patrick.net

I moved to windows 10 and like it. Of course I've got all the tracking crap turned off. I don't use Cortina (or whatever they call their assistant), but I do like the interface.

Go Mac.

I finally just gave in... It's not so bad...Once you get used to the fact that everything is just a little bit different than before.

I think all the Windows new versions have subliminal messages trying to make you interested in having rabid nerd sex with Gates and Ballmer, but none of them have ever worked, so they keep trying.

elliemae says

Why does Microsoft want me to windows 10 so badly?

1. Windows 10 is Microsoft's attempt to turn Windows into a service that you will have to pay for on a regular basis as oppose to an OS you can use until the hardware it supports is obsolete. The fact is that hardware isn't being replaced at the rate it used to be, and the connections today are largely unchanged or backwards compatible. So hardware doesn't force you to upgrade your operating system like it used to. Microsoft wants to establish a new revenue stream to replace a dying one.

2. Windows 10 is an ad platform and a store. Windows has seen Google and Apple make a fortune by controlling the software market by having their store fronts right in the face of the end user as the one and only way -- unless your a techie -- to purchase and install apps, or download free apps laden with ads. Google does this on Android, and Apple does this in iOS. Microsoft wants to do the exact same thing in Windows. Why develop software when millions of people will do that for you and you siphon off 30% or more. Working is for patsies.

It’s common knowledge that Apple takes 30 percent of the revenue for any app sold in iTunes, which is, of course, the only place to get iOS apps for (un-jailbroken) iPhones, iPod Touches, and iPads. This is nothing new; Apple has done the same with the music in iTunes for years. It’s simply the cost of selling 1s and 0s via iTunes to people with iOS, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Apple can set whatever rules it wants, because it makes the devices and operates the store. If developers don’t like it, they’re free to sell their stuff somewhere else, to someone else.

Side note, with capitalism issuing a 30% tax on wealth producers before government applies any taxes, how the hell does capitalism promote free markets and competition? It doesn't. Developers aren't free to compete with Apple on establishing market places because of the inherent power that having billions of dollars gives to force people to bend to your will and pay tribute in terms of money to you. That's why capitalism is fundamentally flawed no matter what its religious zealots say. Regulations are needed to keep capitalism from collapsing under its own corruption. Or we could establish an entirely new kind of economic system. There are an infinite number to choose from.

3. Microsoft wants to force updates on all users it can. This simplifies Microsoft's support, but it entails a huge risk to customers. Windows updates can and do occasionally break certain hardware. If 1% of Microsoft's users are affected negatively by an update, even rendering their machines unbootable, Microsoft is unlikely to roll back an update or patch their prior update so that it does not break that 1%. It's just not cost effective. Microsoft's answer will likely be, update your hardware schmuck or don't use that brand as it's not popular enough to support or bug the hardware manufacturer to update their drivers.

turtledove says

It's not so bad...Once you get used to the fact that everything is just a little bit different than before.

Windows 10 is essentially Windows 8.1 with a worse desktop shell that is less customizable. Windows 8.1 is actually the best version of Windows with the exception of Windows XP x32, though in many ways Windows 8.1 is better. The OS itself is great, at least as good as Windows 10 and better than Windows XP and Windows 7. The complaint people had about Windows 8 and 8.1 is the metro shell, but you can easily disable all Metro and Charms features, so Windows 8.1's desktop shell is like Windows 7, only better. Gone is the annoying lense flare on the application bar that makes text hard to read. The support for resizing text and graphics is vastly superior to Windows 7. Task Manager is much improved as are other control panels, although control panels still relies too much on search. The icons are cleaner and nicer. There are also a bunch of other little improvements in the desktop shell.

I'm running Windows 8.1 on my work computer, my home computer, and my home theater PC. Windows 8.1 will never bug you to upgrade to Windows 10 if you uninstall update KB3035583. This is easy to do. Here are the exact steps for Windows 8.1

1. Right click the Windows start button. That's the button with the Windows icon on it.
2. Left click on Control Panel in the pop-up window.
3. Click on Programs and Features.
4. Click on View installed updates.
5. In the search bar on the upper right corner type or paste KB3035583.
6. Right click the update in the list and click on Uninstall.

