 Notice. New forum software under development. It's going to miss a few functions and look a bit ugly for a while, but I'm working on it full time now as the old forum was too unstable. Couple days, all good. If you notice any issues, please contact me. |
Forum Index : Microcontroller and PC projects : Back to win$sucks but will it last
Page 1 of 2   |
|||||
| Author | Message | ||||
Bryan1 Guru  Joined: 22/02/2006 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1344 |
G'Day Guy's, Well as nightshift is taking up much of my time I did mention to the sparky I was after a new laptop while having our morning coffee and he brought up the Evans & Clarke website where some laptops were. Namely a Dell Latitude 7400 W with 32 gig of ram and a 500 gig SSD, also mentioned was a touch screen so when i got home just had to put a bid on. Learnt very quickly if one wants to win an auction one simply puts in real high bid and the chance are that no-one will try and jump the bid.  So in total for $421 I picked up this laptop, when I got home booted it up where a login screen said Admin put in a new password so did that and no where did I find the requirement to activate.  Tried out the touch screen and yes it works nicely so this weekend I'll install everything and see just how I fair after more than 10 years away from win$ucks. Never used a USB 3 USB port before and this laptop doesn't have dvd drive so I'll have to get an external one as I think this laptop will have enough grunt to get my cnc going in time. Cheers Bryan |
||||
PeteCotton Guru Joined: 13/08/2020 Location: CanadaPosts: 368 |
I think most of them have the Windows License key stored in non volatile ram. Also, before you invest in an external DVD drive, do you really need one? A USB 3.0 memory stick is usually a good way of loading software - or better still directly from the web. I haven't used a DVD drive for years. (And if you want it to play old games, might I recommend just buying them again for a couple of bucks on Good Old Games - www.gog.com ) |
||||
Grogster Admin Group  Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9306 |
Yes, newer laptops do keep the Windoze key in the UFI EEPROM memory - most of the time. I reset a laptop the other week when the HDD died. I put an SSD in for a bit of a speed boost, but as the original HDD had died, I had to do a full clean-install of Windows 10 Home. At completion, I noted that the activation happened automatically, as part of the setup process. When I checked, it said that "Windows is activated with a digital license." - which suggests that during the setup, Windoze found the still-valid key in the EFI and so just used that. I told my chum that he'd probably have to cough-up for a license key, but nope! Nice feature to have - so long as it works. Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
||||
| Bryan1 Guru Joined: 22/02/2006 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1344 |
Well the sparkie at work did say a new key was $33 off a website where he gets a lot of stuff. They do claim the key is recycled and is legit so if this laptop does popup with the activation it won't cost the earth to register it. Now when I hooked the wifi off my starlink router the laptop was still ocked off the net and it didn't take long to see the win$ucks firewall was the cuplrit so by turning that off the net was restored. I do suppose now I'm back to using this OS I will have to install an anti virus now with using linux all these years one doesn't even need one as it doesn't have a backdoor where this OS has one builtin just so like everything concerned with this OS costs good money so the big con can keep going |
||||
| PeteCotton Guru Joined: 13/08/2020 Location: CanadaPosts: 368 |
I haven't used an anti-virus in years. The built in Windows defender does a pretty good job, and I assume your tech savvy enough to not run programs from strangers. You should be fine without anything extra. |
||||
| PeteCotton Guru Joined: 13/08/2020 Location: CanadaPosts: 368 |
https://www.tomsguide.com/news/windows-defender-good-enough-for-new-laptop Link to an article about it. |
||||
| Bryan1 Guru Joined: 22/02/2006 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1344 |
Well just gotta luv win$sucks updates went and did an update being careful NOT to check upgrade to win$sucks 11 and after downloading the updates and a reboot found the audio driver had disappeared  Had a look online and yes it is well documented about this issue so had a good think about it as with using linux where it just downloads all the drivers programs need where in win$sucks one has to go find each driver file. So went to the Dell site and got the right file and got the sound back to normal. Well the memories are coming back to me know about using this OS, now with reading years ago about the upgrade to a new OS and the problems do you guy's reckon this win$sucks 11 is worth it or just stick with 10 pro ? Cheers Bryan |
