I'm just going to leave this one here.

http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2425381/microsoft-is-downloading-windows-10-to-your-machine-just-in-case

Seems you can avoid it if you don't have the necessary updates to get the upgrade. There just seems something criminal about forcing a 3-6gb download on everyone, when not everyone has uncapped, unmetered internet connections.

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Linux laptop:
record uptime: 1511d 20h 19m (ended due to the power brick giving-up)

In light of a new pile of updates today, my Win 7 machines had a pile of them today. Most were security updates and stuff for Office, but there is one in particular that is.....mysterious and questionable at best.

3083324 is was optional, but InfoWorld suggests avoiding it.

Some time between the InfoWorld article and later in the day on Tuesday, it became important.

There's not enough info about it to know if it is really a bad update to avoid, but until there is more information, I'm avoiding it.

Since I dumped 10 & went back to 7, I don't install anything regarding the update client, except the initial update that was required after installing win 7. It's gotten so bad that I don't trust anything that is coming out on update Tuesday anymore and only install it if I think it would benefit me and after doing much more research than I've been doing in the past.

I didn't wait for the 28 day limit when I reverted, it barely lasted a week if that. The system was so corrupted that I couldn't do what should have been a normal backout via the system restore, and that's after the 2nd go-around installing Win 10. I had to completely reformat the system disk and do a clean Win 7 install, and I didn't have a problem with getting it re-activated online. Unless M$S cleans up their act, I won't get off 7 until I'm too senile to know what I'm doing, or the day after I leave this world, and seeing that I'm 70, it won't be that long.

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I don't buy computers, I build them!!

From Softpedia News:

As part of the switch to Windows as a Service, Microsoft has also changed the way it documents updates for Windows 10 PCs, providing almost no information about the improvements they bring unless there’s something really important included.

It turns out that the very same strategy is now being used for Windows 7, as Microsoft has just shipped an update to computers running this OS version that brings improvements to the Windows Update client. What kind of enhancements is yet unknown though, as Microsoft is once again providing us with updates without actually offering any kind of release information.

KB3083324 is specifically aimed at Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 machines and “contains some improvements to Windows Update Client,” according to the information posted by Microsoft in the official KB article.
No change log unless there’s something big

The secrecy around Windows updates is happening because of Microsoft’s decision to detail the patches it releases to users only if they provide significant changes, so cumulative updates, bug fixes, and small patches are very likely to ship without any information.

“As we have done in the past, we post KB articles relevant to most updates which we’ll deliver with Windows as a service. Depending on the significance of the update and if it is bringing new functionality to Windows customers, we may choose to do additional promotion of new features as we deploy them,” a Microsoft spokesperson was quoted as saying last month.

This isn’t obviously the best approach, given the fact that users need to know what they install on their computers, so posts on UserVoice that call for the company to provide change logs for every update have already received thousands of votes.

In the meantime, Microsoft doesn’t seem to be willing to change its strategy regarding Windows update information, and it has only said that, at some point in the future, enterprise customers could indeed get some release notes, but only for certain updates.

Keep the masses dumb. We will decide what's good for you(r machine). Microsoft has gone Leninistic?

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Cosmic_Ocean

Thanks for posting that article. Read through it and decided to check my c: drive, and sure enough, there was $Windows.~BT and $Windows.~WS. Did a little checking and it turns out that Disk Cleanup is the way to get rid of the BT directory. Disk Cleanup, then hit the Clean System Files button. It left the WS directory, I think because some of the files were compressed, I decompressed those and then just deleted the $Windows.~WS directory manually.

I also deleted C:/ProgramData/Microsoft/Diagnose. Files in the BT and WS directory were trying to write to the ctllog directory there. The Diagnose directory was created at about the same time as the other two.

Thanks for the info, keep us all posted.

Bruce

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Bruce

Last year I bough a HP minitower with Windows 8, soon upgraded to 8.1. RDP was working. This year it was upgraded to Windows 10 Home edition. RDP is not working, so I cannot see the CERN jobs running in VM consoles in vLHC@home, ATLAS@home and CMS-dev. For the rest it works with Virtual Box 4.3.30 and BOINC 7.6.6.
Tullio

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From Softpedia News:
It turns out that the very same strategy is now being used for Windows 7, as Microsoft has just shipped an update to computers running this OS version that brings improvements to the Windows Update client. What kind of enhancements is yet unknown though, as Microsoft is once again providing us with updates without actually offering any kind of release information./quote]
Keep the masses dumb. We will decide what's good for you(r machine). Microsoft has gone Leninistic?

One of which bypasses a user's update settings. I have mine set to Check but allow me to download & install which has been set since installation of windows. Shut down system Wed evening & 23 updates installed. Shut down again yesterday evening & a further 2 installed. Today system showing updates ready for installation on shutdown icon.

Also, Win 10 upgrade was hidden, yet keeps coming back. Very nasty M$, carry on like this & Linux Mint is getting closer to kicking your butt!

Last year I bough a HP minitower with Windows 8, soon upgraded to 8.1. RDP was working. This year it was upgraded to Windows 10 Home edition. RDP is not working, so I cannot see the CERN jobs running in VM consoles in vLHC@home, ATLAS@home and CMS-dev. For the rest it works with Virtual Box 4.3.30 and BOINC 7.6.6.
Tullio

Has anyone with this problem tried using the Microsoft Remote Desktop Preview App?

