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Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

arstechnica.com

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Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#21

Post by fidotron »

short_sells_poo wrote: post #17
yomlica8 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Telemetry shows moving the option around results in higher use of the start page thing. Every time it moves less people can find it and the uptake of the new feature improves.

It's funny (in a bad way) that all this telemetry and optimization somehow optimizes for basically antisocial behavior. If I translate what you write into plain language: "every time we upset people by deliberately altering the interface, they are forced to rediscover things and they might start using some new bullshit we want to push". Imagine if your local supermarket regularly reshuffled all the wares because this…

Your local supermarket almost certainly does do that for that reason.

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#22

Post by tetris11 »

throwaway70134 wrote: post #19
not_your_vase wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Windows is nowadays required for maybe 2 major things: games (I know, Wine is a thing, but let's be honest: it is very much still a hit or miss), and some video conference software (e.g. webex with camera). I install Windows only for job interviews. Usually I install it 2 days ahead, and keep running windows update repeatedly, until it finally finishes with everything, and I can use the system for a 30 minutes call,…

And Android ROM stuff. All the vendor-specific ROM flashing apps are Windows only and I don't have the balls to run it via Wine. Sadly not even macOS (my main system) is an option.

There are usually linux alternatives. Heimdall is a pretty good alternative to Odin

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#23

Post by nateb2022 »

gumballindie wrote: post #16
Corsome wrote: post #5

Phew. After being a Windows user for literally almost two decades I've happily migrated to Linux and couldn't be happier. Yep, it took some time to prepare but let's be frank, developers already use quite a lot of Linux/Unix tools already so why not cut the middleman and just work directly with what we need most?

Exactly. I made the switch from MacOS and couldn't be happier. The fun thing is that with Linux these days you have the option of a powerful workstation that you can upgrade be it laptop or desktop, can do gaming, and is private. The next thing for me is to "decloud" - meaning remove any and all online services that are not mission critical.

> The next thing for me is to "decloud" - meaning remove any and all online services that are not mission critical.

These are often useful, so the better option is to host your own privacy-respecting versions of these tools.

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#24

Post by JoshTriplett »

fidotron wrote: post #21
short_sells_poo wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's funny (in a bad way) that all this telemetry and optimization somehow optimizes for basically antisocial behavior. If I translate what you write into plain language: "every time we upset people by deliberately altering the interface, they are forced to rediscover things and they might start using some new bullshit we want to push". Imagine if your local supermarket regularly reshuffled all the wares because this…

Your local supermarket almost certainly does do that for that reason.

Which is one of several good reasons to never shop in person.

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#25

Post by nateb2022 »

whoitwas wrote: post #18

I'm a lifetime computer user and software engineer with a half bricked laptop caused by Windows 11. Windows wanted me to create a Microsoft account and somehow me not doing that resulted in a boot loop. I installed Linux on it and work around the Windows partition. I did lose a lot of data that's technically accessible, but too lazy.

You can extract your data from the Windows partition and then delete it entirely from the Linux side.

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#26

Post by www_harka_com »

aquir wrote: post #2

In my eyes Microsoft Edge is even more annoying. Even if you install the "business" version you still get that shitty startpage and if you log in to remote desktop that takes ages to render and then you have to a bit of time turn that "start page thing" off. And MS moves the options around all the time! Such a pain! You can't just set about:blank as an empty tab page any more.

Sure you can. This is one of the first things I do on a new install:

https://www.tenforums.com/browsers-email/167957-truly-blank-...

Edit: I have a regedit file with the value "about:blank" and it just takes a double click.

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#28

Post by 5555624 »

aquir wrote: post #2

In my eyes Microsoft Edge is even more annoying. Even if you install the "business" version you still get that shitty startpage and if you log in to remote desktop that takes ages to render and then you have to a bit of time turn that "start page thing" off. And MS moves the options around all the time! Such a pain! You can't just set about:blank as an empty tab page any more.

> You can't just set about:blank as an empty tab page any more.

For Microsoft Edge, both on my personal computers and work computer about:blank is my home page and new tab page. (Home: Edge version 115.0.1901.203; Windows Pro 22H2)

Under the "When Edge starts" setting, I select "Open these pages:" and add "about:blank"

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#29

Post by dagw »

gumballindie wrote: post #16
Corsome wrote: post #5

Phew. After being a Windows user for literally almost two decades I've happily migrated to Linux and couldn't be happier. Yep, it took some time to prepare but let's be frank, developers already use quite a lot of Linux/Unix tools already so why not cut the middleman and just work directly with what we need most?

Exactly. I made the switch from MacOS and couldn't be happier. The fun thing is that with Linux these days you have the option of a powerful workstation that you can upgrade be it laptop or desktop, can do gaming, and is private. The next thing for me is to "decloud" - meaning remove any and all online services that are not mission critical.

Yup, same here. And the sad things is that Windows was getting so close. Between WSL2, the new terminal and ssh, all the support for VSCode and better dev tools and open source language support, I was becoming a bit of Windows 'fan' and this close to seriously considering Windows 10 a fully usable developer desktop. Then they released Windows 11 and completely shit the bed.

Re: Windows 11 has made the “clean Windows install” an oxymoron

#30

Post by kouteiheika »

not_your_vase wrote: post #12
jamal-kumar wrote: post #3

Has anyone become so disillusioned with windows that they just have a windows pc sitting around collecting dust? Sometimes I still need to use some legacy program or whatever on there but I feel like the last time I booted into that thing was over a month ago now.

Windows is nowadays required for maybe 2 major things: games (I know, Wine is a thing, but let's be honest: it is very much still a hit or miss), and some video conference software (e.g. webex with camera). I install Windows only for job interviews. Usually I install it 2 days ahead, and keep running windows update repeatedly, until it finally finishes with everything, and I can use the system for a 30 minutes call,…

> Windows is nowadays required for maybe 2 major things: games (I know, Wine is a thing, but let's be honest: it is very much still a hit or miss)

I'll be honest: I find it that it's very much a hit nowadays, rather than a miss.

With Valve doing so much work around Proton I can basically buy a random Windows-only game off Steam and... it just works. I don't even remember anymore a time when a game I wanted to play didn't just work.

(Of course this doesn't include multiplayer games with anti-cheat. If you like those then yes, you still need Windows.)

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