Windows 10...
- Thread starter coco69
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Colin_P
Guru
Quite a boring little story...
I had a trusty windows 7 laptop which ate itself just over a year ago. So I bought a new one which came with windows 8.1, I hated it but managed to figure it out and got rid of the metro stuff which is useless on anything other than a tablet. Last summer Win10 launched, I got the popup and installed it.
I thought Win10 was quite nice but then I learned about the privacy issues so after about two weeks I rolled back to Win8.1, who would have ever thought that would happen. I didn't want or need to talk to a Ford Cortina or any of the other junk.
About a week ago I decided to go back to Win7 after seeing that OE discs are available on a certain auction site for about £30. A lot of money I know but I went ahead and bought one.
Installing 7 on an 8 machine means there is some faffing that needs to be done with the BIOS settings but it is a straightforward process overall.
What really caught me out though was the 212 updates that needed to install on top to bring the newly installed 7 operating system up to a current and safe standard. Those 212 updates took about six hours to install themselves. Quite funny really, updates typically take a few minutes to sort themselves out on shutdown and another few minutes once you boot up again. Not that time and good job I was in no hurry to use the machine.
So now I am blissfully luddite like in using 7 again. The thing is probably unbeknownst to me, all those updates have probably installed a load of junk onto 7 that compromise privacy just as badly as 10.
...... I've not had the 10 popups start..... yet.
I had a trusty windows 7 laptop which ate itself just over a year ago. So I bought a new one which came with windows 8.1, I hated it but managed to figure it out and got rid of the metro stuff which is useless on anything other than a tablet. Last summer Win10 launched, I got the popup and installed it.
I thought Win10 was quite nice but then I learned about the privacy issues so after about two weeks I rolled back to Win8.1, who would have ever thought that would happen. I didn't want or need to talk to a Ford Cortina or any of the other junk.
About a week ago I decided to go back to Win7 after seeing that OE discs are available on a certain auction site for about £30. A lot of money I know but I went ahead and bought one.
Installing 7 on an 8 machine means there is some faffing that needs to be done with the BIOS settings but it is a straightforward process overall.
What really caught me out though was the 212 updates that needed to install on top to bring the newly installed 7 operating system up to a current and safe standard. Those 212 updates took about six hours to install themselves. Quite funny really, updates typically take a few minutes to sort themselves out on shutdown and another few minutes once you boot up again. Not that time and good job I was in no hurry to use the machine.
So now I am blissfully luddite like in using 7 again. The thing is probably unbeknownst to me, all those updates have probably installed a load of junk onto 7 that compromise privacy just as badly as 10.
...... I've not had the 10 popups start..... yet.
You can turn off all the privacy stuff and use a local account. It then doesn't matter if windows allows that stuff through the firewall because it isn't doing anything but you can install a third party firewall if your paranoia is that high.
My only issue so far is the continually disappearing start button and the fact that some apps have stopped working either because of my start button fix or because I use a local account. I find this instability mildly annoying but as windows 10 is going to be the ultimate solution and windows 7 and 8 will eventually fall by the wayside, I may as well persevere and sort it out.
My only issue so far is the continually disappearing start button and the fact that some apps have stopped working either because of my start button fix or because I use a local account. I find this instability mildly annoying but as windows 10 is going to be the ultimate solution and windows 7 and 8 will eventually fall by the wayside, I may as well persevere and sort it out.
Nigel-YZ1
Guru
- Location
- Somewhere else... maybe soon.
Gave in and installed a couple of weeks ago. I'm on a Dell Inspiron laptop. All ok except for 'new' wireless drivers that disconnected every 5 minutes.
Regressed them back to 6 year old drivers and all is peachy.
Experience is much the same. Still waiting for the big revelation that makes MS want everyone on it.
There's no adblock plus for Edge so am using IE or Chrome.
Regressed them back to 6 year old drivers and all is peachy.
Experience is much the same. Still waiting for the big revelation that makes MS want everyone on it.
There's no adblock plus for Edge so am using IE or Chrome.
[QUOTE 4220300, member: 9609"]what is a local account ?
I am a little paranoid with it - what is the point of having a firewall if others outwith that firewall can change the settings in it. wondoes and microsoft clearly can as it is there software, but how does google chrome give itself access through the firewall.
I have lost the start button 2 or 3 times now, but it does come back after a restart (cnrl-alt-delete gives access to another power button) but I agree it is bloody annoying)[/QUOTE]
Local account means you are logged into your computer but not logged into the windows cloud.
Here is, one of many, a guide to closing down all the online stuff and protecting your privacy. Once you go through it it becomes a little more obvious how windows 10 operates.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2971...our-privacy-in-windows-10-piece-by-piece.html
I wouldn't worry about stuff appearing in your firewall rules. It might need permissions for all kinds of innocent reasons and doesn't mean it's doing anything nefarious. A 3rd party firewall may well be a better option, one that has a learning mode. It can an intrusive pain at first though, as it will ask you continually what to allow and what to block and you won't necessarily know the answer without doing some research.
I am a little paranoid with it - what is the point of having a firewall if others outwith that firewall can change the settings in it. wondoes and microsoft clearly can as it is there software, but how does google chrome give itself access through the firewall.
I have lost the start button 2 or 3 times now, but it does come back after a restart (cnrl-alt-delete gives access to another power button) but I agree it is bloody annoying)[/QUOTE]
Local account means you are logged into your computer but not logged into the windows cloud.
