The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible • Hacker News Board

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#141

Post by esolyt » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:45 AM UTC

natep wrote: post #131

belorn wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When disagreeing, it would benefit if the person who downvote would say what the contributions are instead of silently downvote. Hacker news arent a poll of "do you like Steve Jobs" with simple yes/no, and i am honestly interested to hear what those contributions are.

I didn't downvote because I disagreed (or agreed), but because your question seemed very accusatory and asked in bad faith, so it does not contribute to the discussion. A reworded question that made it clear you were honestly inquiring still might not get answered, but I wouldn't downvote.

That's because the question was rhetoric and its purpose was to state an opinion. Specifically, the opinion that Steve Jobs did not have significant contributions to computer industry.

So I think you downvoted an opinion.

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#142

Post by cookiecaper » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:46 AM UTC

brian_cloutier wrote: post #62

oscilloscope wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

System76 is attempting to do this. I liked the Gazelle Professional. Considering they're not an ODM, the Gazelle was pretty decent for its specs and screen when it was released. There was no bloat aside from vanilla Ubuntu, except a driver to improve the screen brightness buttons. Still though, you can always throw Ubuntu on a Thinkpad. A small company like System76 can't match the form factor and battery life of pro…

I'll second System76, I've bought laptops from them for a couple years now and never had a bad experience. They only throw in hardware that ubuntu supports and there's absolutely no bloatware. There are still things I have to put up with like Ubuntu's recent decision to use Unity, but gnome3 is a single command away.

Just to provide a counter-anecdote: I bought a Bonobo Pro from System 76 in summer 2011. After about a day of use, it failed to POST. I had to mail it back to a repair center in California. It took over a week to get the RMA information as Sys76's Customer Service has very limited hours and seems stretched pretty thin. I needed the laptop back ASAP, and System76 made me pay $80-some to get overnight shipping labels both ways so that there wouldn't be 1-2 week delays each way.

I got the system back, and it seemed to work, but now I was getting a lot of crashes. I tolerated it for a couple of months as it wasn't so severe to make the system completely unusable, but I eventually got sick of dealing with it. memtest immediately reported some severely damaged RAM, so I emailed System76 and again, after a protracted paperwork/support process, they mailed me replacement parts to install myself (the only alternative to shipping the whole laptop back off to California; the disk is encrypted, but still was not looking forward to the potential of a careless tech wiping it and another $80+ bill to make sure it got back to me within the month).

I installed the new RAM modules (and I'll say that it was quite easy to take apart, only exception being the keyboard ribbon, much better than my old MBP) and things were going better, but I still get full system hangs in 3D games. I am concerned that there is a hardware issue with the GPU. Haven't cared enough to tackle that one seriously yet, as I do most 3D stuff on my desktop, but it's really annoying.

If System76 was better with their support processes, these would not be such a big deal, but with their non-cooperation in getting shipped repairs performed and returned quickly, inability to contract out or reimburse for local repairs, long RMA processes and limited customer service availability (no weekends, hours something like 9a-4:30p Mountain), it's just not worth the hassle.

Next time I will get a powerful Dell most likely. I just wipe them immediately and put Arch on anyway, so no concerns about bloatware/spyware/whatever.

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#143

Post by bpatrianakos » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:46 AM UTC

beloch wrote: post #67

First of all, this guy's biggest mistake was failing to format his drive and start with a clean Windows install. Installing windows requires far less effort than cleansing a vendor's install of crapware. Users should not have to do this. I must fully agree that MS needs to start restricting what Vendors like HP can install on the PC's they sell. Second, I'm very curious to see how the Windows App store plays out. The…

First of all? Really? No. You should not have to for,at your hard drive when you buy a new computer. Nerds aren't the only ones buying computers and the experience the author describes isn't how you treat a customer and you should never have to tell a customer to do some inconvenient thing if they want to use their new computer without hassles.

Go tell your mom to format her hard drive and let me know what she says. I don't know about you but for most of us the answer would be "what?".

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#144

Post by pi18n » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:48 AM UTC

biturd wrote: post #73

ChuckMcM wrote: post #13

I enjoyed this rant. The bottom line is that this 'experience' isn't about you, its about who you can be sold too. That is because "you" are too cheap to pay what "we" think should be paid for them. It is like a hotel which sells you room for $100 a night if you agree to let them leave a web cam on 24/7 and sell any useful 'snippets' it catches while you are there. The bulk of the market doesn't buy "computers" they…

I think there is a company that does what you suggest. I will probably get down voted for saying it, but Apple. They put in the time to make a pretty darned good user experience for first impressions. There's no junk, no spyware, nothing to remove. Occasionally you might get a software bundle, like Office, or Quicken, but literally just drop it in the trash and you are done with it. Rarely would you have to find an u…

I am an Apple user, and the Apple experience has jumped off a cliff for developers. What you are talking about is the casual experience for people that don't know how to use a computer.

If you don't know how to use a computer at all, Apple is really awesome. If you are trying to make your own software or sell software (particularly for phones) Apple is awful.

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#145

Post by what_ever » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:53 AM UTC

antidoh wrote: post #121

jiggy2011 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I mentioned elsewhere, doing a clean Windows install is difficult if the only means of reinstallation you have is the bundled "recovery DVD" which puts all of the shit right back on there. With regards an APT for Windows, I don't see how that wouldn't be possible to add to Windows as a third party thing. With a nice GUI and search and a default catalog of quality mainly OSS software with no toolbars or BS and have…

"doing a clean Windows install is difficult if the only means of reinstallation you have is the bundled "recovery DVD" which puts all of the shit right back on there." That's not a clean install. A clean install is buying a retail version of Windows and blasting it down on your HD. Recovery DVDs recover what the hardware vendor put there in the first place.