Blurtman says

Go Mac.

Apple has had 40 years to convince me to buy their crappy products. They have failed miserably. The Apples Is and IIs were crap and were replaced by Lisa. Lisa was crap and never really made it out the door and was replaced by MACs. MACs were crap and replaced by Power PCs, which were not remotely PCs. The Power PCs were crap and were replaced by PCs, the line we had been using for 15 years. This ended Apple making hardware.

Apple's operating system, System X, was such a piece of shit that Apple could not even maintain it, nonetheless catch up with Windows or OS/2, both of which supported multithreading whereas System 9 and before did not. Apple had to abandon the OS it created and copy BSD Unix. System 10 was never System 10, it was a copy of Unix with a shell hastily thrown on top of it. Apple just kept the marketing term to fool its customers.

Unix has never been as good as OS/2 or Windows. The very architecture of Unix is a horrific throwback to the 1960s and 1970s when all the lame ass engineers were smoking pot and doing LSD. The concepts on which modern operating systems are founded didn't really take form until the 1980s and 1990s. There has been so much progress in understanding how operating systems should work between the time Unix was designed and the time Windows, the OS not the DOS shell, was designed.

To understand how messed up the Unix world is, consider this allegory. Imagine that you need to renew your driver's license at the DMV. To do this you have to fill out a form. When the DMV agent give you the form, she also hands over all the nuclear codes to you because while fulfilling the form, you have to have all the powers of the president of the United States. Now, you're on the honor system, so don't go starting any nuclear wars. Once you are done filling out the form, you will give back all these presidential powers. Does this sound crazy? Yeah it does, and that's the way Unix works which is why it was plagued with code injection attacks that exploited buffer overruns. Sure Unix has fixed those buffer overruns, but it still does the ridiculous thing of giving great power to do minor things.

The WIndows solution is what common sense says. If a regular user needs access to some privilege resource, instead of handing over the nuclear codes, the regular user requests some task be done by an account designated to perform that task and having the rights needed to do that task and no other rights.

Unix also has a terrible user/group/everyone read/write/execute model for sharing files. It's a ridiculously simple and rigid model that is terrible for anyone living after the 1970s.

I'd love to see a new operating system with zero baggage replace Windows, but Unix, even Apple Unix, is not such a system. Windows does have baggage dating back to the 1980s, but Unix has baggage going back to the 1960s.

True, Unix can be lightweight, but it is neither user-friendly nor easy to maintain for anything other than web browsing. If Unix was a great operating system to end users, then there would be no reason to have a platform like Android or iOS running on top of it, and all tablets and phones would run Linux and just Linux. But that's not reality. Unix has become popular as a way of slapping an OS on a product to manage the hardware while managed or unmanaged platforms handle the user experience and the application stack.

An operating system that requires a platform is, by definition, deficient. I'd like to see an operating system that is a managed platform. Android may come close, but not really. The really important system administrative tasks have to be done in the underlying OS. That's where the real control is.

anonymous says

Are the steps for getting rid of the W-10 pop-up on Windows 7 the same as for 8.1?

Mostly. Its the same KB number, but getting to the control panel is slightly different. I don't have Windows 7 in front of me, but off of my memory, you left-click the Windows start button and then left-click control panel or system--> control panel. From there on it's the same I think.

http://www.linuxmint.com/

Dan8267 says

The WIndows solution is what common sense says. If a regular user needs access to some privilege resource, instead of handing over the nuclear codes, the regular user requests some task be done by an account designated to perform that task and having the rights needed to do that task and no other rights.

I'm with you, and have always been a PC user, except at school, since my school (like most) uses Macs.

But why is it that PCs (windows) seem to be more vulnerable to viruses and hack attacks ?

thunderlips11 says

Linux Mint

Haven't heard of that before. I'll check it out, but I'm more interested in understanding how to do system administration of the Unix system under Android.

