Windows 10

[Ben]

Anyone using it yet? I just saw the "get Windows 10" icon pop up in my taskbar, so they've apparently started pushing the update.

I'm probably not going to get it for my Win7 host (at least not until after the first service pack is released), but will install it on my Win8 VM. Just gotta wait till I get a new Interwebz connection. Moved all my stuff to the farm and am still on my 8gig/month 4G modem. Need to decide between data capped 15mbps satellite and the more expensive 3mbps unlimited WISP. Argh. Downside of rural living. And of course I had just started getting the 70mbps service from Cox at my condo.

Anyway, griping aside, curious on what any APSers using it think of it.

[mtnbkr]

I got the icon as well.  I signed up for it, but am not sure if I'll install the update.  I might back up my system just prior to the update so I can restore to win7 if I don't like 10.

Chris

[AJ Dual]

Running the preview on a few of my kids laptops.

Seems pretty solid, other than the lack of video drivers preventing Java from running Minecraft on some of them. And that's nobody's fault.

The Idiocracy Metro interface has been toned down, and integrated a bit better with a semi-legacy Start menu.  

Absolutely DO NOT WANT to deal with Microsoft could identity management or "free" OS with a subscription base. IMO Linux and Chromebooks are going to get a shot in the arm over this. Although I do give Microsoft props for pivoting and realizing the way things are going to at least try and keep with the commoditization of PC's, and "value" being increasingly in the cloud.

Office 365 seems to be doing well with the Corp/Infrastructure side of the biz, but I don't think the consumer base is going to want a "Googlefied" Windows.

[Ben]

Office 365 seems to be doing well with the Corp/Infrastructure side of the biz, but I don't think the consumer base is going to want a "Googlefied" Windows.

We've had that discussion in the past, and I guess I'm on the wrong side of it. Most here seemed to think that it's the bees knees wave of the future (including on the OS update side). I totally get the convenience for business and for those in the workforce who want their home systems to be 100% compatible with their business systems (I was the same way when I worked). However, I really am not a fan of the Google model even though I recognize its popularity. Also not a big fan, in general, of "everything in the cloud".

As a "purely for personal use" computer user now, a "Googlefied" (I like that term :)  ) Win10 would keep me from moving to it, at least for as long as I could hold out with Win7. After that, it might be that I move fully to Linux, or perhaps some other alternative that will be available in the future. I want to always be able to have basic functionality and availability of all the programs I use, whether I have an internet connection or not.

[Perd Hapley]

Ben, I believe the 10* becomes available in late July.

But how is it Googlefied, and what is supposed to be going on the cloud?


* Or should I be like Col. Cooper, and call it "the Centimeter"?

[Ben]

Ben, I believe the 10* becomes available in late July.

But how is it Googlefied, and what is supposed to be going on the cloud?


* Or should I be like Col. Cooper, and call it "the Centimeter"?

Ah, somehow I thought the icon was for early downloads. I didn't click on it yet because I didn't want to accidentally use up data on any kind of auto-download.

[Brad Johnson]

Clicking on the icon gets you a "Reserve your copy" message, plus a whole slew of Hey Look At This!! marketing blab.

Brad

[Perd Hapley]

Can anyone elaborate on some of the reservations about 10 that have been broached? I think someone mentioned a subscription model, which doesn't apply to 10. It will not be on a subscription basis. As for the cloud stuff, what is going to be cloudefied? I tend to like my clouds in the sky, and made of water.

I was planning to switch both of my home's computers to 10 as soon as it was available, but now I'm thinking I might just do the laptop. This desktop box is a few years old. I think I might wait several months, save up some cash, upgrade the mobo and processor, and activate this copy of 7 on the new system. Then I can have my free OS on a fairly recent machine.

[BryanP]

What I see of 10 I've liked.  It mostly seems to fulfill the promise of "10 is to 8 as 7 was to Vista". 

That said, no way am I diving in right off the bat.  I'll let other people beta test for at least 3 months before I move the Win 8.1 laptop to it.  Then after playing with that for a while I'll consider updating my Win7 HTPC to it. 

[AJ Dual]

Can anyone elaborate on some of the reservations about 10 that have been broached? I think someone mentioned a subscription model, which doesn't apply to 10. It will not be on a subscription basis. As for the cloud stuff, what is going to be cloudefied? I tend to like my clouds in the sky, and made of water.

I was planning to switch both of my home's computers to 10 as soon as it was available, but now I'm thinking I might just do the laptop. This desktop box is a few years old. I think I might wait several months, save up some cash, upgrade the mobo and processor, and activate this copy of 7 on the new system. Then I can have my free OS on a fairly recent machine.

No, it's the baby-steps into that model. Which really started with 8. The whole wizard that tries... rather hard... to get you to sign in and link your desktop identity to a microsoft account. I get the benefits of it, microsoft's cloud services/Live etc. acting like a pseudo-domain controller for home and individual users who don't have one, but I deal with that all day at work, I don't want to potentially be forced into dealing with password recovery issues, or connectivity issues to reach the desktop at home. (Yes, it should work offline just fine, but there's scenarios where  you can be screwed..)

[Phyphor]

For those of you who want to check out the Windows 10 preview on a virtual machine (or a real machine you're willing to test it out on:)

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/preview-iso

Don't bother registering, just skip to the ISO download.

Keep in mind that this *is* a preview version, so not 100% ready for prime time.  It'll just give you an idea of where they're heading with this & how things are laid out now.

[erictank]

What I see of 10 I've liked.  It mostly seems to fulfill the promise of "10 is to 8 as 7 was to Vista". 

