11.
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People remember, and reputation matters.
No it doesn't because those people are still using Windows. Unless you're going to stop using Windows what does it matter to Microsoft? You think they're worried that you think they're a crappy software company?
More choices please (Score:2)
So if it's not compatible with Windows 11 (Score:2)
Linux, but still not ready for prime-time (Score:3)
Microsoft says that users who do not want PC Health Check on their system can simply uninstall it
again, and again, and again... I've dropped my Win10 usage to nearly zero, but it used to be that there were several apps that kept re-installing themselves. Some of them were really, obviously important for MS to have on my computer - I think CandyCrush was one of them.
My current system has a Win10 install (next to my main OS of Linux). I used Win10 over the weekend. Could be the first time this year. Anyway, the machine is slowly getting wonky about booting, and one of these days it just won't. Next machine won't have a Windows partition at all, I mean, what for?
That said, Linux is still not ready for prime time, and may never be. i don't know why, but it's not. Just yesterday, I told my laptop to shut down. It hung, showing a screen full of text that would scare any non-Linux mortal. I have no idea what wen't wrong, I could still get to a non-GUI login prompt, issue commands, but the thing would not shut down. In then end, I had to power it off the hard way. Crap like this happens ever more rarely, but it still happens, and it is not acceptable for the non-technical masses.
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You don't have to be afraid of turning it off because Linux, unlike Windows, has a Journaling file system - EXT4, so just turn it off whenever you need to, it will start again like nothing happened. You will just see some journaling messages.
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Interestingly, I use XFS on my NAS even though it's not a journaling FS. It somehow just works nicely. Regarding EXT4, I never experienced any problems when my Debian Linux stopped working due to "faulty" [underclocking and undervolting] hardware [I was still at the stage of optimising BIOS settings]. When restarted, it simply found some orphan nodes and repaired the FS. Oh well, who knows what happened on your PC. Different configurations = different problems.
Cheers!
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True, NTFS is a journaling FS, but my experience with it in comparison to EXT4 is quite different. As I said, could be hardware differences. I must have forgotten that it is a journaling FS because I had too many bad experiences with it and don't use it much nowadays.
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That said, Linux is still not ready for prime time, and may never be.
Worse is that we're now seeing an industry shift towards more vertical integration with custom processors. Google, Microsoft and Apple are all starting to create their own custom silicon rather than using the off-the-shelf technology from AMD/Intel. Sure they are all based on ARM cores (presently) and Linux can run on ARM but it's all the custom pieces and additional proprietary accelerators that count Linux out as an alternative operating system on some of this hardware.
Running Linux on an M1 Mac is lookin
Who's your favorite Distro? (Score:1)
Interesting (Score:1)