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Windows 10 - Deeper Impressions


xper

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And there's another question knocking on the doors of my mind: what's in store (ironic pun) for XP users, once Win7/8/8.1 users have been assimilated…?

 

 

Well, since XP is EOL'd, it most likely won't be getting the GWX updates or telemetry updates. So if most Win7/8/8.1 users are forced onto Win10, there will be a big divide between XP and 10. MS could decide to provide the "upgrade" to spywareOS for XP, but I don't see them doing it.

 

I often joke that MS ended XP support at just the right time, before all of these spyware updates and pushes to "upgrade". At this point, if XP's market share increases, I would not be the slightest bit surprised.

 

I know my next PC will be running XP...

Edited by rn10950
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If they're so obstinate in replacing each and every 7/8.x installation with 10, they probably have a plan, a dark one. As such, a possibly increasing XP market share would not fit that plan at all, I presume, therefore they would have to cook something up to turn XP machines too. At this point, Win9x may have slipped their attention after destroying first the driver pool, then the applications pool. But at some point I can foresee a global directive that no ISP should allow any lower-than-SpywareOS10 machine to connect to the Internet, therefore cutting every ability to communicate, download/install aplications, exchange documents and so on for the "rebels" (without a cause). That would be the end of it.

 

Oh and by the way, your reply above was the fifth session of spam retrievals today. My clicking 'Not spam' every time doesn't seem to count. Luckily I am using the web interface today but usually I'm on the free version of POP Peeper which doesn't retrieve the spam so I would often miss replies and new topics I've subscribed to.

 

P.S. At some point - soon, I hope - this XP I keep only for the Internet connection ability (USB GPRS modem with no 9x drivers) will be replaced with a Linux distribution. Which one I do not know yet, but as obstinate are M$ to push 10 down everyone's throat, the more I am obstinate to find a suitable Linux. Eventually I'll even concede to the chinese-made StartOS - which is still a Linux anyway - if it fits the requirements, rather than joining the 10 bandwagon. For me M$ died giving birth to WinME anyway.

Edited by Drugwash
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Let's add one more to the fanboys' efforts: today only, in four occasions I had to retrieve MSFN mail notifications (most of them from this topic) from the Spam folder. And this is not the first time at all. It's an AOL account.

Are M$ fanboys massively marking MSFN notifications as spam, or is AOL under their stronghold? (I'd bet on both, though)

 

At least you're getting some kind of MSFN notification by e-mail. It's been months since I've gotten any. :)

 

--JorgeA

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And there's another question knocking on the doors of my mind: what's in store (ironic pun) for XP users, once Win7/8/8.1 users have been assimilated…?

 

 

Well, since XP is EOL'd, it most likely won't be getting the GWX updates or telemetry updates. So if most Win7/8/8.1 users are forced onto Win10, there will be a big divide between XP and 10. MS could decide to provide the "upgrade" to spywareOS for XP, but I don't see them doing it.

 

I often joke that MS ended XP support at just the right time, before all of these spyware updates and pushes to "upgrade". At this point, if XP's market share increases, I would not be the slightest bit surprised.

 

I know my next PC will be running XP...

 

 

The line really is drawn at XP. Vista isn't getting the GWX update, but my systems did get the telemetry updates offered to them.

 

--JorgeA

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I've seen the same thing. I disabled WU and sometime, somehow over the last week it re-enabled itself.

 

In Properties under Recovery tab change to "Take No Action" on first and second failure.

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At least you're getting some kind of MSFN notification by e-mail. It's been months since I've gotten any. :)

Try to reset your e-mail address in the Control Panel, maybe it got corrupted sometime during the past board issues. Otherwise try another e-mail provider. Tough choice here: I went from Yahoo to GMail to AOL. Got nowhere else to go, can't trust newer european services as they may come and go at any time and other western ones - such as inbox.com - don't accept me.

The line really is drawn at XP. Vista isn't getting the GWX update, but my systems did get the telemetry updates offered to them.

And XP will go down following the earlier 9x scenario: no drivers for new hardware, no compatibility with new applications/standards/file formats, no more related technical/debug information on websites. It's not about the home users, they're (almost) unimportant - it's about enterprises that have to be legit and have to stay in business full time. Home users may or may not bite the bullet and switch to Linux (is there actually any other operating system out there for PC that is not Windows and is not Linux-based?) but enterprises won't afford to completely and suddenly switch to an OS they don't know, where their possibly personalised software won't work.

