Windows 10?

[Rick Danger]

UPGRADE, or I will CRUSH you all !

Name: Satya Narayana Nadella
Born: 19 August 1967 (age 47)
Birthplace: Hyderabad, India
Residence: Washington, United States
Citizenship: United States
Education: B.E., M.S., M.B.A.
Alma mater: Manipal Institute of Technology (B.E.)
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (M.S.)
University of Chicago Booth School of Business (M.B.A.)
Occupation: CEO of Microsoft Corporation
Employer: Microsoft Corporation
Salary: $17.5 million (with per annum stock grant and bonus)
Religion: Hinduism

[Rick Danger]

[9876543210]

a435843,

Originally Posted by a435843

Your plan works for the Insider Program, not the full version coming out Wednesday, the so called "free" "upgrade". (Lot of quotes when talking about MS.) There's no dual boot either, without purchasing a full second license for 10 (I'm not sure if 10 Pro is necessary as well, but probably not.)

This "deal" is a one-for-one trade only, 10 on top of the 7 or 8.1 installation only, an "in place" upgrade, not a installation from scratch, unfortunately. As I said, you may wish to uninstall and reinstall apps before and after the install, for safety's sake.

If she's OK with being on the Insider Program indefinitely, which isn't advisable since some on PC Magazine's site said that the Insider Program install wiped out a number of old applications, then a dual boot might work. Also, there's the forced updates, possibly on an earlier schedule than regular Home users.

OK, well, I think that answers that. She must have a reliable machine and, at least in my experience, Win 10 isn't reliable enough for her. The last thing I need is her calling every 10 minutes asking where this is and that went.

Wonder if they ever fixed the disappearing Start button?

[9876543210]

I'm thinking, just for the heck of it, I should swap the Win 10 drive back into my laptop, update it and then see if the Start button has returned. If it still doesn't return I'll just reinstall the Win 7 drive.

This Win 10 rollout really should be interesting to watch. I can just imagine what might happen if tens of thousands (or more) of machines start losing their start menu's and start buttons. And then people can't roll back to 7 or 8.

Seems MS is taking one hell of a chance on a POS OS. This may well be the beginning of the end if something major hasn't changed in the last couple of weeks.

[9876543210]

a435843,

Originally Posted by a435843

The disappearing Start Menu is one of those errors which MS historically has been good about, while other vendors, not so much.

If I get some time in the next few days I'll stick the Win 10 drive in and see what happens. Had it in a little while back and the Start Menu/Start button being gone was still a problem.

But, they're flying by the seat of their pants on this one...just get something out the door so they can make their too little, too late play for app developers. If random, big f-ups like the one you described becomes the rule, rather the exception over the next month or so, for the users who accepted the "free" "upgrade" (love those quotes), this will be a debacle, fast.

It does make you wonder. How in the world can they release something which still needs so much work? And so much basic work. I mean, what happens to potentially millions of people if their Start buttons/Start menus disappear fairly quickly? People who are just average users?

One would think that, if anything, the MS team should have a pretty good idea of how to keep the Start button and menu right where its always been. But if, all of a sudden, it starts disappearing and people can't get it back quickly then I can see how people will abandon Win 10 and never return. Sending MS into one hell of a PR problem which will really damage their reputation.

One hell of a risk if you ask me. Don't think I'd do that if I was CEO.

Now one thing I have heard in the past week is that MS has confirmed that people who install 10, can go back to 7 or 8.1, if necessary (such as the damn thing doesn't work, or they can't find anything, or it doesn't support any hardware, etc., etc.), if the following is true:

1. They have installation media, including "system restore" discs from vendors, for the original OS. This might be an issue if people don't make them when they receive their PC, or use a system imaging product...most don't. Those users will have to contact the vendor if that's the case. They're usually free or available for a small charge, but there's shipping charges, and waiting time. Then, of course, the fun of reinstalling an OS, all the apps, etc.

Heh, heh. Got a bit of a chuckle out of that. Maybe your experience is different than mine, but I could probably count on one hand how many people have the System Restore disks. Almost nobody ever made them and most people, when I ask if they have them, stare blankly at me.


Luckily (maybe half the time if the HD is still usable), the hidden partition is still there.




And one other observation.


Mostly back on Win 7 now. Started the machine earlier today and surprise, surprise! The Win 10 nag is back! What! I thought I hid that! So uninstalled it, rebooted and went back to Win Update to hide it again. Will it show up again?

