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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Jun 2015
    Posts
    918

    Default Thanks for the Information

    Hi,

    I am still on Windows 7 and was looking with trepidation at what i have anticipated doing in terms of an upgrade before January. Windows 10 has been an unmitigated disaster for my lab and has been an enormous time sink, but we were required to upgrade by the University. Just try running Bitlocker on 20 machines and keep control of the encryption keys.

    Just a note that with Windows 10 Pro you can put off feature updates for 365 days... quality for 30. I hear they were going to do the same for Home, but it is worth getting Pro just to have this option.

    There is a lot of talk on the Security Podcast I listen to about continuing using W7 after January in certain cases... half the world's Windows computers are not yet updated (this is 500 million).

    I probably need to seriously consider that and my understanding is that it would be relatively safe if you do not use the browsers and mail and Microsoft Remote Access. I am using Chrome remote access, which is as safe as their browser, and I have not seen the CPU overuse, but it looks like I turned that scan off long ago. Any other access to my machine is blocked at the router.

    The problem would be file sharing, since I use OneDrive and I bet they will not update that, so that would be a serious security flaw.

    Anyway, all this is pause for thought. If something comes up and you want me to ask, I can officially pose questions to Stanford IT and get written responses. They probably have dozens of screwed up machines by now.

    JY

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Oct 2005
    Location
    Mesa, AZ
    Posts
    33,720

    Default

    Thanks Jerry. At this point we need to just wait and watch. I will periodically force check for updates, take whatever comes my way, and test ACP with it. Eventually we will be back to normal. They screwed up like this in early Summer but the damage was localized and they cleaned it up fairly quickly. Sending out a breaking Features Update was a bad one. Let's hope this is a temporary issue. They will be heavily motivated to avoid this sort of goof-up, after years of outstanding reliability. It is sooo easy to lose the confidence of the customer base, and with all the rabid Linux/Mac people out there I am sure Microsoft knows they risk permanent damage to their ecosystem.
    -- Bob

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Jun 2015
    Posts
    918

    Default

    Yeah, I think you have the sticky on the 30/day feature setting. They pull back if the updates fail well before 30 days... maybe not 7. Unfortunately we are the Beta testers for this monstrosity.

    They cannot internally test with all the computer chipsets and drivers possible... they do have some official Beta testers, but they do not listen to them. It just goes out and we test it en mass.

    If you delay installation and it fails, they will pull the update, like 1809, until it is stable, or never update anything other than the most simple machines, and delay 6 months.

    I hate to try to go back as that is really reinstalling the system from a drive image and again these drive images in W10 do not work well. 90% of W7 images worked. Easy to brick a W10 machine.

    I could go on, but there is no reason to do these feature updates. They could just dribble out the security updates as they did on W7. This is like reinstalling the OS twice a year.

    Enough complaining,

    JY

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Nov 2008
    Location
    me: Albuquerque scope: Mayhill, NM
    Posts
    1,097

    Default

    The sad thing is: for most update features, we are not in fact beta testers. Microsoft has an Insider program for those who want bleeding-edge updates. Why anyone would beg for updates that are guaranteed to be less stable than the ones we're getting, well that's a mystery to me but I guess I'm glad they're out there.

    I have my observatory laptop on Windows 10 Pro, which allows pausing all updates for 35 days. Usually the followup patches are out and the wailing and gnashing of teeth has subsided by the time my 35 days are up, lucky so far.
    measuring space rock rotation rates, live from Albuquerque NM

 

 

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