 

But then again let's not forget that many/most home users prefer Windows mostly/only for the plethora of games. Those games will hardly work under Linux + WINE, if at all - I couldn't even get my simplistic "toys" to work in such environment and I must tell you, when it hangs, it hangs the whole system. Other specific tools in Windows don't have a direct and feature-par equivalent in Linux. The first and probably only one I could never give up is Total Commander packed with plugins which does almost everything I need; there's Krusader coming close, but not close enough. It produces more frustration than results. There would be many, many other differences - of which only a few I've discovered lately since I decided to switch - that summed up would deter a current Windows home user from taking the leap. Hard and sad truth.

 

 

I've seen the same thing. I disabled WU and sometime, somehow over the last week it re-enabled itself.

 

In Properties under Recovery tab change to "Take No Action" on first and second failure.

 

Mine is set like that. I always set them like that from the very beginning, for all the disabled services. It didn't matter - they know how to revert the changes.

 

Luckily my download quota was already depleted at the time so download speed was capped at ~15kB/s which slowed down the downloading of extra junk enough for me to notice the suspect activity and take measures.

 

Remember: that was an XP machine! So, what the heck was with a stealth installation of .NET 4.0 on an XP machine?!

 

Also, my monthly quota at full 7.2Mbit/s connection speed is only 5GB. If I had a Win7/8.x and M$ downloaded without my consent a 6GB unwanted file, there would have been war. Because it's simply a matter of principle.

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All of you are ranting against MS, and it is perfectly understandable why, but everybody seems to be missing one point - we are only a tiny fraction of their customer base. By "we", I mean those of us who are interested in the OS and its appearance and functionality. Most others (all my family and most friends, for instance) use their computers only for checking their emails, browsing the web, and making spreadsheets or word documents. The OS could be Win 95 or XP or 10, for all they care. (Win 8 was a shock for them too.)

 

I'm pretty sure that your experience with your peers would be similar - do most people you know care about Aeroglass, or even know the term? Do they care that their OS silently updates itself? (Put that way, they might even think that's a great thing.)

 

The spying issue is one that should trouble a larger number of people, not just us geeks. But then again, how many people have bothered to learn all about it? Most people would simply shrug and say that they don't really have any secrets, and do not do anything illegal on their computers, so they don't need to care.

 

While I am as disgusted as you about the way the desktop experience is going, I think many of you are way off the mark when you say that MS is giving its customers a raw deal, and that it would hurt them to ignore user feedback and wishes. The vast majority of users, as I said before, do not give two hoots. They have figured out the way to make money in future, and that is by data mining and selling info about people, rather than selling a great product to those very people. I think, and the future will reveal whether I am right, that MS made a brilliant business decision in making Win 8 and 10, and unifying the OS to work on all platforms. It erodes our desktop experience, but most people don't really care, and moreover, it gives them a path to enter the handheld device market, where they had no presence before. We can rant all day, while MS laughs all the way to the bank.

 

The only place where innovation in OSes is still happening is in the Linux/GNU/open source front. In the past, every time MS released a new OS, I would eagerly install it, and tinker and play with it, to discover all the new features, and to experience a different computing platform. Since Vista, there has been no such joy - there is nothing drastically new, and plenty to rue. If I migrate from 8.1 to 10, I know that I wouldn't see or feel any difference, except of course the knowledge that somebody in Sacramento knows me better than my closest friends, and they will share that info with ad companies and the govt and anybody else who pays.

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Certainly, lack of both knowledge and concern are a major factor that Microsoft is counting on to make its Win10 abomination succeed.

 

I'm reminded me of the old joke: Pollster knocks on a homeowner's door. The owner answers and is greeted by the pollster.

 

"Good morning, sir. We're conducting a public opinion survey. What do you think about the level of ignorance and apathy among the general public?"

 

"I don't know and I don't care!!"

 

By staying on the sidelines and going along, people like that help make it possible for the Hitlers and Stalins of the world to go on and on. It's up to those of us who care to help them become aware of what's happening and to stir them into action. With regard to Windows 10, fortunately we don't have to dodge bullets and hide from secret police: we just do our research, talk to each other and compare notes in places like MSFN, then we go out to the blogs and to our friends and family and spread the word.

 

The process worked in the case of Windows 8. After an initial warm reception with the usual hype, the tech press became increasingly cool toward that OS, and its readers and by extension eventually their families and friends came to understand why. It did help that visually the contrast with XP and 7 was so great.

 

The same process can work with Windows 10. The challenge is greater, both because the differences from previous OSes are more conceptual and because Microsoft is pushing much more aggressively to get it installed on people's computers. But this could itself become the source of bad press and public pushback, and it may already be happening; see for example NoelC's graphs suggesting that Win10 adoption is leveling off and that 7 is bouncing back in spite of it all.