I do like that Linux supports multiple desktop shells. The desktop shell should not be married to the operating system and should be plug-in-play. Unfortunately, I haven't seen any Linux shells that are as good, in my opinion and tastes, as Windows XP or Windows 8.1.

www.youtube.com/embed/YLcpOQl_LoU

I'd be more comfortable with an OS that didn't recently require patching up memory leaks. The key tasks of an operating system, particularly managing resources and process lifecycle, are the very first things the OS needs to get right, and it needs a long history of not having problems with these responsibilities. Only then can you go on to the operating system's API and desktop shell.

marcus says

But why is it that PCs (windows) seem to be more vulnerable to viruses and hack attacks ?

Seems and is are too entirely different things. Crackers go after the most popular platforms because that's where the money is. It's not worth your time to break into a Commodore 64 or an Apple desktop. Now breaking into people's iPhones, that's worth the time. And it happens because that's where the money is.

The focus of crackers have always shifted quickly as the popularity of platforms have shifted. The alleged security of Apple's System 9 and before was a laughable myth. It was just that no one bothered to attack MACs because their customer base was so unprofitable. iOS, being a platform that tracks users' locations, banking, and purchasing habits is a much more attractive target, and you'll see more attacks on mobile platforms, especially iOS and Android, as crackers shift to mobile computing targets. Whichever platform, iOS of Android, becomes the more popular will be attacked more and will seem like the less secure platform.

Blurtman says

Go Mac.

I agree

I got the best of both worlds by installing my old OS X 10.10 installer (from my dead Macbook Pro) onto a new x86 build.

Takes something called Clover to adjust the motherboard into something OS X can install on.

It's not for the masses but it's really f-ing awesome to be running OS X 10.11 now on standard x86 hardware, hardware I hand-picked from newegg.

To get a similar iMac from Apple would cost $1000 more than it cost me.

Aside from laptops, Apple offers me zero value-add with their hardware designs now. I actively hate the iMac and Mac Pro, actually. Mini too.

All I want is a decent nVidia GPU with a decent Intel CPU with a decent SSD and 16GB of RAM. Apple says "f- you!" to that, but at least the Hackintosh avenue is open to me for some reason.

I had a Mac from 1989-2015 (IIcx, 1995 PowerMac 7500, 1999 G3, 2002 PBG4, 2006 Mac Pro, 2008 Macbook Pro) but it was great only spending $600 at newegg for exactly what I wanted, nothing less and nothing more. I plan on getting a Pascal graphics card next year when they come out.

Dan8267 says

. The alleged security of Apple's System 9 and before was a laughable myth

The old Mac OS wasn't particularly secure, but to hack it you had to have a Mac, and having a Mac made one to want to not ruin the fun for other Mac users.

Dan8267 says

I'd be more comfortable with an OS that didn't recently require patching up memory leaks. The key tasks of an operating system, particularly managing resources and process lifecycle, are the very first things the OS needs to get right, and it needs a long history of not having problems with these responsibilities. Only then can you go on to the operating system's API and desktop shell.

I'm guessing you've never googled windows 10 memory leaks (or 8 or 7 or me or xp or whatever). Be serous, windows always had leaks. Every OS ever written has leaks. I've had a lot less trouble with it on ubuntu than xp which was the last ms product I will ever use.

I'll disagree with many here.

I had Windows 7 since it came out. Finally my install became very creaky and unstable. I wiped it and installed Windows 10 and I couldn't be happier. Even on my 2007-era desktop it performs just fine.

I also have Macbook and iPhone, but sometimes I need Windows.

I have also warmed to Office 365. There are risks of course, but I can get a lot of Office type basics done anywhere I have a web browser now. Physical hardware dies, it's not the end of ability to work any more.

Vicente says

I'll disagree with many here.

I had Windows 7 since it came out. Finally my install became very creaky and unstable. I wiped it and installed Windows 10 and I couldn't be happier. Even on my 2007-era desktop it performs just fine.

Just wait a year. You'll be sorry. With Apple, you don't have any of those headaches, and it installs new operating systems by itself.

but sometimes I need Windows

yeah I got Windows 10 on the other SSD. Haven't booted it up in weeks . . .

Strategist says

With Apple, you don't have any of those headaches, and it installs new operating systems by itself.

Have never found an Apple product that I like. And windows wants to install it's updates itself but gives you the option of allow you to allow that to happen or not, like making grown up decisions.