I think you can't buy a retail version on Windows anymore. Plus, when it was available previously, you had to pay for that.

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#146

Post by philwelch » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:53 AM UTC

antidoh wrote: post #121

jiggy2011 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I mentioned elsewhere, doing a clean Windows install is difficult if the only means of reinstallation you have is the bundled "recovery DVD" which puts all of the shit right back on there. With regards an APT for Windows, I don't see how that wouldn't be possible to add to Windows as a third party thing. With a nice GUI and search and a default catalog of quality mainly OSS software with no toolbars or BS and have…

"doing a clean Windows install is difficult if the only means of reinstallation you have is the bundled "recovery DVD" which puts all of the shit right back on there." That's not a clean install. A clean install is buying a retail version of Windows and blasting it down on your HD. Recovery DVDs recover what the hardware vendor put there in the first place.

So you have to buy Windows twice?

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#147

Post by bpatrianakos » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:57 AM UTC

unimpressive wrote: post #123

zemanel wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

good thing he didn't. one of the reasons i enjoy working on OSX is the "mintness" i got accustomed from using Linux

No matter how hard I try I can't understand this comment. Are you implying that Linux is a Mac OS X clone?

I think what he's trying to say is that on Mac you get a fresh OS every time. It's never preloaded with crap. If you don't like the !ac you'll find a way to tell me I'm wrong but there really isn't any third party crapware on the Mac. You don't get security alerts every 2 seconds, and uninstalls really do just uninstall apps. You know exactly what to expect when you buy a Mac and the experience stays roughly the same throughout the lifetime of the machine. You can get crapware on a Mac but its pretty rare.

So basically you get a machine in mint condition. And yeah, it is like Linux in that when you install the OS it's the OS and nothing more. You can talk about freedom and locked down platforms all day long and I'll even agree but thats neither here nor there. Point is, the Mac isn't screaming for your attention, doesn't come preloaded with shit, and generally doesn't fuck with you in the same way Linux doesnt do those things. There are exceptions to every rule and god knows you have to cover them all here on HN but generally speaking that's the way it is.

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#148

Post by ricardobeat » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 2:58 AM UTC

zanny wrote: post #134

ricardobeat wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bringing tablet computing, multi-touch, voice control, quality screens (IPS etc), video-calling on phones, small utility software, ubiquitous (real) web access, to mainstream (before someone attacks: yes, all these existed for a long time, but only became common place after Apple pushed them)? Pushing hardware design way past what anyone else was doing in the past half dozen years? Cornering the music industry with a…

The singular man acting as CEO did all this, and more! He is smarter than everyone else ever . Or he just used smart and predatory business practices, and somehow was the only major player to realize eyecandy will win over configuration for everyone that wants just a "tv" into the internet.

Well, just 20 minutes ago I was using my "TV" and it's nice unix shell to develop a cross-platform multiplayer game. And you could say it's usability and experience over configuration, not eye-candy (remember Aero Glass? KDE Plasma?), althought nice-looking interfaces can help with both.

No, he didn't do all this himself, but he was captaining the ship. Has Sergey Brin changed the way people use the internet?

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#149

Post by pi18n » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 3:08 AM UTC

flogic wrote: post #27

eli wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is nonsense fanboism. Modern versions of Windows are extremely similar to OS X from a usability perspective. OS X has plenty of counterintuitive warts. Computers of any flavor are pretty hard to use. > I never understood the install wizards for windows software... I never understood why half the time when I download Mac software and double click it, nothing seems to happen because it's a "disk image" (talk about…

The problem isn't the process of installing. It's the damned trip line installs along the way. If you install Adobe Reader, it shouldn't install McAfee for you. If I install your software, you don't have the right to install browser plugins. In terms of installers, Windows has developed a culture of malware that really needs to go.

Adobe pulls this maneuver on OS X as well. Other Mac apps will try to sneak in some global software for cool effects; I've had Growl installed three of four times without my consent. Obviously the Windows installers were worse on average, but I think OS X would have gone that direction if not for sandboxing. If sandboxing hadn't turned out to be awful I would upgrade. The idea is really good for users, but their implementation is lacking.

Re: The amount of crap Windows users have to put up with is incredible

#150

Post by pi18n » Sun, Nov 11, 2012, 3:14 AM UTC

kstenerud wrote: post #124

biturd wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is a company that does what you suggest. I will probably get down voted for saying it, but Apple. They put in the time to make a pretty darned good user experience for first impressions. There's no junk, no spyware, nothing to remove. Occasionally you might get a software bundle, like Office, or Quicken, but literally just drop it in the trash and you are done with it. Rarely would you have to find an u…

Definitely NOT Apple. Despite their open source site, the most important bits of the OS are closed, and so developers can't dig into the OS to figure out if the bizarre behavior they're seeing is a bug in the OS or not. Worse, they can't submit patches for things they do find. Instead, they have to go submit a radar report, which can't be seen by anyone but themselves. It's so bad that it has become common behavior t…

I'm really enjoying your zen-like calm. If I had to enumerate everything I disliked about their experience for developers I would be foaming at the mouth after three or four bullet points.

Everything you posted is basically an understatement of the truth. Like you forgot to mention that if you do bother going to the trouble of posting a radar, it's probably going to get ignored.