Windows 10 **FORCED** OS updates -- thoughts?

[The Traveler]

Something I've been posting around a bit, here's an excerpt from the Win10 EULA:

"Finally, we will access, disclose and preserve personal data, including your content (such as the content of your emails, other private communications or files in private folders), when we have a good faith belief that doing so is necessary to:
1.comply with applicable law or respond to valid legal process, including from law enforcement or other government agencies;
2.protect our customers, for example to prevent spam or attempts to defraud users of the services, or to help prevent the loss of life or serious injury of anyone;
3.operate and maintain the security of our services, including to prevent or stop an attack on our computer systems or networks; or
4.protect the rights or property of Microsoft, including enforcing the terms governing the use of the services – however, if we receive information indicating that someone is using our services to traffic in stolen intellectual or physical property of Microsoft, we will not inspect a customer’s private content ourselves, but we may refer the matter to law enforcement."

I find this fairly disturbing. While I understand it's mostly intended to fight piracy of their products, it bothers me that my PC would be "an open book" to MicroSoft. I also question the procedures that MicroSoft would employ to determine a "good faith belief" of wrongdoing. Regardless, it's thrown a cold towel over my plans to upgrade to Win10 ...

In all fairness, you can opt out of some of this crap that you will have involuntarily been opted in to. All it takes is wading through 13 pages (yes 13 pages!) of privacy/security settings and then erase your MicroSoft account. You then create a brand new one WITHOUT all the personal data Win10 sent out.

[chk071]

Edit: Nevermind, HPC, no interest...

[The Traveler]

Ah, messed up my original post ... sorry for the trash ...

[The Traveler]

chk071 posted: "Yes, a terrorists privacy should be respected. Evil, evil Microsoft.

But seriously, what exactly are you scared of? That people browse your private stuff for fun? Well, i'm sure there are loads discussions in HPC on the topic already... don't forget that any secret service in the world will be able to monitor your phone calls if they want to. And you won't even notice or have accepted any EULA which allows that sort of thing."

chk071, It's simple for me. I value my privacy. There is no being "scared" of anything more than M$ taking yet more liberties with my personal property. After 20+ years in IT, (yes, I'm one of those old skool, beardie-weirdie UNIX guys) I will tell you this, if you give people the opportunity to compromise you, they will. The biggest risk is the folks inside a system, not those outside. However, that being said, if you want to consider the sheer "hackability" of the Windows OS over the years, I'd consider that a security risk too. 95% of Windows users won't care. But then again, I see a new iMac in my future anyway.

Cheers.

[BMoore]

Something I've been posting around a bit, here's an excerpt from the Win10 EULA:

"Finally, we will access, disclose and preserve personal data, including your content (such as the content of your emails, other private communications or files in private folders), when we have a good faith belief that doing so is necessary to:
1.comply with applicable law or respond to valid legal process, including from law enforcement or other government agencies;
2.protect our customers, for example to prevent spam or attempts to defraud users of the services, or to help prevent the loss of life or serious injury of anyone;
3.operate and maintain the security of our services, including to prevent or stop an attack on our computer systems or networks; or
4.protect the rights or property of Microsoft, including enforcing the terms governing the use of the services – however, if we receive information indicating that someone is using our services to traffic in stolen intellectual or physical property of Microsoft, we will not inspect a customer’s private content ourselves, but we may refer the matter to law enforcement."

I find this fairly disturbing. While I understand it's mostly intended to fight piracy of their products, it bothers me that my PC would be "an open book" to MicroSoft. I also question the procedures that MicroSoft would employ to determine a "good faith belief" of wrongdoing. Regardless, it's thrown a cold towel over my plans to upgrade to Win10 ...

In all fairness, you can opt out of some of this crap that you will have involuntarily been opted in to. All it takes is wading through 13 pages (yes 13 pages!) of privacy/security settings and then erase your MicroSoft account. You then create a brand new one WITHOUT all the personal data Win10 sent out.

Why are you all such idiots...

https://www.reddit.com/r/YouShouldKnow/ ... ll/ctlowdk

[The Traveler]

BMoore, you pick your sources, I'll pick mine. But then, I won't label you an "idiot" for your choices. I see nothing in your citation that I would consider "authoritative". Oh, it's interesting, and it's probably accurate to some degree, but I'm sure it's not going to be the last word on it. The real clincher for me was "For the summer I've lived with my boyfriend who works for Microsoft." Uh-huh ... well, then ... hmm.

BTW, DetCord12B makes a convincing counter argument just a few post further down in her post.

I'll remain skeptical. Have a nice day.

Cheers.

[kbaccki]

You can disable automatic driver updates via Windows Update per device in Device Manager. This works in all editions of Windows.

Does that work in Win10? If so, maybe that goes at the top of the tweakers FAQ. Then for the rest of it, hope that you don't get a dodgy MS security patch, which I think have generally been problem free(?). Still have to worry about all those "optional" updates, though... I never install those.

Something as simple as a dodgy FireWire driver or USB firmware could render a $1500 audio interface unusable. Yes, I said it, at some point Microsoft screwed up FireWire for everybody.

FireWire has been a very tricky thing ever since its inception. There have been some very crappy FW chipsets that were doing things in unusual ways (not according to spec), so it's not entirely MS' fault for that.

