JorgeA

Once this tool is ready to go, the key will be to spread the word somehow. People can't benefit from it if they don't know about it. Would it be possible to, say, get it listed on the BetaNews file forum? --JorgeA

When I first read the headline, my first thought was that Samsung is trying to put a stop to the borked-update madness, but after reading the article it looks more complicated than that. I don't like what Samsung is doing, but OTOH they have a point about Updates messing with the hardware. All of this, of course, argues for MORE granular control of Updates by the user -- not less, as Microsoft is pushing with Win10. I had another, more devious thought about this hidden Samsung software. Wonder if the program will work in Windows 10 on a non-Samsung computer? Remember that the point of the program is to prevent Windows Update from performing its magic; applying it on a Win10 system, where there is no choice but to accept downloads when they become available, might then bring a measure of control back to the user. Users maybe could then research the updates as they come out and manually download the ones they want. What do you think? --JorgeA

Let's clear this aspect , you get payed ONLY AFTER I have been paid , provided that MS has any money left . jaclaz That's fine, I'll be happy to take my turn. If the kitty's empty by the time I get to the front of the line, well, it couldn't have happened to a more deserving bunch of folks. --JorgeA

When I first read the headline, my first thought was that Samsung is trying to put a stop to the borked-update madness, but after reading the article it looks more complicated than that. I don't like what Samsung is doing, but OTOH they have a point about Updates messing with the hardware. All of this, of course, argues for MORE granular control of Updates by the user -- not less, as Microsoft is pushing with Win10. --JorgeA

There finally seems to be some clarity with what Insiders are (not) getting for working as beta testers. One commenter here puts it succinctly: My time is worth something. I've already spent countless hours exploring Win10 and providing feedback in multiple venues in the attempt to help save Microsoft from itself. I'm not going to invest volunteer hours indefinitely into the future just to avoid paying money for Windows 10. When the last Insiders build expires on or after July 29, I am done with Windows 10. To echo what jaclaz said a few days ago, at this point Microsoft would have to pay me to keep using this POS operating system (and those initials don't stand for "point of sale"). --JorgeA

You bet! jaclaz posted elsewhere on MSFN about running Win 3.1 on DOSBox... while I'm not quite keen on using VMs, it sure seems a good option for games requiring very slow hardware (read 4.77MHz 8088 like). It's also the best option for running DOS executables and Win 16 protected mode executables on x64 NT OSes... So maybe we should open a thread dedicated to it, shouldn't we? If we may be permitted to float further back than 3.11, my father once had a DOS machine that had a switch to toggle the CPU between 4.77 and 8 MHz, precisely for the purpose of playing games that didn't work well on the faster setting. --JorgeA

I remember thinking "Wow!" the first time I slid a CD into the tray of my WFWG 3.11 machine, and hearing music come out of the speakers. I didn't even have to get up from my chair anymore to play music as I worked. --JorgeA

To be fair, the Win10 partition contains nearly 217,000 files, while the Win7 partition has about 128,000 files, so the speed difference is not as stark as might seem. (The difference in the number of files is attributable mainly to the presence of some 98,000 files in the Windows.old directory in my Win10 installation.) Still, this translates to 28,059 files/second for Windows 7 in the "load from RAM" trial, vs. 13,745 files/second for Windows 10, so Win7 is more than twice as fast in this test. --JorgeA

That sounds interesting, I will do that. My test laptop has both Win7 and Win10 on it, so the comparison will take place on the same hardware. Ran some tests this afternoon, each time after rebooting to the OS to be tested next. Here are the results, given (as suggested above) as files/second: Windows 7: 1715; 4188, 1333, 7821 Windows 10: 1182, 1209, 1527 Each of these times was taken some minutes after booting, although I suspect that some of the same-OS variation might be due to the boot process not yet being quite complete. The fastest results occurred after the longest waits post-boot. A formal test would involve taking the measurement after a standard amount of time -- say, 10 minutes after booting. Out of curiosity, I also reran the tests once with each OS immediately after doing it a first time. Win10 repopulated the results in 15.78 seconds, but Win7 did it in 4.34 seconds. Hardware: Lenovo IdeaPad Z580, Intel Core i5-3210M. Others are welcome to try the test and see how their results compare. --JorgeA