 

I don't see Windows 10 giving Microsoft a path to the handheld device market, any more than Windows 8 did. Every device and OS the company has made for mobile has struggled and I'd be curious to learn how Win10 might change that. As far as I'm concerned, they're needlessly wrecking the Windows experience for their most loyal customers for the pie-in-the-sky of cellphone users who've never shown any great inclination to buy Microsoft.

 

The tragic part of all this is is that it didn't have to be that way. There is no technical reason why users couldn't be offered the choice of Aero Glass on their i7 Core systems with 16GB of RAM. There is no need for Cortana to send my query about my next appointment to a server in Redmond -- that kind of information can be stored and retrieved locally just fine. I could go on, but it mostly boils down to the idea of choice. It's funny how Microsoft claims that it wants to "personalize" our PCs, but what Win10's drab color schemes, shrinking customization options, and forced Windows Updates actually lead to is a homogenized experience across the user base.

 

As to whether Microsoft's moves turn out to be brilliant, I agree with you that time will tell. If they succeed and the sheep are happy to shuffle into the corral to be poked and tracked and analyzed no end for a few bytes of Candy Crush, then so be it. I'll watch the camp fill up and then make my way to Linuxland. In the meantime, anybody who has ears to hear with, I'll keep shouting to warn them about what they're getting into.

 

--JorgeA

 

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It's funny.  I've had a Win 10 configuration stable and able to run all my programs since some time in August.  It even looks pretty good on the desktop.

 

I've done my ROI investigation.  As with Win 8.1 it doesn't really bring anything I NEED, per se, but there could be some intangible value to "keeping current".

 

It's not really surprising - save for the Metro/Modern/Universal parts that I absolutely don't use, it's really just Windows 8.2 rebranded.

 

It really works, and it could meet my business needs.  All proven, end of story, right?

 

If this had been rolled out as a Service Pack for 8.x I'd have already started the process of migrating my main system to it.

 

But nooo, it comes with BAGGAGE.  Continuous updates, forced cumulative updates, reduction in control.  The PROMISE that I'll have to go through it all again in a few months.

 

Everything about it is moving in a direction I don't need, and there are no compelling reasons (none!) to follow it.

 

But EVEN CHOOSING TO DIVORCE MYSELF FROM MICROSOFT isn't enough.  Not today.  Now I have to become more and more defensive of my current systems to prevent Microsoft from trashing them!  I feel sorry for most folks, who don't have the experience and knowledge to set up what I have, but I'll tell you what, I'm not all that confident either - I don't know, for example, whether if I divorce my systems from Microsoft's Windows Updates will they just invalidate my activation after a time?

 

-Noel

Edited by NoelC
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That's a great question.

 

I'm not aware of anything in the Vista or 7 agreements to suggest that MSFT is allowed to invalidate our Windows activation if we fail to install Windows Updates. I suppose that they could change the EULA/TOS/MSA/whatever at any time, but at the very least they would need to announce such a change very prominently, else it would be Class Action City.

 

I do know of people running Windows Media Center PCs who've had updates disabled for years, without consequence.

 

--JorgeA

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I don't see Windows 10 giving Microsoft a path to the handheld device market, any more than Windows 8 did. Every device and OS the company has made for mobile has struggled and I'd be curious to learn how Win10 might change that. As far as I'm concerned, they're needlessly wrecking the Windows experience for their most loyal customers for the pie-in-the-sky of cellphone users who've never shown any great inclination to buy Microsoft.

--JorgeA

 

This is the piece of the puzzle that just doesn't fit.  Digging around for answers, I started to fly into the "CLOUD"!!! and once I reached an altitude high enough to stop smelling all the dung spewed by marketing folks, I began to choke and gasp for air, then I escaped back out and came up with this -- WARNING: this could be based in reality or it could be tabloid-style FUD.

 

The Windows mobile market share is dreadful, surely they don't think they can change that and convert complacent iPhone/Android users by making them pay for a new phone when theirs are already FREE (so they think) and subsidized by the carrier?  Haven't cared to look, but all we've seen for the new Lumias is a retail price tag, no word on carriers that will be supplying it.  In conventional business, campaigns with loss-leaders to upsell later are commonplace.  But can MS really afford to have so many loss leaders in recent years Xbox, Windows 10, now phones?)

 

Just as they want Windows 10 on all desktops, perhaps they want Windows 10 on all phones - Lumias and everything else?

 

Instead of only pitching very affordable low- and mid-range devices that come with some impressive software bundles, the company is apparently also thinking about taking over existing Android devices. 