Thanks Richard. I tried to download it but I should have a Microsoft account on my Windows 10 PC, while I have only a local account. My mail client is Thunderbird.
Tullio

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Can anyone assisted me with how to add the updates that install windows 10 on Windows 7/8.1 to the exclude list/installing blacklist for wsusoffline 9.8?

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Thanks Richard. I tried to download it but I should have a Microsoft account on my Windows 10 PC, while I have only a local account. My mail client is Thunderbird.
Tullio

You can set up a MS account with any email address you want. I have several MS accounts of different computers (not sure if that is what they want or not) some using a outlook.com address and some using my local ISP address. I do not think the address really matters.

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SETI@home classic workunits 4,019
SETI@home classic CPU time 34,348 hours

Referencing http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/forum_thread.php?id=77121&postid=1724353 I successfully deleted the Window$~BT using file cleanup and deleted Window$~WS but when trying to delete Diagnosis from the program data file I ran into the old "Permission required from 'Trusted Installer'" message and even though logged in as Administrator it would not let me continue.

Any suggestions would be appreciated to remove this infection from MY(NOT M$'s!) system.

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"Sour Grapes make a bitter Whine." <(0)>

I see I have the $Windows.~BT and $Windows.~WS folders and contents as well. Both made on the first of August 2015. This despite me always checking and rechecking I didn't have any of the KBs installed. Well, in the end it appeared I did have KB3022345 installed, and from this I only removed the tracking service.

Yet I still ended up with the folders and contents.
I'll have to check the other systems now.

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I'm reading on some Dutch pages that Microsoft has been pushing Windows 10 as a recommended update through Windows Update since July 31st, but as they say only on systems that use Automatic Updates. That's a lie then, as I don't have automatic updates, but manual. The last batch of 12 Important and 3 Optional updates is still waiting for my approval.

The biggest problem here is that the Windows 10 update isn't showing as any KBxxxxxxx update in Windows Update and so cannot be blocked there. Microsoft also says you can remove the files using disk cleanup, but this does not cancel the update and will at a later stage download all those files and try the auto-update installations again.

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I think about upgrading my laptop from 8.1 to 10. I have read the last few pages of this thread and while there is a lot of talking about privacy, security, spying, etc., I didn't see much concrete here.

So pls, short & precisly, what exactly does concern you with W10? Give me a few concrete examples pls.

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So pls, short & precisly, what exactly does concern you with W10? Give me a few concrete examples pls.

If you get the Home edition as I did from 8.1 on a HP PC, you won't get the Remote Desktop Protocol which I need to see the VM consoles in vLHC@home, Atlas@home and CMS-dev, all CERN projects using Virtual Box.
Tullio

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I think about upgrading my laptop from 8.1 to 10. I have read the last few pages of this thread and while there is a lot of talking about privacy, security, spying, etc., I didn't see much concrete here.

So pls, short & precisly, what exactly does concern you with W10? Give me a few concrete examples pls.

By default, any searches you do on the system are reported to MS, driver updates occur automatically- you can't easily stop them from occurring. Plenty more.
If you use an Android or iOS device many of these things already occur, but it's the first time that under Windows they have been enabled by default, and while they can be disabled (some of that requiring certain features to be disabled completely), doing so is very difficult as the options are spread out all over the place & often several levels deep.

30-ways-windows-10-phones-home

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Grant
Darwin NT

Yeah, I know this. And as a long time Android user, that's nothing new for me. But as long as I can disable it, I don't really care.

For example, the default settings even allow MS to remotly connect to your computer and run diagnostic software on it.
So yeah, the default settings suck, no doubt. But you can simply change those setting, they are not hidden or locked. So that alone is no reason for me to say "W10 sucks" or "W10 is spying on me".

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http://www.winprivacy.de/

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With each crime and every kindness we birth our future.

I think about upgrading my laptop from 8.1 to 10. I have read the last few pages of this thread and while there is a lot of talking about privacy, security, spying, etc., I didn't see much concrete here.

So pls, short & precisly, what exactly does concern you with W10? Give me a few concrete examples pls.

I have been using Windows 10 since day one on both my main machine and my laptop. As has been said, MS has gone the way of Android and Apple in that the default install means that MS sees basically all you do.

If you do a "manual install" this allows you to disable most to the "phone home" features.

Also I have used the free program from here

O&O Shutup 10

Which is able to turn off a lot more, here is my list
Green is off red is on.


Quite a list.

(I have since turned on automatic updates just to get whatever was outstanding, you can of course then use O&) to turn it off again till you are ready for the next lot.)

However once that is done I have found Win 10 is overall slightly faster and nicer to use than Win 7, and definitely a much improved look and feel from 8.1.

I have not had any GPU driver problems on this machine but it does have a newer GPU and my laptop never even tried to install graphics drivers, much too old!!

On the two crunchers I upgraded (both using older cards) I had to un-install the Windows driver and install the Nvidia one, that was before I had the "install drivers" switched off.

If you want to use Cortana, then you will have to sacrifice some of your privacy. It didn't interest me so no loss.

I have to say I am quite happy with Win 10 and would not wish to go back to 7. Hopefully a few others who have had positive experiences will post here.

Remember there is no rush, you have till next June to decide.

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