Windows 10 Discussion - Because seven ate nine

Microsoft decided to make Windows 10 free for anyone with Windows 7 SP1 and 8.1. I’ve already taken advantage of their generous offer and installed Windows 10 on my gaming machine which previously ran Windows 7, and I have to say, it’s pretty good.

I’ve not had any major issues so far, and I find that it’s much more usable than previous versions of Windows. I didn’t have any problems transitioning from 7. Everything just felt… right.

What does everyone think of it?

alot of people say that it runs horribly… i found that it helped my computers performance immensely even though it did ruin my copy of halo one…

Also some people are getting all hung up about certain privacy issues which are easy to fix this is why you always read terms and agreements and read whatever has a lick checkmark box…

windows ten also feels a little bit like a more user friendly windows eight with windows seven hiding in it somewhere. i like the new start bar much more and combined with the apps it makes it really easy to use everything.I havent had a chance to use cortana… probably never will i can type faster then she can talk. overall it feels really good i enjoy the new windows ten alot.

I just like the title of this thread. So… Hai !

This is from one of my dad’s freinds that works on cyber security for reasons why i shouldn’t get it:
(1) Win10’s BitLocker feature contains at least one official backdoor.
This door can be shut with effort, but is open by default. The keys
to this door are transferred to servers subject to various US
agencies.

“When device encryption is on, Windows automatically encrypts the
drive Windows is installed on and generates a recovery key. The
BitLocker recovery key for your device is automatically backed up
online in your Microsoft OneDrive account.”

(4) Win10 implements OS-managed supercookies. Access to these may be
limited through a settings menu, but it is unclear at this point
whether they can be properly eliminated.

“Windows generates a unique advertising ID for each user on a device.
Your advertising ID can be used by app developers and advertising
networks to provide more relevant advertising. You can turn off access
to this identifier at any time in the device Settings.”

(5) Win10’s default web browsers (IE and Edge) share browsing history
with Mircosoft servers. It is currently unclear whether this can be
turned off completely.

"Page Prediction sends your browsing history to Microsoft and uses
aggregated browsing history data to predict which pages you are likely
to browse to next and proactively loads those pages in the background
for a faster browsing experience. "

(9) Win10 transfers copies images and videos to Microsoft servers by
default, which was a root cause of the iCloud celeb hack.

“Your photos, videos, as well as screenshots, saved in your camera
roll automatically upload to OneDrive. You can manage your photos
and/or videos in OneDrive, and you can disable the automatic upload in
Settings.”

so i don’t think i will change over from my windows 8.1 any time soon. Besides the point i have gotten quite used to windows 8.1 because my computer is a touch screen so i don’t ant to change anything on my computer any time soon. Especially with all these faults in operating system safety wise even if i did change it my dad wouldn’t be to happy about it.

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ok, I’m curious as to the real cost of win 10. Yes, initially FREE, but MS doesn’t just give things away. :wink: When/how will MS start charging for win 10? Seriously, they will not loose money on this so what’s the catch???

actually when you switch to windows 10 you can’t switch back or change operating systems after that. Therefore I think that is the catch.

That doesn’t explain why they are giving it away. That’s just locking it in so to speak. As to downgrading once installed, all recent windows OS’s did not allow a downgrade, you have to reformat then reload.

It appears to me that the catch is the default settings that allow a great deal of personal information to be gathered. I really dislike and disagree with how much privacy is sacrificed for the sake of convenience. That’s an incredibly high price for convenience and not worth it to me.

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system restore to factory new would revert the OS system… it would be a bit nasty but it should work…

Seems to me once you install a new OS that the restore option is no longer there.

Yes, agreed, but still not filling the MS coffers with gold.

By giving it away free, MS is going to get a lot more people to upgrade. More people on the latest Windows means fewer people on older Windows. This is good for MS because it will lessen the amount of support they have to give to these older OSes, which is undoubtedly costing them money.

Also, one of the biggest complaints about Windows Phone has been the lack of apps in the store. By making the core OS the same for both Windows PC and Windows Mobile, MS has made it easier for developers to target the phone.

Apps written for the PC (which are quite common because of windows’s commonness) now automatically run on phones. By moving as many people as possible to Win10 and making development easy, MS is trying to attract more developers to write apps for Win10 and Win10 Mobile.