 
It appears Microsoft has found a way to install Windows 10 on Android handsets
 
You read that correctly.  Currently there is only 1 model of phone - the Xiaomi Mi4 in China where you can re-flash Android and install MS's custom ROM.  So what, right?  That's just 1 phone, they can't possibly develop drivers for all the different chipsets that Samsung and all other Android phone manufacturers use, right?  They'd have to be willing to shell out a boatload of cash for cooperation, or have some pretty serious leverage against Samsung.
 
Microsoft vs Samsung Patent settlement
 

Microsoft was getting $5 [royalty] per Android handset sold by phone maker HTC under a patent agreement, and Microsoft was looking for up to $12.50 per phone from other handset makers.

To apply the $5 price to Samsung, the Korean company could be paying Microsoft about $1.6 billion per year, based on Samsung's sales of 318 million smartphones in 2014.
   
Samsung said it had agreed in 2011 to pay Microsoft royalties in exchange for a patent license covering phones that ran Google Inc's Android operating system. Samsung also agreed to develop Windows phones and share confidential business information with Microsoft, according to court filings.
 

Assuming MS is now in possession of a multi-billion dollar royalty carrot over Samsung and now privy to the confidential business information of Samsung (presuming hardware drivers, etc) the question is what delivery method are they going to use to start "upgrading" Android phones to Windows 10 with custom ROM's?

 

Microsoft Dialer for Android said to replace your phone app, coming later this year

http://www.androidauthority.com/microsoft-dialer-for-android-said-to-replace-your-phone-app-coming-later-this-year-649180/

 

 

The writing's on the wall!  Resistance is futile!  Time to stop worrying and learn to love the "bomb"!
Stop fighting and just join!  We need to develop some more Mahjong clones, Bejeweled clones, FPS clones, Angry BIrds clones, tower defense clones, etc just like the top-earning apps in the Windows Store!  Join and copy your way to success and profit!!!
One of us!  One of us!
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This is the piece of the puzzle that just doesn't fit.  Digging around for answers, I started to fly into the "CLOUD"!!! and once I reached an altitude high enough to stop smelling all the dung spewed by marketing folk

 

:lol:

 

 

Microsoft vs Samsung Patent settlement
 

Microsoft was getting $5 [royalty] per Android handset sold by phone maker HTC under a patent agreement, and Microsoft was looking for up to $12.50 per phone from other handset makers.

To apply the $5 price to Samsung, the Korean company could be paying Microsoft about $1.6 billion per year, based on Samsung's sales of 318 million smartphones in 2014.
 
Samsung said it had agreed in 2011 to pay Microsoft royalties in exchange for a patent license covering phones that ran Google Inc's Android operating system. Samsung also agreed to develop Windows phones and share confidential business information with Microsoft, according to court filings.
 

Assuming MS is now in possession of a multi-billion dollar royalty carrot over Samsung and now privy to the confidential business information of Samsung (presuming hardware drivers, etc) the question is what delivery method are they going to use to start "upgrading" Android phones to Windows 10 with custom ROM's? 

 

Huh, so Microsoft might let Samsung off the hook for some of those royalty payments in exchange for being allowed to install Windows 10 on their phones.

 

The reaction from Samsung phone users would be interesting to follow. I don't know about others, but myself I view all smartphones as basically having the same (or similar enough) hardware capabilities that then it's the OS that matters. So my choice is based on the OS, its features, UI, and preinstalled apps. If I suddenly get switched from my chosen Android to Windows 10, there'll be hell to pay. At the very least I'll be looking for a different phone and/or carrier ASAP.

 

--JorgeA

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Desperation?

 

Planning to purchase a Windows 10 computer? Microsoft will buy your old device

 

Planning to purchase a new Windows 10 laptop but don't know what to do with your old, existing gear? Microsoft has a solution. The company is willing to pay you up to $300 if you decided to swap your existing machine for a new Windows 10-powered computer. Microsoft is running a new promotion called Easy Trade Up, wherein it is accepting old systems -- up to six years old -- and offering money if you intend to upgrade to a new Windows 10 computer.

 

--JorgeA

 

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Desperation?

Not only that, also a clear statement about the near-real-time speed of the interwebs and/or MS computing/payment processing infrastructure:

Step 4: Receive your reward

Receive your payment within 28 days of validation of your claim

 

this being year 2015 ... in the first half of the 19th century a letter made it from - say - London to Paris in 48 to 72 hours.

By the time your refund arrives to you there will be two new PC models released.... :whistle:

 

jaclaz

Edited by jaclaz
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