||||
Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 6787 |
Depends how long you want MSoft to support it for. They are currently considering withdrawing support and updates for Win10. Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
||||
| Grogster Admin Group Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 9306 |
I still have one machine with W10 Pro on it for my Windoze-only CAD, and I like it, and GENERALLY SPEAKING, it behaves itself MOST of the time. I don't like the complete reformatting MS did with W11, so I have not upgraded to that, and had to go and hack the registry at one point, cos MS kept nagging me with pop-ups saying I could get a free upgrade to W11, which I did not want. I would not mind the pop-up, if it was only once or twice perhaps, and then it left you alone, but it kept popping up pretty much every day, and THAT got my blood-pressure up when I had already told it by this time "No thanks" what felt about 100 times.  I don't really love W11 that much, due to MS's policy for the last few versions of Windoze, where you usually have to upgrade your whole computer to get enough grunt to run their latest offering. MS have been peddling the market like that for several years, and each new release of Windoze, just so happens to need more hardware power then you have right now. Cut-down versions like Tiny7, MicroXP and GhostSpectre prove that you can easily run those versions on sometimes quite ancient machines, and they run fine, so exactly WHAT all that MS bloat is for, is anyone's guess at this point, but I suspect some serious telemetry etc, so they can try to push ads at you that they think will appeal to you. Unfortunately, that DOES work on LOTS of people who are not tech-savvy, but just use their computer for things. MS don't tend to like us techy people that much, who want the machine to be how WE like it to be rather then how MS think you should have your own computer setup.  Smoke makes things work. When the smoke gets out, it stops! |
||||
| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 6787 |
The cut down versions of Windows leave out a lot of stuff that is useful to some people. It's not telemetry. Most language options are missing for a start. The results are runnable but limited - and you can never be sure that some of the removed stuff hasn't been replaced by a keylogger or something equally vile as any virus scanning will have been crippled to not find them. The answer is to move to linux and run Windows in a VM if you have to. :) I use the free version of NanoCAD under Win 10. I tried it with wine on a linux box ages ago and it crashed intermittently. :( Unfortunately there are no good, free CAD programs on linux that I know of. There are several free ones but I never found a good one. There are also a couple of pretty good ones but they aren't free. Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
||||
| matherp Guru Joined: 11/12/2012 Location: United KingdomPosts: 9115 |
I run W11 exclusively. Multiple IDEs, CAD, CAM etc. Never crashes, runs perfectly day-in and day-out. I allow all updates and they never cause an issue. No virus protection other than in-built. If you get a semi-decent modern box W11 is completely stable and reliable. I've also installed it on "non-compliant" H/W using the various workrounds and again it works without issue |
||||
| Mixtel90 Guru Joined: 05/10/2019 Location: United KingdomPosts: 6787 |
I have a little W11 box as well as this W10 one (although I think this will accept W11 but it may not be worth it because of its limitations). I still need to figure out why my email doesn't work on the W11 one though. I've currently no linux boxes in everyday use, just an old notebook that I use for rescuing the occasional SD cards and USB drives that windows refuses to recognise. Mick Zilog Inside! nascom.info for Nascom & Gemini Preliminary MMBasic docs & my PCB designs |
||||
atmega8 Guru Joined: 19/11/2013 Location: GermanyPosts: 722 |
Absolutely ACK, same to me. Stable! Stop WIN bashing. I'am also satisfied with Linux. |
||||
| Volhout Guru Joined: 05/03/2018 Location: NetherlandsPosts: 4233 |
