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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

#781

Post by bigyabai »

labrador wrote: post #709

I guess I'll be the contrarian in the thread: My main machine is Windows 11. I recently bought a refurbished laptop to make it a Linux torrenting machine with ProtonVPN. I first installed Fedora, which I hated. Where's the mininmize window button? Why are scrollbars practically invisible? What's with the hideous cartoonish desktop? I switched to Ubuntu, which I'm more familiar with. Installing ProtonVPN was an absolu…

> What's with the hideous cartoonish desktop?

Have have you used a version of macOS made in the past 5 years? Fischer-Price is the new Jony Ive.

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

#782

Post by mrmuagi »

noirscape wrote: post #604
tombert wrote: post #585

I doubt it’s going to happen, but a part of me prays that people will eventually get sick Microsoft’s increasing bullshit and it really can become the Year of the Linux Desktop. Gnome has genuinely gotten pretty great in the last couple years, and I think a lot of former Windows would genuinely like it if they gave it a chance, and virtually any Linux you install will have less tracking bullshit than Windows. I suspe…

I think people will sooner just start hard breaking Windows ISOs just to get rid of MS's garbage (arguably already the case if you use Rufus, which customizes the OOBE setup to already reject checks and tracking if you tick the boxes. They also have a checkbox to iirc disable the TPM check that's killing a lot of older device support because there's nothing in W11 that actually relies on a TPM, it's just an artificia…

Is not supporting TPM an issue in terms of some app compability though? I was investigating whether to upgrade an old computer from windows 10 to 11 and that was said somewhere online. I don't know if its true or fearmongering.

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

#783

Post by brendoelfrendo »

tombert wrote: post #585

I doubt it’s going to happen, but a part of me prays that people will eventually get sick Microsoft’s increasing bullshit and it really can become the Year of the Linux Desktop. Gnome has genuinely gotten pretty great in the last couple years, and I think a lot of former Windows would genuinely like it if they gave it a chance, and virtually any Linux you install will have less tracking bullshit than Windows. I suspe…

I could maybe convince my wife to move to Linux, but she's a full-time student and some of the EDU spyware for remote learning won't run on Linux. Most of it supports Mac, but she's not a Mac person either and I don't really see much advantage in trying to get her to be one. For at least the near term, we need to have a Windows PC somewhere in the house so she can get her work done.

Much has been said about this before, but much as I would like to see a year of the Linux desktop, what I think we're going to see is a situation where other software vendors will increasingly hook into these bullshit "features" and people will continue to use what is pushed out to them even as it gets worse and worse out of necessity. Companies see Microsoft squeezing as much value out of a customer as possible, and they want in; that means less control, more tracking, more ads, online activation, centralized accounts, etc.

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

#785

Post by tombert »

Exoristos wrote: post #717
tombert wrote: post #585

I doubt it’s going to happen, but a part of me prays that people will eventually get sick Microsoft’s increasing bullshit and it really can become the Year of the Linux Desktop. Gnome has genuinely gotten pretty great in the last couple years, and I think a lot of former Windows would genuinely like it if they gave it a chance, and virtually any Linux you install will have less tracking bullshit than Windows. I suspe…

As someone who's used Linux on the desktop (mostly Ubuntu) daily for about 15 years, I still couldn't conscientiously recommend it except to tech hobbyists or for limited use cases. It's shinier than ever but still a mess.

I think it’s generally pretty ok for people who primarily just browse the web.

My grandmother, who doesn’t know anything about computers at all, runs Linux Mint. She primarily uses Chrome, and someone set her up with Thunderbird and LibreOffice and she’s been totally fine with that. Keep in mind, this computer is old. When she bought it, it had Windows Vista installed and she’s still getting some life out of it.

I think Linux is in a weird place, where it’s great for people who know a lot about computers or nothing about computers. If all you do is browse the web and write email, Linux is perfectly capable for pretty much anyone. If you’re a software engineer, Linux has a lot of useful utilities and is perfectly ok to debug and fix.

The worst case is someone like my dad, who is kind of in the “prosumer Windows” camp. He doesn’t know a lot about computers but he knows enough to where he would want to dig down and change stuff, and doing that he would have to relearn everything from scratch if he moved to Linux.

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

#786

Post by AlexandrB »

AmazingTurtle wrote: post #401
Luker88 wrote: post #400

Sure, Evil Microsoft. But Apple is the one that normalized this. ...Like the developer account for mobile ...Like "sideloading" And this is why this things should have been fought much harder from the beginning. These companies are merely copying what the other is getting away with.

can you please stop your whataboutism

That's a pretty uncharitable take. Parent wasn't defending Microsoft and it's worth recognizing that this move is part of a general pattern on the part of "big tech".

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

#787

Post by SubiculumCode »

jcalvinowens wrote: post #736
Night_Thastus wrote: post #598

My biggest annoyance is that I specifically bought a Windows 11 license, from the MS store, using my MS account. I did this because I assumed that if something went wrong, I would always be able to recover it. I could never 'lose' the key if it was tied to my account. Well unfortunately, MS screwed me. When I upgraded my PC I was apparently supposed to transfer the license before deleting the old PC from my account.…

> When I upgraded my PC I was apparently supposed to transfer the license before deleting the old PC from my account. Doing it in the wrong order lost the license forever - no way to transfer it. This happened to me too! It's absolutely insane that a license I bought through my account can't be transferred somehow... My newest NUC is somehow recognized by Windows 11 as being entitled to a copy, and I can reinstall on…

I run Linux at home too. Its annoying, but I sometimes need to run Windows in a WM for Word, as the online version is crap on large complex documents where formatting matters, and interoperability with colleagues keeps me from using LibreOffice Write.

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

#788

Post by voidmain0001 »

jcalvinowens wrote: post #736
Night_Thastus wrote: post #598

My biggest annoyance is that I specifically bought a Windows 11 license, from the MS store, using my MS account. I did this because I assumed that if something went wrong, I would always be able to recover it. I could never 'lose' the key if it was tied to my account. Well unfortunately, MS screwed me. When I upgraded my PC I was apparently supposed to transfer the license before deleting the old PC from my account.…

> When I upgraded my PC I was apparently supposed to transfer the license before deleting the old PC from my account. Doing it in the wrong order lost the license forever - no way to transfer it. This happened to me too! It's absolutely insane that a license I bought through my account can't be transferred somehow... My newest NUC is somehow recognized by Windows 11 as being entitled to a copy, and I can reinstall on…

I so wish I could move to Linux, but I extensively use Windows computers via RDP and the Linux RDP clients are just so bad on my eyes. I tried Remmina, rdesktop and FreeRDP. Maybe NX would be a good option but I can't install NX on all of the computers I use. I guess I should shut-up and try to contribute to those projects to make them better.

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

#789

Post by integralid »

philipallstar wrote: post #686
observationist wrote: post #665

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies that cannot run their businesses responsibly at scale should not be allowed to run their business at that scale. If Microsoft can't do it, if Apple, Google, Facebook, X , OpenAI can't do it, then maybe we shouldn't allow companies to operate at scales which inevitably lead to widespread consumer harm. They should be required to provide human customer service, with some sort of legal liability to ensure thei…

I guess they don't want Windows to cost $10000 per licence.

Now come on. A basic level of support would not cost Microsoft $9900 - that's absurd to suggest. It may reduce their profit margins a bit, or they may have to increase the price, but it's not like Microsoft has earning problems.
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