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Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

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Re: Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

#561

Post by wirybeige »

database64128 wrote: post #363
0rdinal wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I daily drive Ubuntu, the user experience is comparable (in many cases better) to Windows 11. The only sticking point for me is display drivers. HDR on Wayland is barely functional (in my experience), and getting things like hardware accelerated AV1 encoding, full Vulkan API support etc to work has been extremely difficult. Every time I login using a Wayland desktop, only my main monitor is detected and it defaults t…

> Every time I login using a Wayland desktop, only my main monitor is detected and it defaults to 60hz. I have to go through a whole process of unplugging the "undetected" monitors and plugging them back in. Are you using GNOME? mutter has this problem where it does not retry commit on the next CRTC: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/mutter/-/issues/3833 . If this is actually what's happening on your system, switching t…

GNOME has both color management and color representation protocols implemented. HDR works fine on it

Re: Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

#562

Post by maples37 »

avhception wrote: post #274
eadmund wrote: post #200

If customers keep trying to do something … let them do it? Charge them to do it? It’s crazy to me: folks quite clearly want to run Windows 11 without an account. What is it worth to Microsoft let someone do that? $12? $144? $1,728?

That's a bit like asking to get a "smart" TV without the spyware / adware. Sure, you could pay more! But they can also just take both your money and that other money. What are you gonna do, buy a non-"smart" TV? :)

I recently bought a Samsung television, which came with a bunch of the smart nonsense. During the whole setup process I was thinking "I have made a mistake, I need to return this ASAP" but forced myself to continue clicking "no" through the setup screens.

After about 5 minutes of setting up (never once connected to Internet), it's pretty much exactly what I wanted: a display for broadcast TV and for HDMI inputs. A pretty good one, too. The only "tricky" part was getting it to remember the last channel/input at power-on instead of going to it's "home" screen, but that was just a setting in a menu somewhere, not particularly hard to find (though I'm the kind of person that does a depth-first-search through the entire menu tree just to see what all is there).

I think the key is never letting it get a taste of internet. No internet, no ads :) The internet-related things I do want to watch (like youtube, etc) are easily accomplished through the Linux PC I have connected.

Re: Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

#564

Post by maples37 »

fransje26 wrote: post #445
ta12653421 wrote: post #441

Question out of curiosity: On todays hardware, it should be possible to run Windows in a VirtualBox on a Linux System, or am I wrong? Thinking about this to be my next setup for the next machine (in 1 or 2 years) Im mainly using corp & office software and MS dev tools - those should be useable in a virtualized Windows? Any experience?

> Any experience? Yes. As you transition to using Windows less and less, you'll get reminded more and more about how much of a pain it is to use, and how much of a Stockholm Syndrome you've developed over years of abuse. To the point that you'll be avoid Windows as much as you can. You'll be booting your system infrequently enough, that, at every boot, Windows will be unresponsively slow, hogging your CPU and your ba…

Can confirm. Daily drive Linux for software development, and have a Linux on a laptop for gaming (Silksong anyone? :D). I keep a Windows 10 partition around on the laptop for Fortnite with friends, but that's about it.

I was actually pleasantly surprised the other day, I booted into Windows for the first time in several months and it was surprisingly quiet. No nags, no bs. Just "normal" stuff like Epic Games forgetting my account again and Windows updates going on in the background.

My friend whose laptop has Windows 11, on the other hand, that was a WILD experience. Similar situation, he mostly only brings it out for gaming with friends. He also had gone several months without booting, and the system was borderline unusable. Like, the battery settings page would refuse to open until he waited for the updates to finish and rebooted. No error, just an infinite loading spinner. Windows 11 also seemed much more aggressive about hogging the laptop's Internet connection -- our laptops were both downloading Windows updates and Fortnite updates at the same time, and my Fortnite update was literally progressing at twice the speed (~200mb/sec vs his ~90mb/sec).

Anyway, all that to say, I don't miss Windows, and anytime I'm exposed to it, that attitude is constantly re-affirmed.

Re: Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

#565

Post by giancarlostoro »

mythz wrote: post #300

The best thing to happen to Linux Desktop is Windows 11, with perfect timing too as modern Linux has been a joy to use as a daily driver. Normally I'd be unhappy when a sleazy corp forces me to give up on 25 years of muscle memory of using my preferred OS, but I'm thankful they gave me the push I needed to rip off the ad/spyware laced Windows Band-Aid that I only need to do once in my life. It's been over a year sinc…

It's been two to three years now for me. I'm never going back. The only time I use Windows is on employer provided hardware. If given the choice I'd rather get a Mac or be allowed to smash over Windows with Linux (which most employers wont allow anyway).

Re: Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

#567

Post by CSMastermind »

Aerroon wrote: post #187
wmf wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this change (and everything in Windows 11) is being driven by the MS Account PM watching telemetry and making number go up.

Their telemetry data didn't seem to help them figure out how important the start menu is for users. I doubt it's going to help them really do anything else either. They might have the data, but they're not using it.

I was at Microsoft during Windows 8 and the decision to remove the start menu was made with telemery data first and foremost.

"Only 3% of users regularly use the start menu." was the justification.

Then they did a bunch of research with eye tracking software to justify the new 'start screen' saying that it was actually better for users who do use the start menu because they were able to locate an item on the full sceeen overlay faster than the traditional start menu.

Re: Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

#568

Post by MartijnBraam »

typpilol wrote: post #12
Havoc wrote: post #7

Had to edit a .docx today to refresh my CV today...and realised oh...I don't have any more windows machines on hand anymore. Interesting how smoothly that faded away psychologically after 20+ years of windows use without me even overtly noticing. Think MS is in for a rough ride on Windows. Short of corporate world - Excel/Sharpoint/AD - there is just no moat. Browsers work fine on all platforms, dev work is better on…

They've been saying this for years now. The problem is there's no real alternative. Your grandma is not going to use Linux. So the choice is between windows and mac.. and the truth is a lot of apps people use are windows only. I don't see windows losing desktop share anytime soon.

I'll have you know my grandma was using Linux just fine... was certainly a lot easier than windows changing random UI elements every time.

Re: Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without MS account

#569

Post by phatfish »

naldb wrote: post #344
mythz wrote: post #300

The best thing to happen to Linux Desktop is Windows 11, with perfect timing too as modern Linux has been a joy to use as a daily driver. Normally I'd be unhappy when a sleazy corp forces me to give up on 25 years of muscle memory of using my preferred OS, but I'm thankful they gave me the push I needed to rip off the ad/spyware laced Windows Band-Aid that I only need to do once in my life. It's been over a year sinc…

The best thing to happen to Linux Desktop is not that it has improved but that its biggest competitor has dropped the ball? That’s not really praising it.

I think it has improved significantly. For the last few years KDE has been great and getting more polished.

The pain points are nothing worse than the crap Windows 11 throws at you. The only difference for the average person is that their go to tech support person might not know Linux. And paid support options like the India call centre stuff that gets thrown in with a laptop purchase for a month or so doesn't exist for Linux.

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