this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2024
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[–] [email protected] 129 points 4 months ago (30 children)

At this point, I have lost count of the number of times that I've left my perfectly working Windows computer at the end of my work day, only to return to a completely broken computer that won't boot the next morning.

I find this to either be a lie or self inflicted. I manage a small fleet of a few hundred windows systems and all updates have been fine for years.

In the windows admin user groups there are more than a few that are deploying updates within 24hrs of release to thousands of servers and workstations and have not reported issues.

Lastly I think that tech bloggers say things like this to get clicks, so they can get ad revenue. Then they also tell you how to disable updates so they can get more clicks and ad revenue.

It’s disingenuous and probably harmful to be telling people to disable updates that lead them to be exposed to vulnerabilities.

[–] [email protected] 87 points 4 months ago (3 children)

I hate Windows for all the monetisation and privacy issues but I never really had problems with it killing my computer.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 4 months ago

I had a Windows 10 update fuck up my laptop for about 15 hours until it somehow magically unfucked itself and started working again once.

But thats about it

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

The primary issues that I faced with Windows (Win10 nearly a decade ago) are

  • very slow updates
  • constant 100% disk usage after boot
  • high background process usage
  • [Rare] messing with my dual partition setup
  • The final error which caused me to format my PC -> After logging in, the desktop froze, no icons showing up, no task manager.

If I had never used Linux, these wouldn't even seem like problem; just normal Windows shenanigans. But after using Linux, I can never go back. I don't know how much worse/better Win11 is now but can't be bothered to try.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 4 months ago (4 children)

It's kind of disingenuous of you to proudly say, "I don't use the same version of Windows that this person likely does and I don't have the same issues that this person does so they must be full of shit".

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

It's kind of a wide disparity for something that's so locked down, though. It's not as though one person is saying they get occasional issues and the other is they often have issues... it's one person basically saying their own personal computer is nigh unusable and the other providing an example of a large number of examples of that being extremely unlikely...

It's far more likely this individual is fucking up their computer on a regular basis, or has a very high bar of usability that is broken any time there is even the slightest hiccup or inconvenience.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 4 months ago (1 children)

That's the difference between the Home and Pro versions though. The things that generally break on the Home versions are all the things not generally enabled on a domain controlled Pro version. Thisbis more about Microsoft just being bad at small updates versus these giant roundup packages they like to ship.

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[–] [email protected] 21 points 4 months ago

The interesting thing for me is that I own two different surface pro 7 tablets. I have one for work and one for home (now that work doesn't require me to bring my own device anymore). The work surface has windows 10 pro on it. My home one doesn't, The difference is very interesting. The IT team have disabled a lot of stuff on my work surface that I don't even have access to on my home unit. I don't often have bugs from updates breaking things at work. I do at home though which is enough for me to perhaps upgrade the windows key on my home unit someday. If I don't install linux first which is a possibility.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 4 months ago (2 children)

I find this to either be a lie or self inflicted.

"I've never experienced what you describe, so it must be either imagined or your own fault."

I've seen this nonsense over and over again in communities of all kinds, most often in tech forums (where there are always a few participants suffering from a big-fish-little-pond effect). It's a very rude and foolish bit of human behavior.

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 4 months ago

It’s disingenuous and probably harmful to be telling people to disable updates that lead them to be exposed to vulnerabilities.

That is probably why Microsoft forced updates on people in W10.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 4 months ago

My two cents, I could say the same as the author. My Windows work laptop most of the times cannot wake up from sleep (you know, opening the lid after it's closed) so I have to force a restart. There's a 50% or less chance that Bluetooth and WiFi won't work at all (they won't be displayed on Windows, like it's not even a feature) after I turn the laptop on, so most of my pre-work morning is restarting the laptop until it's working as intended. It's the third laptop I got from them, they're different models but they're all HP, and they all had problems. The Macs and the same HP laptops running Linux have none of these issues.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It's not harmful to tell average people who run windows to disable updates, because you can't disable the updates as a single-license scrub.

(Theres usually some hacky bullshit to delay or block updates, but they break constantly and you have to keep finding new ones, because Microsoft thinks of their userbase as stupid babies who can't be trusted with their own hardware).