Dan8267 says

I'd be more comfortable with an OS that didn't recently require patching up memory leaks. The key tasks of an operating system, particularly managing resources and process lifecycle, are the very first things the OS needs to get right, and it needs a long history of not having problems with these responsibilities. Only then can you go on to the operating system's API and desktop shell.

I'm running Cinnamon version of Linux Mint. Unfortunately, the NVidia support could still be better but it's much improved. You do have to use a PPA because the I think version 352 doesn't cover 900 series cards very well. Love how I can customize my desktop experience. Crashes almost never happen, when they do it's usually a graphics crash and rebooting the X-Server takes care of that.

Windows sits on a hard drive, and only gets plugged in when I want to play a Windows only game once in a while. I do need to use the Mac for work still, but we've been migrating to a PhP/SQL database and away from the Proprietary 4D garbage, so pretty soon my Mac can go bye-bye, too.

I use, and recommend Ubuntu.

Dan8267 says

Dan8267

A very intelligent and helpful analysis. Thanks Dan.

I'm glad all technology is made in the U.S. creating jobs & boosting our economy.

saroya says

Dan8267 says

Dan8267

A very intelligent and helpful analysis. Thanks Dan.

Wow, the trolls hate me so much they are now disliking replies that thank me for helpful posts. It's really sad when someone is that filled with hate for a person they never met and whose only influence on their lives is an Internet forum.

These trolls always remind me of a certain scene in Return of the Jedi.
www.youtube.com/embed/PFkAAvDkj9k

elliemae says

Microsoft desperately wants me to upgrade to windows 10. why? what to do?

So they can spy on you with greater speed and efficiency.

bgamall4 says

So they can spy on you with greater speed and efficiency.

Glad to see you believe in conspiracy, ZZYZZX!

In the case of Microsoft, I'm guessing it's also part of their latest anti-piracy efforts.

bgamall4 says

zzyzzx says

So they can spy on you with greater speed and efficiency.

Glad to see you believe in conspiracy, ZZYZZX!

Can you believe it? What kind of people would believe in conspiracy theories? Makes me scratch my head.

bgamall4 says

Strategist says

What kind of people would believe in conspiracy theories?

Smart people.

I feel so stupid.

elliemae says

Microsoft desperately wants me to upgrade to windows 10. why? what to do?

You should upgrade to avoid being shamed on social media for having an old OS.

Dan8267 says

Wow, the trolls hate me so much they are now disliking replies that thank me for helpful posts.

Patrick, here's your first customer. Please sell this guy some LIKES.

Strategist says

Strategist says

What kind of people would believe in conspiracy theories?

The kind of people that can't believe the Oswald ONE BULLET THEORY.

I was an early adopter of 10. I don't like it.
I was an early adopter of 8 and 8.1 after it. Didn't like them.
I was an early adopter of Vista. Didn't like it.
I was an early adopter of XP. I liked it.

1/4? Meh, I still prefer UNIX and UNIX-like systems to Windows. To each their own. Sorry not sorry.

I wish they would release open soure windows 95.

So it could be tweaked and the OCX crap taken out of it, maybe even ported over to a Linux flavor.

Paying MS trough AppStore to have MS totl controll over me ? No thanks but no thaks !!! At the year of Win7 death sure Linux will be more user friendley so Hello Linux ! MS pushes users to Linux ! For internet use Linux os is far more secure as win and now shiny new brand Win10 policiy and crappiest desktop ever created with realtime spying ? No thanks but no thanks !

Bring back Heathkit and HDOS!

I remember receiving the first release of Windows 95. It hosed up my Windows 3.1 PC big time!

I'm using Windows 10. It's OK.

Dan8267 says

Windows 10 is an ad platform and a store. Windows has seen Google and Apple make a fortune by controlling the software market by having their store fronts right in the face of the end user as the one and only way -- unless your a techie -- to purchase and install apps, or download free apps laden with ads. Google does this on Android, and Apple does this in iOS. Microsoft wants to do the exact same thing in Windows.

I hate being right.

How to Disable Ads on Your Windows 10 Lock Screen

Windows 10, the ad platform.

A predictable and lame insult from a predictable and lame person.