More info: https://www.gearslutz.com/board/10737686-post58.html

Sure, hence the whole "gotta use a TI chipset" thing, right? I did not read that GS thread, but I will...

From what I remember, that MS FireWire driver debacle was specifically about throttling the FW speed down to S100 or whatever, to "protect" the end user from dodgy FW implementations. Then it would keep resetting itself if you tweaked the registry, IIRC. The solution was to rollback the driver to the one on the original install disk. Anyway. Water under the bridge, I guess. Personally, I think it was all part of a big industry conspiracy to push people to their beloved USB.

[kbaccki]

I'll remain skeptical. Have a nice day.

Personal email server (works for Hillary). Keep your stuff out of the "cloud". Make sure you don't have any cloud indexing against your local drive (I think the GoogleDrive app does this?). The Cloud can go eff itself, and take gmail and Facebook with it.

Other comments are right... NSA already has all your PCM phone calls, and the government can get whatever it needs off your machine without a warrant. If corps also want the power of warrant-less search, they can go screw. Ultimately, it is their "service", so if you agree to terms, then you agree to terms. Now, what was MS saying? Something about "OS as a service?"...

[incubus]

Are really peoply liking those flat GUI over the Aero trasparency thing??

Aero is hideous, looks cheap, trashy, kitsch is the right word

I know better than to bite at the bait, but I can't help myself

What looks better? Certainly not windows 10? It's like looking at my old palm unit.

Are you going to say mac? I don't think there is anything better looking about OSX. I just think it's a pretty bold/emotional thing to say unless there is something I don't know about

[toothnclaw]

Thoughts?

Here's mine: just use a 'disposable' XP or Linux installation for all your Internet activities, and keep your 'serious' Windows 7, 8 or 10 system completely off the Net. If you have any sensitive data, put it on a hard drive that's not visible to your XP/Linux 'Net' OS.

[eidenk]

AFAIK, but I might be wrong, Vista and above OSes deactivate themselves if they can't phone home after a certain time interval, 3 to 6 months I've heard, so keeping them permanently offline doesn't appear to be an option.

[t3toooo]

AFAIK, but I might be wrong, Vista and above OSes deactivate themselves if they can't phone home after a certain time interval, 3 to 6 months I've heard, so keeping them permanently offline doesn't appear to be an option.

They phone home for validation but they don't deactivate.

[eidenk]

Are really peoply liking those flat GUI over the Aero trasparency thing??

Aero is hideous, looks cheap, trashy, kitsch is the right word

I know better than to bite at the bait, but I can't help myself

What looks better? Certainly not windows 10? It's like looking at my old palm unit.

Are you going to say mac? I don't think there is anything better looking about OSX. I just think it's a pretty bold/emotional thing to say unless there is something I don't know about

I've got Win 7 on a laptop I bought earlier this year and I like Aero. In fact Aero is the only thing I like in this OS. As for the rest, besides full compatibility with recent software, it is one giant pile of poo-poo IMO. And since nothing is improving, to the contrary, with 8 and even more so 10, my next desktop system is gonna have to be Linux. For now I've got a persistent Knoppix Live DVD on USB flash drive that I use from time to time on either my desktop or laptop.

[t3toooo]

According to Microsoft the Win 10 updates are delivered in another form.
It's not like Win 7 which needs one update after another since the release,Win 10 makes the update process less bloated.

I for myself update the OS when i update software like Native Instruments for example,just to be sure to use the same environment.
Backward compatibility is not so much the problem.

What i can do is to read about possible update problems before connecting to the net.Other than that,updating is a never ending constantly ongoing process.
I like to go every some months online with my working machine and there are a lot of (little) improvements delivered with updates too.

[t3toooo]

As for the rest, besides full compatibility with recent software, it is one giant pile of poo-poo IMO. And since nothing is improving, to the contrary, with 8 and even more so 10, my next desktop system is gonna have to be Linux. For now I've got a persistent Knoppix Live DVD on USB flash drive that I use from time to time on either my desktop or laptop.

Win 10 is a improvement,it's snappier,faster,the core utilization is more improved,at least on my socket 2011 workstation platform,i don't know what are you talking about.

I also mainly use Ubuntu for the internet simply to reduce possible infections even with normal and save surfing.
So it's not a contradiction to use Linux but a giant time saver (in case of re-installation) and a comfortable workflow.

But even my little Asus Netbook from 2010 (coupled with a SSD) is enjoying Windows 10 and it is faster than Win 7.
It doesn't mean the CPU is faster but there are optimizations to make a better use of it.

Other than that.
There are for certain some things to turn off,like specific Apps etc, Being Win 10 is pretty new i guess soon there will be something (useful) to read about customization.
I'm certain tweaking's,like registry tweaks are unnecessary as it was with Win 7 because it is most probably weaken the system.


Btw.Win 7 in the current form isn't the same Win 7 from years ago,things are evolving,optimized and the generally backward compatibility for older hardware is just amazing,means it works much better now on older hardware than years ago but that's not only Windows but Ubuntu and i guess Apple too.

This process is called sustainability,i'm glad not to be forced anymore to buy a computer every 2-3 years because of outdated drivers.