Also, you live in your own personal slice of Windows control with your hundreds/thousands of systems being managed with group policies. I have no doubt that you don't see issues, because your company chose a few models of laptop or desktop and know how they'll react to the updates. You can turn off the annoying shit, and choose specific updates at specific times. Microsoft doesn't want to piss off their corporate customers, especially the ones with massive spending contracts with Dell/HP/Lenovo.

Thing is, outside of you - and your groups of other corporate windows admins - the general user (with varied hardware/software configurations) don't have the safety of catching issues on a few test machines and delaying a deploy to the fleet, or even the option to delay updates at all, and they're screwed over constantly by random broken drivers, system setting that aren't respected between updates, and bloat/backdoors that you can't opt out of.

It is you who is being disingenuous, by suggesting that the windows update system has no flaws, because you operate in an extremely controlled environment with tons of safeguards and - ironically - way more autonomy.

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[–] [email protected] 89 points 4 months ago (8 children)
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[–] [email protected] 80 points 4 months ago (14 children)

I just got a new laptop and was genuinely gonna try windows 11 and wsl for my coding needs. But in first boot, it demands internet to do updates. Ok, I connect to coffee shop wifi. Nope, won't do it because it can't handle the click through screen to accept wifi ToS. Fine. I take it home, where my Internet is great but has a glitch where it drops out for a few seconds now and then. Turns out that windows will literally cancel updating and demand I reconnect and restart for the kind of drop that I barely notice day to day. So I gave up, plugged in my ArchLinux thumb drive, and mkfs.ext4 before rsyncing my entire old computer to it

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[–] [email protected] 70 points 4 months ago (16 children)

Let's be honest, very few people who talk about how much they hate Microsoft will even consider alternatives

[–] [email protected] 17 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (4 children)

It's not a failure to consider the alternatives that slows adoption, it is the very real material problems with those alternatives.

It's not fair that a multinational corporation gets to wield virtually limitless power to starve the alternatives of oxygen and create as much friction as possible in the process of switching, but it is a very real problem, and blaming the users won't solve anything.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 4 months ago (10 children)

Yes, because I need Adobe to do my meh wage part-time job in developing country from my one and only working laptop and I don't have the luxury of surplus money, time, and mental energy to do anything about it.

But I get your point. If I have the means, I will fix my broken Thinkpad and definitely install Linux there the first chance I get. Either that or Adobe finally release Linux version, which will probably be released after Half-Life 3.

I can't wait to try Endeavor (so I can finally be an obnoxious person who say "I used Arch^-based^ ^distro^, btw")

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Either that or Adobe finally release Linux version, which will probably be released after Half-Life 3.

Yeah, I've seen what Adobe's support looks like. I remember the Linux version of Flash Player. The guy in charge of it whined on the official Adobe blog on the subject that he had to support "minority browsers" which at the time was everything but Internet Explorer on Windows.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Most people believe they will start seeing problems where there were none before. They need to invest time into research about their use-cases, which is a cost even before switching.

The typical user used Windows since before they became scared of change, so that's what they'll stick with.

The pain of using Windows still can and will be higher without the majority of people switching to anything.

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[–] [email protected] 58 points 4 months ago (3 children)

Microsoft is constantly experimenting with how far they can push users into a corner and get away with it. There might be a day when Microsoft caves and releases a Windows that is more like what we wanted, but I imagine it's going to get a lot worse before it gets any better. We have not yet seen the worst MS has to ~~offer~~ force upon us.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago

There might be a day when Microsoft caves and releases a Windows that is more like what we wanted, but I imagine it's going to get a lot worse before it gets any better.

I thought that was going to be with Windows 10's forced updates and telemetry, but people just stopped caring. I'm pretty much assuming that'll be the same for the current batch of nonsense. I can't imagine how bad it would have to get for the general public to say "enough is enough".

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago

Just look at how bad the car industry is now. Your car spies on EVERYTHING.

Windows can still get a lot worse before we begin to see an improvement.

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[–] [email protected] 46 points 4 months ago (55 children)

It’s so weird to me that Lemmy is full of anti-Windows, anti-Google posts but the comments are always “I’m thinking about switching.”

How about… just do it?