That's really strange. How would other computers be able to get to that page (I just tried it successfully on a Win7 system), but not a Win10 machine? --JorgeA

UAP seems to be User Account Protection, a term from Vista which is now just UAC. You can make a Modern app (appx) using HTML5, but I do not think they are exclusively using just webpage technologies. Thanks for the explanation, Trip. Now I can go back and read that guy's comment properly. --JorgeA

LOL The irony of that would be that one of the supposed reasons for killing Aero Glass was to speed things up on less-powerful devices. And then they'd turn around and cripple things by adopting XAML? --JorgeA

FYI, I find the Microsoft Silverlight Add-On that I have on my fully updated Win 10 build 10130 system is 5.1.20513.0 dated May 13, 2013 (and is 32 bit only), while the one on my fully updated Win 8.1 system is 5.1.40416.0 dated April 16, 2015 and is 32/64 bit. A casualty of the Win 10 Windows Update process changes? Very interesting. More research is warranted on what happened here. -Noel Maybe Microsoft is phasing out Silverlight, and therefore not paying much attention to it? Still, it doesn't speak well for that new "keep everybody up to date by force" model. You make people dependent on it and then don't deliver. --JorgeA

That sounds interesting, I will do that. My test laptop has both Win7 and Win10 on it, so the comparison will take place on the same hardware. --JorgeA

That news upthread about Insiders getting a free copy of Windows 10 has become as clear as mud. Read these three posts in the order given; to get the fullest effect of the sequence of events, make sure to delay reading the "updates" at the top of the second and third articles until you finish reading their original articles: Microsoft clears up confusion, reaffirms free Windows 10 for Insiders Windows Insiders get Windows 10 for free, Windows 7/8.1 not required *updated* Microsoft backtracks(?) on free Windows 10 for Insiders... again *updated: maybe not* If I read these right, the bottom line is that Insiders will NOT be offered anything at all that won't also be offered to the mass of users of Windows 7 or 8.1 -- namely, a "free" Win10 license if you turn in your Win7/8.1 license. IOW: "thanks for all your feedback, here's what it's worth to us: ." --JorgeA

The other day while surfing the Web on Win10 I ran into a site that told me my Silverlight was out of date: Then when I clicked on "Update" I got an error message: So much for Win10's vaunted automatic forced updating feature. I eventually managed to bring Silverlight up to date the old-fashioned, manual way, and the objecting page loaded. --JorgeA

It's fantastic that you have such a systematic record of Windows performance going back years! A quick look at the stats for the first few scans, relative to the most recent scans, suggests about a 14 percent decrease in performance. As to what might be causing that, we can (and probably should ) speculate, but as to the degradation itself there seems to be little room for argument. One thing I'm not clear on: you mention a decrease in performance after the installation of Windows 8.1. Was that installation in addition to Windows 7, i.e. to create a dual-boot system? --JorgeA

...and a suggestive report of a brand-new Windows 7 installation that slowed down after recent Updates and then speeded back up when the updates were uninstalled: They wouldn't stoop that low, would they? --JorgeA

They cannot possibly believe that Windows 10 will be ready for public consumption in less than six weeks: 1.: 2. (a reply to the above): --JorgeA

Another report of hardware affected by Windows 10: --JorgeA

Old Windows Users of America, it sounds fine.... jaclaz My comment will be OT, but I have to say it's impressive that they would digitize issues of their magazine that came out before the Web existed. --JorgeA

An incisive observation from a commenter on this webpage: --JorgeA

^^ To my mind, there are two questions that remain unclear about this announcement: As a Windows Insider, will I have to give up an existing license in order to use/activate the Win10 license? What exactly do they mean when they say: [emphasis added] Does that mean that I have to sign into Windows 10 with a Microsoft Account and stay signed in? Thus far I've managed to avoid that, instead logging on individually to each app that I use. --JorgeA P.S. If I can get Win10 without giving up an existing license, then I will probably keep it on my test laptop, just to stay current with the latest outrages changes as Microsoft force-feeds new features with future Windows Updates.

I saw the following exchange on this page. Does anybody have insight into the answer given by "Dr. Manhattan" (second quote below)? Not sure what a "UAP wrapper" is. Does his answer make sense? When using Metro apps, are we merely getting a Web page with a severely limited feature set? --JorgeA

Excellent, you found both the source of the problem and the solution! --JorgeA