That said, no way am I diving in right off the bat.  I'll let other people beta test for at least 3 months before I move the Win 8.1 laptop to it.  Then after playing with that for a while I'll consider updating my Win7 HTPC to it. 

Reserving early gets you a copy to download, which you may then install at your leisure.

[Hawkmoon]

What I see of 10 I've liked.  It mostly seems to fulfill the promise of "10 is to 8 as 7 was to Vista". 

That said, no way am I diving in right off the bat.  I'll let other people beta test for at least 3 months before I move the Win 8.1 laptop to it.  Then after playing with that for a while I'll consider updating my Win7 HTPC to it. 

But ... what is 10 to 7?

I still have one notebook and one desktop running on XP. The notebook is old enough that I'll leave it alone, since it rarely gets used. The desktop will be migrated to 7 using the second of an upgrade 3-pack I bought while they were still available. My newer desktop and notebooks are on 7 and I can deal with that, although I still prefer to run them using the "Windows Classic" interface, and I use a non-Microsoft alternate for the new Windows Explorer.

I currently also use a computer on the state's network when I'm on-site at the field office for a large state construction project. I think it's instructive that the state has standardized on Windows 7 and has no plans to migrate to 8 or 8.1.

I'm skeptical about 10. And ... whatever happened to 9?

[Brad Johnson]

I wonder if 10 is going to suffer the software fubars of 8. By that I mean having to repurchase or seriously upgrade apps that ran hunky dory in XP/7 but barfed a big hairy furball in 8.

Brad

[41magsnub]

I'm skeptical about 10. And ... whatever happened to 9?

7 ate it

[TechMan]

I'm skeptical about 10. And ... whatever happened to 9?

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/191279-why-is-it-called-windows-10-not-windows-9

TL;DR

Alternative theories for skipping Windows 9

First, an ExtremeTech reader called Benny sent an email to say that the number 9 is considered unlucky in Japan. Microsoft has a big enough presence in Japan that it may have skipped Windows 9 to avoid any weirdness or ill will. Benny says that Trend Micro — a Japanese company — did the same thing a few years ago when it skipped version 9 of its antivirus software.

Second, someone purporting to be a Microsoft developer posted this comment on Reddit:




As dumb and yet amazing as this sounds, it is actually quite feasible that there are still a lot of legacy Desktop apps that use this method (or something similar) to check for Windows 95 or 98. Bear in mind that this is just an example piece of code — some developers will check for the OS name (“Windows…”), some will check for the version number (as discussed in the previous section of this story), and some may use other methods entirely to find out what OS the app is running on.

[Hawkmoon]

As dumb and yet amazing as this sounds, it is actually quite feasible that there are still a lot of legacy Desktop apps that use this method (or something similar) to check for Windows 95 or 98. Bear in mind that this is just an example piece of code — some developers will check for the OS name (“Windows…”), some will check for the version number (as discussed in the previous section of this story), and some may use other methods entirely to find out what OS the app is running on.

That actually does make a certain amount of sense. But ... then what happens when 10 is done and it's time to move on to 11? Can't have a new version that begins with "1," so does that mean we now jump in tens, and the replacement for 10 will have to be 20?

[Brad Johnson]

The precedent has been set to incorporate two- or four-digit comparators so no worries for 'teens versions (even though MS claims this "will be the last version of Windowz").

It's like the millinium software scare. Four-digit year codes became the norm after people figured out traditional two digit year codes were teh badz.

Brad

[lee n. field]

The precedent has been set to incorporate two- or four-digit comparators so no worries for 'teens versions (even though MS claims this "will be the last version of Windowz).

It's like the millinium software scare. Four-digit year codes became the norm after people figured out traditional two digit year codes were teh badz.

Brad

My first computer's OS encoded years using a 2 bit offset from 1980.  That's thinking ahead.

[Hawkmoon]

My first computer's OS encoded years using a 2 bit offset from 1980.  That's thinking ahead.

And the original IBM PC could not recognize anything beyond 640K of RAM because, after all, nobody would ever need more than that.

[Fitz]

http://www.extremetech.com/computing/191279-why-is-it-called-windows-10-not-windows-9

TL;DR

Alternative theories for skipping Windows 9

First, an ExtremeTech reader called Benny sent an email to say that the number 9 is considered unlucky in Japan. Microsoft has a big enough presence in Japan that it may have skipped Windows 9 to avoid any weirdness or ill will. Benny says that Trend Micro — a Japanese company — did the same thing a few years ago when it skipped version 9 of its antivirus software.

Second, someone purporting to be a Microsoft developer posted this comment on Reddit:




As dumb and yet amazing as this sounds, it is actually quite feasible that there are still a lot of legacy Desktop apps that use this method (or something similar) to check for Windows 95 or 98. Bear in mind that this is just an example piece of code — some developers will check for the OS name (“Windows…”), some will check for the version number (as discussed in the previous section of this story), and some may use other methods entirely to find out what OS the app is running on.

the dev quoted in your thing is correct

[Phyphor]

Yup.  Generally, the Win32 API was such a complete *mess* that "anything goes" wasn't merely a saying....

So, checking for version numbers.... Let's just decide to check for a certain string and not actually query the version number, shall we?

Garbage coding practices led to garbage code.

[Perd Hapley]

Microsoft's marketing explanation is that 10 lets you know the new OS is not just an improved 8.

[Hawkmoon]

Microsoft's marketing explanation is that 10 lets you know the new OS is not just an improved 8.

So you can run a desktop computer as if it's a desktop computer, rather than having to pretend it's the world's most awkward tablet?

[HeroHog]

So you can run a desktop computer as if it's a desktop computer, rather than having to pretend it's the world's most awkward tablet?

That is the best quote EVAR! May I share it with the world? PLEASE?