Here is, one of many, a guide to closing down all the online stuff and protecting your privacy. Once you go through it it becomes a little more obvious how windows 10 operates.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2971...our-privacy-in-windows-10-piece-by-piece.html
I wouldn't worry about stuff appearing in your firewall rules. It might need permissions for all kinds of innocent reasons and doesn't mean it's doing anything nefarious. A 3rd party firewall may well be a better option, one that has a learning mode. It can an intrusive pain at first though, as it will ask you continually what to allow and what to block and you won't necessarily know the answer without doing some research.
MontyVeda
a short-tempered ill-controlled small-minded troll
- Location
- Lancaster... the little city.
my old desktop had a dual core processor and about 3gb of RAM. My new desktop has a quad core processor and 8gb of RAM, but the addition of an SSD is what really makes the difference... it really does go like the clappers!
steve50
Disenchanted Member
- Location
- West Yorkshire
When installing any operating system you get a choice of which updates to install, best choice imo is "install important updates only" this drastically reduces update time on your machine. Anyone who wishes to stay with windows 7 or 8.1 can do so by disabling the windows 10 prompts (and the unattended upgrade to 10 which microsoft seem to be going ahead with) simply download the "stand alone" version of GWX control panel, http://ultimateoutsider.com/downloads/
This will enable you to disable the windows ten prompt, remove the win 10 icon from your toolbar and prevent any further installation of windws10.
This will enable you to disable the windows ten prompt, remove the win 10 icon from your toolbar and prevent any further installation of windws10.
fossyant
Ride It Like You Stole It!
- Location
- South Manchester
Windows 10 has been rock solid on two laptops, a gaming PC and a tablet. The only issues we have had has been Nvidia Drivers messing up the Gaming PC - no major deal as all game saves were on-line (my son), but we did free up over 100GB on his SSD by re-installing the whole machine..
Happy with it. Still got 7 on an old machine.
Happy with it. Still got 7 on an old machine.
Brandane
Legendary Member
- Location
- Costa Clyde
Today I finally caved in to the pop ups from Microsoft, and allowed them to upgrade my Asus laptop to Windows 10. Not being a techie type, I have no idea if this will be a good thing or not.
So far I have discovered that I can't use AdBlock on MS Edge (which seems to have replaced the IE browser), so I use Firefox.
Most annoyingly though, I seem to have lost the ability to scroll up or down pages by using 2 fingers on the mouse. I know I am supposed to be able to use the scroll lock ("scr lk") in conjunction with the function key ("fn") to enable/disable the scroll function, but it now has no effect. WTF have they done?
So far I have discovered that I can't use AdBlock on MS Edge (which seems to have replaced the IE browser), so I use Firefox.
Most annoyingly though, I seem to have lost the ability to scroll up or down pages by using 2 fingers on the mouse. I know I am supposed to be able to use the scroll lock ("scr lk") in conjunction with the function key ("fn") to enable/disable the scroll function, but it now has no effect. WTF have they done?
fossyant
Ride It Like You Stole It!
- Location
- South Manchester
The mouse scroll on the pad should still work, so check out your settings. Sometimes things go amiss on updates.
Still very happy with Win10, and our old PC won't update to 10, fails every time, but it's old.
What I would recommend is an SSD upgrade these days to every PC. Makes a huge difference in usability, even on beastly machines. The older computers really benefit, it goes from a tea break boot up to 20 seconds.... the fast machines are really fast, faster than an ipad can start.
Still very happy with Win10, and our old PC won't update to 10, fails every time, but it's old.
What I would recommend is an SSD upgrade these days to every PC. Makes a huge difference in usability, even on beastly machines. The older computers really benefit, it goes from a tea break boot up to 20 seconds.... the fast machines are really fast, faster than an ipad can start.
Seevio
Guru
- Location
- South Glos
If you must, you can still use internet explorer. It's still installed in Windows 10.
Scrolling with the trackpad is a function of the drivers rather than the operating system. It possible that Windows has installed basic drivers which although newer, are not as featured. You may be able to download the appropriate drivers from the Asus website.
Scrolling with the trackpad is a function of the drivers rather than the operating system. It possible that Windows has installed basic drivers which although newer, are not as featured. You may be able to download the appropriate drivers from the Asus website.
deptfordmarmoset
Full time tea drinker
- Location
- Armonmy Way
My 83 year old mother, who's getting progressively more blind and pernickety, IMed me on Thursday to say that Windows had updated to 10. When asked about it, she tried to blame it on my nephew (who was on a train to Liverpool at the time). I don't know what path she had followed during the installation but all her documents and pictures had disappeared so had to be reinstalled from a backup drive. I fear I may have more and more surprises as time goes by. Still, 83 and using emails and instant messaging is not to be sneered at.
fossyant
Ride It Like You Stole It!
- Location
- South Manchester
That's good going. My FIL was very techy, but was all his life, but things started going a bit wrong as he started dying (not that we knew at the time).
Our old PC updated itself, as have a few others said on here. All our other computers, we selected the upgrade, but I know the old PC tried it on it's own. Didn't work though. Only just got 7 to work on it. It's really old bt was a gaming PC ones, but it stores all the old photos with backups, and is the main PC for emails, although we both use phone apps and web email as well to get to the same account.
Brandane
Legendary Member
- Location
- Costa Clyde
Problem solved. The good old fashioned method of switching off and then switching back on again seems to have worked.
fossyant
Ride It Like You Stole It!
- Location
- South Manchester
Oh and yes that's one of the pains with Win 10 auto updates. If stuff stops working, reboot. we've seen the same and you can pin it down to a background update. It's a pain if you have a slow Hard drive, not if you get an SSD.