[sandhunter]

MS tech department will definitely be working overtime for a while if they aren't all ready and all the companies making apps for 10 , 3 more days till the fun begins , my 1 computer that is eligible and that I deleted the update on , I will not be turning on for a while .

[Rick Danger]

I gleaned this from InfoWorld Tech Watch. Woody Leonhard appears to be someone you should pay attention to if you want the straight scoop on what's going on with Microsoft.

What's particularly frightening about this article is the reported problem with a Windows 10 update hit one of their strategic products: the Surface 3 line of tablets. The over-hyped challenger to the iPod empire. If Windows 10 BOMBS one of their top products, what can users of non-Microsoft hardware look forward to ? Can you imagine your new Surface Pro 3 tablet you bought for work or supplied by your company suddenly turning into a useless paperweight ?

Note the new term: ramrodding................

And we haven't even gotten to the start of the heavy rolllout efforts.

So we can look forward to the ol' "1-2-3 strikes YOU'RE OUT"; Unannounced "updates", NO technical details that can help you remediate an update failure, and NO WAY to escape repeated, failed attempts to apply the same update everytime you reboot your device - assuming your machine CAN reboot after the update's first pass. A rather unpalatable combination of events to look forward to.

Firmware update for Surface 3, Surface Pro 3 triggers error 0x80246013

There are also reports the undocumented update to Windows 10 build 10240 causes an error with the Surface Pro 2

Woody Leonhard - Senior Contributing Editor
InfoWorld.com - Jul 24, 2015

An undocumented firmware update is causing problems for Surface users. First reported by Brad Sams at Neowin, Windows 10 build 10240 users (and possibly others) were offered System Firmware Update - ‎7/‎23/‎2015 on their Surface Pro 3, Surface 3, and possibly Surface Pro 2 machines. On some (but not all) of the machines the update triggers an Error 0x80246013, then rolls back.

Those users running Windows 10 have no option to block the update -- it comes through Windows Update and is thus subject to the new ramrodding rules -- so the firmware update keeps trying to re-install.

Apparently the new Intel HD 5000 drivers install in the same update session. One user, uxo22, reports a confounding combination on Neowin:

My system with 10240 just crashed after update, now it will not boot, citing Video_Scheduler_Internal_error.

I can find no mention of the new firmware update. The Surface Pro 3 update history page doesn't list a firmware update for July; its last update was for June 23. That's led to some speculation that the error customers are encountering today is from the June 23 firmware update, but the error messages are clearly labelled "System Firmware Update - ‎7/‎23/‎2015."

My guess -- and it's only a guess -- is that this firmware update is intended for Windows 8.1 machines, to pave the way for Windows 10. I'd also guess that, if the firmware update is installed on a machine already running the Windows 10 Technical Preview, the installer dies with a 0x80246013.

That's really not a horrible outcome -- with three exceptions. First, if it's tied in with a video driver crash, the machine could end up bricked. Second, Microsoft hasn't documented a bloody thing as best I can tell. Third, if you can't block the update in Windows 10, your machine may be doomed to repeat the whole process every time you reboot.


Woody Leonhard writes computer books, primarily about Windows and Office; he's currently working on the Win 10 follow-up to the thousand-page "Windows 8.1 All-in-One for Dummies." A self-described "Windows victim," Woody specializes in telling the truth about Windows in a way that won't put you to sleep.

[Rick Danger]

[Rick Danger]

According to Woody Leonhard at InfoWorld, Microsoft Windows 10 build 10240 is very close to being what will be pushed out July 29th. Hence his article, "Where Windows 10 stands right now" is useful reading.

http://www.infoworld.com/article/291...l#tk.ifw-infsb

[Rick Danger]

Woody Leonhard at InfoWorld referenced this article by Gregg Keizer on the ComputerWorld.com website.


Recent pair of security updates illustrate how opaque the new OS's updates may be for users

By Gregg Keizer (gkeizer@computerworld.com)
Computerworld - Jul 20, 2015 9:29 AM PT

Microsoft last week demonstrated how much of a black box a Windows 10 update may be to the millions of users expected to upgrade to the new operating system.

The Redmond, Wash. company has served two updates to Windows 10 devices running the July 15 preview build 10240, which most believe will be almost identical to what Microsoft launches next week when the free upgrade program launches.

Identified as KB3074663 and KB3074665, the second of the pair was announced Friday by Gabriel Aul, engineering general manager for Microsoft's OS group, on Twitter. "We're releasing an update package on WU [Windows Update] for PC build 10240 today. It will install automatically or you can check for updates to grab it," Aul tweeted. Minutes later, he added, "It will be described as a security update, but that's just because it's cumulative and includes the last package's security fix."

