I don't recall exactly how old #350 is... but it's getting up there in the years. I'm pretty sure it's past halfway to that "in a decade or so" thought at least.]

Well, the Blaster worm was around 2003/04, so that probably puts it at around the 10+ years mark.

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Grant
Darwin NT

I have several machines I am not ready to update, and sensitive data and source code (unrelated to Seti/Boinc) wholly inappropriate to expose to the cloud. m$ has absolutely no place collecting/forcing anything that can affect my income/survival.

That's why I turned all that off when I did the upgrade.

Yeah, a bit too much to risk right now. Will definitely happen one day, but not until I can move terabytes of stuff on RAID, onto a NAS

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"Living by the wisdom of computer science doesn't sound so bad after all. And unlike most advice, it's backed up by proofs." -- Algorithms to live by: The computer science of human decisions.

I have several machines I am not ready to update, and sensitive data and source code (unrelated to Seti/Boinc) wholly inappropriate to expose to the cloud. m$ has absolutely no place collecting/forcing anything that can affect my income/survival.

That's why I turned all that off when I did the upgrade.

Yeah, a bit too much to risk right now. Will definitely happen one day, but not until I can move terabytes of stuff on RAID, onto a NAS

Even then you need to disable Cortana, the search assistant.
Doing any search using Cortana (like Siri) results in data on the search being sent back home.
So I made sure to turn it off.

Likewise, use a local account, not a M$ account.

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Grant
Darwin NT

To lessen M$'s ability to accumulate info on you, only set up a local account when installing Win 10.

> PSA: You Can Run Windows 10 Without a Microsoft Account
> How to set up a local account in Windows 10 during or after installation
> How to Check if User is a Local Account or Microsoft Account in Windows 10
> HTG Explains: Microsoft Accounts vs. Local Accounts in Windows 8
> Should you use a local or a Microsoft account in Windows 10?

Wow, just read this article. All I can say is wow, and have to say the best comment I read in the comments section sums it up pretty succinctly:

greywolf7

The article that never should have been written. What an arrogant horse excrement spewing horses posterior

Keep drinking the Kool-aid, Mr. Jason Perlow. Resistance is futile, assimilation is assured! AmIRight? lol

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Hmm. Why upgrade? Governments and banks are still using very old technologies.

Want to launch a nuclear missile? You'll need a floppy disk.
That's according to a new report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), which found that the Pentagon was still using 1970s-era computing systems that require "eight-inch floppy disks."
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) report says that U.S. government departments spend upwards of $60 billion a year on operating and maintaining out-of-date technologies.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/05/26/us/pentagon-floppy-disks-nuclear/index.html?sr=twCNN052616pentagon-floppy-disks-nuclear0957AMStoryGalLink&linkId=24889590

Hmm. Why upgrade? Governments and banks are still using very old technologies.

Want to launch a nuclear missile? You'll need a floppy disk.(...)

I really feel a lot safer now, knowing this!

Just imagine it's enough to say: "Hey Cortana, fire'em up!", "Hey Siri, give'em a bad day!" or "Hey Google, screw'em up!"

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Aloha, Uli

There is nothing wrong with old technology if it works as designed and does its job. If you over-complicate with the "newest and latest and greatest" you introduce the potential for bugs and errors and security holes and malware, and the more components a thing has, the more there is to fail.

Example: homeowners who weren't happy with a simple mechanical thermostat that works for decades, and needed a Nest "smart" thermostat connected to the internet. Except now it goes and updates its firmware without asking anyone, and the update fails, and it doesn't work anymore which means the furnace is off and perhaps the water pipes will freeze and burst when the owner is away... now imagine this is the cooling system of a nuclear power plant instead.

Some of these "old tech" systems were engineered to a much higher standard of uptime reliability and real-time operation than any consumer-grade OS. Replacing them with a general-purpose machine could compromise this, ie "Sorry... can we put off the imminent attack for an hour? Windows is upgrading again."

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It's hard to hack a floppy disk in a storage sleeve......

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

I've got to think that the number of hackers actively attacking systems running COBAL, FORTAN and the like are essentially 0. How about them apples (a saying, not the brand), huh? Or old IBM mainframes, bet their vulnerabilites are fairly low as well. I could be wrong, but obsolescence has its advantages... ;-)

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Example: homeowners who weren't happy with a simple mechanical thermostat that works for decades, and needed a Nest "smart" thermostat connected to the internet.

Precisely.
I built such a system from scratch several (20) years ago, when in my place Internet was very much difficult to reach, at home and away from home.
It is still running reliably and it is even based on discret electronic componentes, though it is made "intelligent" by a computer. Originally a PC, now a RaspberryPI, which in his kind is state of the art, but not the most complex computing system you can think of.

