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Windows 10

Swordfishtrombone said:
...a) I have windows 8 running now how I want it, with settings that make it open straight to desktop, and a third party freeware program that gives me a proper start button, in the style of windows 7. As it now works for me, is stable, and I don't have to ever see the ugly full screen "apps", I'm happy with the status quo....
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May I ask... which Start Button freeware did you go with? I'd like to put one on this Nextbook (not a bad little $170 2-in-1).
 
rjh01 said:
In other words Windows 10 is not much of an upgrade. Hence it is free (Edit. That cannot be right!). If I do not want Windows 10 then no files should be downloaded into my computer for the upgrade. If many people decide soon after it is released to upgrade without warning then that could be a huge hit both on the servers and the wires connecting the server to home computers.

But if Microsoft decides that it would take a month to give everyone an upgrade then that would reduce the issue.
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I think "reserving" the upgrade triggers the down-loads. After the release you get a notification that you can set it up to complete the deal.
 
DGM said:
I think "reserving" the upgrade triggers the down-loads. After the release you get a notification that you can set it up to complete the deal.
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I just reserved my copy (how do I cancel this?). It says
Once it's available on July 29th, Windows 10 will be downloaded to your device.
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It does not say it will be downloaded before July 29. I would say if you want it in July then you need to reserve your copy.

It requires 3GB of your download allocation.
 
DGM said:
I just reserved on one of my PCs and it now shows the confirmation on both. I wonder if they both will upgrade? I would have thought you had to opt in on each PC.
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Based on your login - I suspect you are using the same MS account on both PCs?
 
Been running the preview for several months and apart from an issue with sound not working in some apps I've not had one issue. Miss a couple of Windows 8 features but can live without them. Not too happy with the reintroduced overloaded start menu similar to XP and 7.
 
I'm looking forward to getting a new PC with Win 10.

All is not great for me though.

My current machine is a Vista and I was going to set that up as a separate machine for my wife. I don't think it's going to be free to update that if I decide to.

I use Windows Media Center on my entertainment computer that runs Windows 7. It looks like Microsoft has abandoned Windows Media Center and will disable it under Windows 10. I've been looking around for alternatives to WMC and Kodi (previously XBMC) might work. There are other alternatives. The key is that they work with the CableCard in my HomeRun tuner.

As to how Microsoft is going to make money by giving the software away: Google manages to make money by giving the android software away and Microsoft might be thinking of that model. More likely the plan is to come close to forcing people to pay a monthly or yearly update fee in the future. The only thing limiting that plan is that if Microsoft gets too greedy some form of a Linux operating system, a browser based operating system, or even an apple operating system could make a move.

Editorial comment: It is just amazing what a crappy job Microsoft did with monetizing WMC. Everybody in my family would be using it if I had recommended it, but I didn't because, it would be just too hard to keep up and running for the non-nerds in my family. Microsoft seems to think that people don't use it because people don't want a product like that. Maybe, but it is hard to know for sure when Microsoft did so little to address the operational problems. I could never get the thing to come out of sleep mode reliably to record a program and go back to sleep. Eventually I just gave up and I found a patch to the registry that makes it so sleep mode is defeated, although the screen does power down and it looks like the computer is in sleep mode. Getting WMC to run reliably was full of issues like that, all exacerbated by Microsoft's theory that the less they tell you in an error message the better off they are.

ETA: I'm planning to get a solid state drive to use as a cache for my new computer or a drive with a built in solid state memory cache. Any comments?
 
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Reading rjh01's comment about server loads made me think they started the 'reservation' to get a feel how big the load could be.

Then again, they deliver updates to about as many systems as could be expected to upgrade anyway, so why test server load if the upgrade is delivered through those update servers anyhow?

And yet another angle, Windows' update were never that painless/bug free as they could be.
 
Jim_MDP said:
May I ask... which Start Button freeware did you go with? I'd like to put one on this Nextbook (not a bad little $170 2-in-1).
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I went for Stardock's start8 ($4 IIRC) and my wife went for the free ClassicShell. I'm a deepdiving geek and she's a busy project manager who just "<redacted> wanted the <redacted> thing to <redacted> work <redacted> like I <redacted> want". We're both happy-ish.
 
Vista isn't included in the free update as you'll need to run a complete, clean install to "upgrade" to win10. Or even win8.1.

If you want to run win10 on that particular machine, make sure to run an upgrade assistant first to see if your processor is compatible. The one for win8 (available on MS homepage) should give you a clue. Its the PAE/NX option you should check. Win10 needs it to run apparently.....

If PAE/NX test comes out negative at first, reboot and check your BIOS settings. If theres an option to activate PAE/NX under security settings(I think it was there) all you'll have to do is activate it before install (WArning: Vista will most likely crash due to an incompatible HAL if you do this ahead of time) and the install should run perfectly.

OTherwise you are, like my mom, stuck with vista.....
 
I hid the update on one of my PCs to remind me that I'm not going to update it from Win7 Pro (at least not for the next few years). It will actually turn out to be cheaper in time/money for me/my employer to wait and buy a new PC later. Since Win7 support continues until 2020 there's plenty of time before security issues become a concern.
 
SezMe said:
Me too. Is there any way to get rid of the damn thing?
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To just hide it:

Click on the little UP arrow, go to Customize.

Find the icon (GWX) in the list and change the setting to hide or show what you want. I put it to "Only Show Notifications" and the icon doesn't show in the taskbar now.
 
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