Microsoft said only a bit more than that on the support document linked to KB3074665. "Microsoft has released a security advisory about vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash Player in Internet Explorer," the document stated. "Additionally, this update includes non-security-related changes to enhance the functionality of Windows 10 through new features and improvements."

Although there was a smattering of replies to Aul's tweets from users complaining about problems after installing KB3074665, and some messages about issues on the Windows 10 support forum, they were neither pervasive nor a surprise: Any given update typically generates some such reports.

However, Aul did acknowledge that a bug in the OS's networking stack -- which caused Wi-Fi troubles for some -- is known and would be patched.

The first update, KB3074663, was released July 15, and was also marked as a security update. "The vulnerability could allow elevation of privilege if the Windows Installer service incorrectly runs custom action scripts," said the accompanying support document. Like its follow-up, KB3074663 also used the phrase "This update includes non-security-related changes to enhance the functionality of Windows 10 through new features and improvements."

What may disturb veteran and advanced Windows users is the paucity of information about the contents of KB3074663 and KB3074665 other than the security-related components. The phrase "includes non-security-related changes to enhance the functionality of Windows 10 through new features and improvements" could cover a host of changes across wide spectrums of the OS.

For editions prior to Windows 10, Microsoft identifies non-security updates separately, each with its own support document -- a "KB" in Microsoft's parlance -- even though the accompanying descriptions are often as terse as a tweet.

It's not clear whether the bundling of multiple changes related to both security and non-security issues into single updates will continue with the production version of Windows 10 -- those running Windows 10 Home, for instance, who will receive updates automatically through the Windows Update service -- or will remain a Windows Insider-only practice.

Insider, the beta test program Microsoft launched in October 2014 and will continue after the official launch next week, has been billed as the "branch" -- a Microsoft term for one of its four release, update and upgrade channels -- that receives changes first and for some, at a furious pace.

But customers are already nervous about the take-it-or-leave-it, minus the leaving, that Microsoft plans for updates to Windows 10 Home, and other SKUs (stock-keeping units) that adopt its "Current Branch" (CB).

"So what happens if an update causes an unknown issue on a system used for business?" asked David Ogg in a comment appended to a Computerworld news story last week about the automatic updates. "What does that person do? Are we forced to install this bad update? This has happened before."

Skepticism of freely-flowing updates won't be helped by Microsoft's tight lips about what's inside each.

But users shouldn't be surprised: Microsoft has been on a less-information kick for months now in a campaign that some experts have linked to layoffs that hit the company's security staff last year.

In January, Microsoft shut down the public advance notification service for impending security updates, limiting the alerts and information to major customers who pay for premium support. Before that, it had dumped a monthly webcast that went through the most recent updates in detail, and closed the Trustworthy Computing security group.

The dearth of information in Microsoft's update descriptions, particularly about what fit the firm's "non-security-related changes to enhance the functionality of Windows 10" phrasing, may be more than distressing to users who want details.

That's because Windows 10 includes the ability to uninstall updates, or at least those marked as security updates. The feature is tucked under "Advanced options" on the Windows Update panel. When that's clicked or touched, followed by "View your update history," which appears in the next screen, the option "Uninstall updates" manifests. Click or touch that and a Windows 7-esque window pops up showing the updates eligible for deleting. On a PC running build 10240 of Windows 10 Pro, the only listed were KB3074663 and KB3074665.

Without a clear idea of what other changes are in an individual update, users will be hard pressed to know whether uninstalling the update will cause glitches, either immediately or down the road, in the non-security arena.

And that's the crux of the problem with Windows 10. Previous editions of Windows have clearly demarked security from non-security updates, albeit with little more information than KB3074663 or KB3074665 provided. The difference is that the bulk of updates for Windows 8 and 8.1, and nearly all for Windows 7, have been, if not a vulnerability patch, then a bug fix of some kind. But rarely, if ever, new features and functionality.

The addition of the latter categories makes updates even more opaque, even more difficult to swallow by users who want to know exactly what Microsoft is putting on their machines. Microsoft has removed much of the control over updates that users once enjoyed: The only options remaining to them in Windows 10 Home are when the system reboots and whether they receive updates immediately or later. By not revealing an update's complete content, the company is walking further down a path that some already refuse to take.

And that's bad for Windows 10.


Gregg Keizer covers Microsoft, security issues, Apple, Web browsers and general technology breaking news for Computerworld.