But the important thing is that since the beginning the system was thought so to have back-up systems (even mechanical safety thermostats), so that if anything fails the system reverts to a neutral situation where no problem can arise in the unattended house.

I never had such a problem in all these years. I may have lost contact and control of my house some (very few) times, but I never saw it going toward a critical situation.

This has always been a concern of mine and the result has not been accomplished with state of the art technology, rather also with very old passive devices which you would judge to be even primitive on present standards. Nevertheless, their simple principle of work gives maximum back-up reliability.

Sleepy

Are there any happy stories in this thread? :P

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Are there any happy stories in this thread? :P

As the thread has been so negative from the start I have not posted.

I will just say I have now converted all 7 of my Windows Vista/7 machines to Win 10 and am happy with the result. I acttually paid for Win 8 licences for the Vista machines so I could then upgrade to Win 10.

Since I have had a Hotmail account for many many years, a Gmail account for almost as long, used both Internet Explore and Google Chrome and have an iPhone I believe that Microsoft, Google and Apple already know all about me.

I don't say I agree with Microsoft's tactics, but they are loosing out to the smart phone and tablet and have to find a way to get back on top.

Many people I know these days don't have a laptop, let alone a desktop, all use smartphones and tablets, which are not Microsoft.

Microsoft have tried to get into these fields but left it too late. The future belongs to Android and iOS not Windows.

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I acttually paid for Win 8 licences for the Vista machines so I could then upgrade to Win 10.

I haven't paid that close attn, I guess I had presumed that any currently supported OS (including Vista for about another year) was eligible for the free upgrade. I especially assumed that considering the lengths they are going to trying to get all those Win7/8 peoples computers 'upgraded' to 10. I figured it was a no brainer for them, that they would like to suck as many people into their new world as they could. Learned something, thank you!

The future belongs to Android and iOS not Windows [on those devices].

Thought I'd add that little caveat for you. ;-)

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It's baaaaaaack!

2952664 - Last Review: 06/08/2016 16:11:00 - Revision: 21.0

Yesterday I encountered real-life case of auto-upgrading.
It was my collegue's notebook that did auto-updated w/o his consent (actually he was AFK to kitchen just for few mins to found the upgrade proces started on his return).
Update took ~1,5h and was real disaster. Few mission-critical programs refused to work under Win10 so his everyday work activity was ruined.
Fortunately I was able to revert update back to Windows 8.1 (by stock means, it's still allowed) filling questionary why I reverting back and hitting quite a lot confirmation buttons that "I'm sure I wanna drop wonderful Win10 and return to stone age of Win8.1" so to speak.
Auto-install of recommended updates was enabled on that notebook.
So, beware!

Fortunately I was able to revert update back to Windows 8.1 (by stock means, it's still allowed) filling questionary why I reverting back and hitting quite a lot confirmation buttons that "I'm sure I wanna drop wonderful Win10 and return to stone age of Win8.1" so to speak.

You can also revert by just clicking Decline on the EULA then confirming:

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Fortunately I was able to revert update back to Windows 8.1 (by stock means, it's still allowed) filling questionary why I reverting back and hitting quite a lot confirmation buttons that "I'm sure I wanna drop wonderful Win10 and return to stone age of Win8.1" so to speak.

You can also revert by just clicking Decline on the EULA then confirming:

As I said (please re-read) update was installed in automatic mode w/o user consent. That's the issue.

As I said (please re-read) update was installed in automatic mode w/o user consent. That's the issue.

Ah, then they must have consented then prior. The EULA is presented during the install process. It's the only way to back out at that point without it installing and requiring reversion.

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As I said (please re-read) update was installed in automatic mode w/o user consent. That's the issue.

Ah, then they must have consented then prior. The EULA is presented during the install process. It's the only way to back out at that point without it installing and requiring reversion.

It's one of the reasons M$ has been copping so much flack for the way they are pushing the upgrades.

When they changed the status of the upgrade from "Optional" to "Recommended" the result was that Win10 became just like all the other Windows updates. If you have Windows update set to "Automatically download & install updates" that's what it does, downloads & then installs the update. Since Win10 is now considered the same as a normal update, it gets installed.
No need to agree to the EULA as you already agreed to the update by selecting "Automatically download & install updates" for Windows Update.

The last time Win10 was made a "Recommended update" there was a huge backlash, so it was reverted back to a "Optional update". I'm guessing they've changed it back to "Recommended" again.


Anyone that has Windows Update set to "Notify me of any new updates" won't have this problem.

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Grant
Darwin NT