The point is that there isn’t really a catch for you as a user. The only catch is that they are trying to beat competition by using a new tactic. I don’t know for sure, but I think the latest Mac OS is going to be free as well, so MS may be following Apple.

Another view is that Microsoft may be moving from using Windows as there main money maker and trying to use it rather as a platform to sell their services like OneDrive and Office 365.

@abby
Very interesting for sure.

I just want to ask a few questions. I’m no cryptography expert, but I enjoy discussion.

(1) I think the issue here is that the OneDrive could be hacked and your BitLocker recovery key (I actually don’t know what it is) could be discovered. From the way your quote is worded, it seems like the BitLocker recovery key is per-device, so the hackers must actually have your device to use it. By the time they manage that, Microsoft will probably have found a solution.

(4) I’m not really sure what the problem here is, so I’ll skip this.

(5) If IE shares its history with MS Servers, then this is a problem with Win8 as well. Also, I believe Chrome roams its history and settings as well.

(9) OneDrive is a service for uploading docs, pics, and vids, so it seems like this is no worse than uploading to youtube or something.


Most of the problems seem to stem from the fact that Win10 is more cloud-oriented(If you data is in the cloud, it can be hacked, right). But the fact is that a lot of your data is already on the internet. You’re google account, paypal account, amazon account are all on servers that could be potentially hacked. Win10 actually introduced a new feature called Windows Hello, which is supposed to eliminate the security risk introduced by using the same password on multiple sites(if one site is hacked, they have you password to another site).

I realize that you’re just quoting and that you probably trust you’re dad’s friend more than me, so go ahead and do what you want. comfortability is a great reason not to upgrade. Also, you can upgrade for free for a whole year, so there is no rush.

I’ve been keeping up with they development of Win10 and I have been liking it a lot myself. This is probably because I’m a developer born and raised on .NET, so I want MS to succeed so that I can get a larger audience for any apps I write.

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Philip the problem with #4 is it means that Microsoft can gather data about you without you knowing. Also these are only a few problems with it he’s listed many more but those are the ones that I find the most interesting.

I’m sure Microsoft could get data about you other ways if they wanted to. I don’t think that’s their game, but if it is, it’ll be awful hard to fight it.

I’m not really trying to argue with your dads friend (I probably know way less than he does); I just like discussing tech.

its fine I’m just happy to answer, my dad knows a lot too, but not as much as his buddy. Then there’s me as a bi product of all of this because i listen to my dad telling me about his work day.

I’m enjoying windows 10 on my desktop. I havn’r upgraded my laptop yet becasue windows 10 still has some issues but I’m liking it a lot.

For some reason 1 of my older games (Command and Conquer generals) Won’t run on windows 10 but I think that is something that is fixable I just have to mess around with a bunch of stuff and figure it out.

Here’s my take

  1. Encryption is overkill for most purposes anyways. The key is stored in the cloud for convenience, and Microsoft or a hacker have much better and more efficient ways of data-gathering than decrypting your hard drive.

  2. They’re gathering data with cookies, doesn’t surprise me a bit.

  3. Not like anyone uses IE, and Edge isn’t very good either.

  4. Put all your files in a different directory? Disable OneDrive? Also the iCloud thing happened due to Apple not protecting against brute-forcing passwords. Yeah, encryption doesn’t do much good if you can spam passwords until you get in.

Did you try running in compatibility mode for the OS the game was released on?

EDIT: Abby and others concerned about privacy, I’m sure all your concerns could be addressed by actually reading the EULA and disabling what you don’t like in settings.

EDIT 2: This reddit thread talks about some stuff to disable/remove.

Another one to disable.

restoring computer back to factory new does change the OS… talked to a friend and whenever you update even if you update the OS it has to create a restore point… and restoring to factory new is pretty much the computer right after its been made and loaded for the first time. and this always has a restore point to it…

Please don’t pass judgement on Edge so quickly, unless you’ve actually tried it(and even then…). I haven’t tried Edge myself. The good points of a browser are in its speed, html/css/js compatibility, and features. I think Edge is pretty high on speed and features. Compatibility is not quite so high yet I don’t think.

ive been using edge and its a pretty good browser however im more comfortable with google chrome just because ive been using it for ages now…

it does have some glitches that will probably be pounded out in later updates… this is a new OS that just recently had a bunch of people start using it it will have some technical difficulties for a bit…

Did my upgrade! Pretty happy about it. Have a gaming rig myself and no issues yet. ;D