Win, 2 years ago I bought a new PC for my wife. W10. Nice 17" laptop PC with high end graphics card, and running stable. She uses it with all kinds of applications that are tied into school environment (she's a teacher). 1 year ago the W11 nagging began with popups "you can convert now to W11". Since I did not want to risk loosing compatibility with school applications (they run a mix of compliant and non-compliant PCs' so can not convert to W11), I told her (and I myself did the same) to choose "do not convert" every time the popup shows. And one morning (6 months ago), the laptop started in W11. W10 was gone. Honestly.. it works fine, and I have seen no compatibility issues, but... The upgrade was not approved by us (the users). I have an opinion about that. I do not question the the product W11, but I do question the MS company policy. You are not in control of the things you own. If I compare that to some of my Linux systems, that are nagging me for 5 years to upgrade Ubuntu 16.04 LTS, and consent with my choice (good, otherwise I would loose applications that are dear, old GTK2 apps). Volhout Edited 2024-02-17 00:22 by Volhout PicomiteVGA PETSCII ROBOTS |
||||
| atmega8 Guru Joined: 19/11/2013 Location: GermanyPosts: 722 |
“The upgrade was not approved by us (the users).” Definitely not! Nonsense. |
||||
| atmega8 Guru Joined: 19/11/2013 Location: GermanyPosts: 722 |
“The upgrade was not approved by us (the users).” Definitely not! Nonsense. Sorry Volhout, rumours. Responsible for Hundreds of Workstations, never saw such an “automatic” Upgrade. You MUST confirm. Edited 2024-02-17 04:46 by atmega8 |
||||
stanleyella Guru Joined: 25/06/2022 Location: United KingdomPosts: 2129 |
“The upgrade was not approved by us (the users).” my win 10 says updating after hours.shut down,reboot and upgrade. Not an option really. it doesn't offer upgrade to win 11 as my pc doesn't meet system requirements. one way of stopping an upgrade. Edited 2024-02-17 05:27 by stanleyella |
||||
KeepIS Guru Joined: 13/10/2014 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1679 |
I'm another with exactly this same experience and setup. I'm not going to comment on any other OS as I know where that inevitably ends up  . It's all too hard. Mike. |
||||
bigmik Guru Joined: 20/06/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 2914 |
Hi Volhout, All, I had a perfectly working Windows 10 PC then it decided it was time to update to W11, After an hour it returned to the W10 screen with a message "Upgrade Failed", Thank you MickeySoft, especially for the very descriptive error message. That was fine, I was happy with W10, then about every week it would do exactly the same, My PC (Dell XPS8940) is on the compatible list (and it passed the compatibility test) but it would never update to W11. I once saw a message before it started rolling back to W10 and on looking it up it was `a device is no longer present' Wow, what help, I stripped everything I could off my PC and disabled all unimportant startups but it still would fail after 1 hour. Eventually I got sick of this and decided it was time to clean install W11 which worked well and I have no issues with it. I don't mind being told there is a new version of windows but I want to chose IF and WHEN to do the upgrade attempt. Kind Regards, Mick (The Big one) Mick's uMite Stuff can be found >>> HERE (Kindly hosted by Dontronics) <<< |
||||
| robert.rozee Guru Joined: 31/12/2012 Location: New ZealandPosts: 2350 |
based upon years of observation of windows and apple computers, tablets, phones, and other such devices, my takeaway would be that it may well be the case that "the upgrade was not knowingly approved by us". commercial software providers have over the years developed a knack for persuading users to upgrade software without said user being entirely aware (and sometimes completely unaware) of what they are doing. every time i have the displeasure of using a computer running one of the mainstream commercial operating systems i am horrified by the barrage of 'junk' popup messages directed at the user by the o/s authors. and i observe that all users, to some degree at least, have become trained to blindly click away to try and dismiss said messages without one-by-one consciously examining and considering what they are clicking on. perhaps your wife's computer came up with a message saying "upgrades are downloaded and ready to be applied. if you would instead like to continue using your computer, click YES to defer applying them". if 'trained' to always click NO, she (or you, or someone else in the household) may have blindly clicked NO without thinking through what the message was saying! i have seen perfectly good iphones effectively remotely trashed by a user agreeing to an ios upgrade - apple love to over-the-air offer ios upgrades that a phone lacks the resources to run anywhere near as effectively as the originally shipped o/s. cheers, rob :-) Edited 2024-02-17 13:45 by robert.rozee |
||||
| Page 1 of 2 |
|||||
 Print this page |
