Windows 10 - Overall Review and Modding

[hishutup]

Every now and then there are some troublesome updates. I think win 7 had one a couple months ago.

Its also nice to remove them because some updates are "crapware" like everyone getting the "Update to windows 10" popup.

[Greg]

Yes, exactly... I mean the crapware like Bing Desktop Microsoft tries to sneak through Windows Update. There are also instances in which regular updates have been known to break development tools. It doesn't happen often, but I usually just delay installing these updates until after a fix is released.

[TechAngel85]

You guys are probably getting a taste of what it will be like for Home users to install updates. Pro users will have the options to ignore updates.

[z929669]

There are plenty of 'critical' updates to ignore. Two of them were posted on this thread by alt3rn1ty, and they were those updates that facilitated pushing Win 10 on all of us :P

 

Other 'updates' have been incompatible with my external devices as well. Need the ability to ignore and choose.

[Octopuss]

You guys are probably getting a taste of what it will be like for Home users to install updates. Pro users will have the options to ignore updates.

Only for relatively short period of time from what I heard. Definitely not indefinitely. I hope it won't turn out the way people fear it would.

[stoppingby4now]

Launchy is similar windows help in some ways, however far more powerful.

 

For applications I start to type what I want too launch, and usually within 2 characters I'm off and running. The cases where that isn't unique, you get suggestions which are better than Windies search. I never use the start menu to launch anything anymore.

 

Documents can just as Walt be managed, and everything can be designated with aliases if it makes it easier to remember.

 

Really, you know what you want to execute, so why drill down through a large menu system, or be forced to manage icons on the desktop that add to clutter?

 

I was a skeptic of Launchy when I first tried it out. Took me a good month of resisting for no good reason, and now it is essential to my workflow for both home and work, providing significant gains in productivity.

[alt3rn1ty]

You guys are probably getting a taste of what it will be like for Home users to install updates. Pro users will have the options to ignore updates.

Nope, Pro users will be treated the same way apparently https://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2015/06/26/free-windows-10-upgrades-danger/

 

Earlier it was mentioned that Pro and Enterprise would retain the ability to defer updates, now it looks like that was not quite accurate :

 

 

 

Interestingly Windows 10 Pro users (primarily businesses and some enthusiasts) are also stuck. They are put on the ‘Current Branch for Business’ (CBB) upgrade route but it only allows for a delay of up to four months from the Slow ring release before updates are then forcibly installed. This can be extended by another four months if Windows Pro users opt to use Microsoft’s ‘Windows Server Update Service’ (WSUS) instead of CBB, but it’s still only a delay.

 

So even Pro users will be spoon fed whatever MS decides they want on 'your machine' ..

Skype WiFi with a rebranded name Microsoft Wifi .. Wonder why the rename :D .. Will no doubt be getting pushed. Lots of exciting tracking opportunities for MS aswell as the NSA / GCHQ, combined with Bing everything versus google, silverlight versus adobe flash spyware, probably a renamed skype app aswell .. and anything else they deem to be an "update" to windows

Edited July 5, 2015 by alt3rn1ty

[DoubleYou]

I'm not worried, cause it will get hacked. This is a big enough thing that someone will "jailbreak" Windows 10 forced updates. It's easy enough to screw up updates so they won't install already, so this won't even be hard to hack.

 

And then Microsoft will either be forced to give us the option or let users hack their Windows.

 

Me? I'll upgrade to it. BUT... I'm going to dual-boot. I own two Windows licenses - Windows 8 I'll upgrade and Windows 7 run alongside.

[alt3rn1ty]

I'm hoping that like you can currently with IE, all the extra fluff becomes part of Windows Features which you can disable / turn off .. Probably buried under other options with an obscure link, but at least the option being there would be nice.

 

Hacks would probably break things long term ( where microsofts patchwork quilt is dependant upon all previous updates being in place, and borrows from expected installed software associated .dlls etc ).

 

 

I have disabled IE once before, and because several major update procedures went past when it came time that I wanted to try a more up to date IE out of curiosity, the latest would not install without the full trail of updates having been performed on the machine first .. And unfortunately MS idea of the trail of updates for my particular setup just failed. Re-installing the OS from the ground up allowed me to get to a place where I could try IE 11. I just left it as is since then.

Even if you disable IE windows still uses parts of its installation, otherwise for example Windows Update Service would not work. So if you get so out of date that other parts of the OS dependant upon it also become disfunctional / a security risk or just not recoverable .. I am expecting similar things of any future installations which become part of the OS that other parts become dependant upon them .. hence why I think ( as desireable as they probably will be ) hacks will probably turn out to be more trouble than they are worth in the long run.

 

Best feature I have for a gaming machine is a wifi button.

Switch it off for gaming on windows.

Switch it on when browsing using dual booted Linux.

 

Anyway : Reference the screenshot above - Has anyone seen a similar dialogue for disabling windows features in the beta Win 10 ?

[Greg]

Click the Start button, type Control Panel. Curse the completely irrelevant Bing search results then click My Stuff to find what you're actually trying to find.

 

You should see Control Panel at the top and you may want to pin it to the start menu.

 

Once you're in the old familiar and useful Control Panel, open Programs and Features and click "Turn Windows features on or off"

[alt3rn1ty]

Excellent, thanks Greg, now hopefully anything which is not actually part of the OS but installed as an update will be listed there in future. That Search the internet with Bing instead of search windows is also going to be for the chop when Win 10 installs, along with the actual bing search engine browser plugin.

[oqhansoloqo]

Hackers are always a step ahead of technology security.  Like DoubleYou says, Windows 10 and the issue of forced updates are big enough that it's guaranteed to get hacked.

[Octopuss]

https://news.softpedia.com/news/microsoft-originally-planned-to-launch-windows-10-in-fall-2015-486210.shtml

Yeah I am sure that will help Release something MONTHS earlier, what a working strategy. Who gives a crap about quality when you think you can get 0,1% better sales if you release it when children are back in school (how that is supposed to make something sell better is beyond me).

Not impressed. I think I will take my time to even give this a try.

[Neovalen]

How very cynical of you...

 

There are lots of good reasons for the timing. As for quality of the release, we will find out won't we? I certainly hope Microsoft wouldn't be dumb enough to release another flop after 8/8.1.

[EssArrBee]

As long as it's free, who cares? I mean how long has it been since you saw someone rocking XP or Vista?