I don’t know what I’m trying to say but being 20 years into “Windows-free” a few years of “Google-free” it’s tiring. I know everyone isn’t me but it’s tough watching this from the other side.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 4 months ago

You know it's not the same person posting every time

Some people have moved passed thinking about it. Others have just started. Its a growing sentiment and more people are starting to feel it.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 4 months ago (2 children)

It's not easy committing to the change when you have no knowledge of the platform. The status quo is always easier until it no longer is.

Having seen how different Linux is from what it was 20 years ago, it's way more approachable than it used to be. Most people could adjust pretty quickly, but with so much of the technical bits hidden from sight, the average PC user these days isn't as tech savvy as they were many years ago, and making the switch can be intimidating.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (5 children)

Linux won't work for my needs. I would switch if it did.

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[–] [email protected] 40 points 4 months ago (11 children)

I switched all of my Windows systems over to Windows 10 LTSC a few months ago, and it's been a game-changer. I still get security updates, but no advertisements, bloat, or new "features." I believe it's supported until 2032.

After that, I'll probably switch my remaining systems over to Linux, but until then, it's not half bad.

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Acceptance is the last stage of grief. You are ready to move on.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 4 months ago

It's like when people in abusive relationships suddenly realize that their partner doesn't actually care about them, and everyone around them is like "Yeah, no shit. Fucking leave their ass."

[–] [email protected] 31 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (10 children)

Thanks in party to the spirit in Lemmy (thanks guys and gals) and getting pissed off at the ever more enshittification, I really went full-on on taking back control, and I don't mean just changing my home PC (mainly used for Gaming) from Windows to Linux, but also replacing the TV Box that's bundled with my ISP subscription (and will be changing ISP when the current contract is over) with my own Mini-PC with Lubunto and Kodi (which is also my Torrenting host with an always-on VPN and my home's NAS) replacing the original Samsung Android (which had been bloated due to updates to the point of filling up all memory) of my aging tablet, with LineageOS and even doing the same on my brand new Smartphone.

Granted, I've always had the spirit of avoiding "smarts" in stuff that doesn't need it - like TVs - but now I went and as much as possible took back control on even the stuff that does need "smarts".

So far I'm quite happy with it all: I've maintained (improved, even, such as my Tablet now having more available memory) my level of Tech access whilst cutting of the ways in which companies exploited my time and patience for advertising money - I definitely feel I'm better now than before: a lot of things became more convenient and less restricted than they were before.

Things are becoming really bad out there when it comes to treating customers as cattle to be milked and I reckon that the only future were Tech is actually a pleasure to use for users is for those people who take control back from the corps on all of their devices.

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (20 children)

In Linux I wanted a window to open in a specific place on boot. Fairly simple bash script.

In Windows FUCK YOU.

With llm's you can get a lot of bad info but for Linux commands, basic tutorials and scripting Linux is WAY easier to learn nowadays.

Edit didn't mean to imply Linux is easier than Windows to learn in general.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Ask your doctor if Linux is right for you

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago (1 children)

He prescribed me a medication but when I went to get it from the pharmacy they just gave me a bunch of precursor chemicals which are just toxic if not combined in the right way. When I asked for help the pharmacist just said "RTFM"

Also, what is a comorbidity?

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[–] [email protected] 19 points 4 months ago (5 children)

It isn't your computer, user license clearly states you're renting the software. You always have been, it's just now they can enforce that agreement more readily. Microsoft is making a lot of bad decisions at the moment, but the majority of consumers really don't care - adverts and surveillance are what they grew up with.

You can switch to Linux, but as much as I love it (it's my daily driver for work and for travel gaming, oh and the community is absolutely amazing), it's not 1-1. You will have to jump through hoops sometimes to get things to run (but damn me there are amazing people out there who can and do help). Then again, you own it because it is free, and it will run most things with the right tweaks.

I can't speak for MACs (too poor to use one, my devices tend to be upgradable or VERY long life), but I hear they're a better experience in terms of less bloat/adverts. Again though, you are renting with Apple, and are largely trapped in their ecosystem, and they have a 'reputation' for lack of repairability....

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[–] hissingmeerkat 14 points 4 months ago

That's because you're the victim of a crime: extortion

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