|
I read some reviews about the
latest version of Windows so was slightly familiar with it but
nevertheless I didn't immediately upgrade my business computer
with its stable Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit.
Day 1
Instead I opted to download the thing
via the Microsoft backdoor. As it's widely advertised this backdoor
is probably wide open by now. The first thing I noticed was my
"Ultimate" version is downgraded to "Professional",
but that may not be particularly important? £50 isn't that
much is it? It is to an OAP... hang on, I'm one of those....so,
yes it is a lot of cash.
I selected the appropriate version in
the download listing and waited ages for something short of a
4Gbyte of iso file. I did this on a second computer rather than
my main one and found that I couldn't convert the iso file to
a DVD without copying the iso to a memory stick and using my
main computer with Nero to produce a DVD.
I then decided to clone my decent Windows
7 on my spare computer to another hard drive before wiping the
solid state drive and installing Windows 10 as a fresh version.
This went OK apart from taking loads
of time with totally disproportionate messages about percentage
completion and ending with no broadband because my wireless adaptor
wouldn't work. I downloaded the Windows 8 drivers (on my main
computer) and those worked fine. Maybe Microsoft didn't think
anyone uses a TP-Link wireless adaptor?
The new operating system looks very
similar to Windows 8..... at least the version you can fiddle
to look more like Windows 7 by turning off stuff and selecting
various options. Microsoft must not realise that business users
want a fast, no-frills operating system. Since NT disappeared
business users are treated just like music downloaders.
Now to some very annoying things....
my anti-virus wasn't compatible. I eventually tried Avast as
a trial version to stop an annoying pop-up warning me that I
needed an anti-virus. I tried Spotmau which uncovered 149 Registry
errors (despite this being a clean copy of Windows 10). Next
I tried my favourite clean-up application, Registry Mechanic
10. "Not compatible", so I can't use this. Next I tried
my Acronis 2013 which I use for cloning. This worked OK despite
this being reported to be "not compatible" when I checked
earlier. NOTE: Since trying Avast Free I've had a friend's
laptop in for repair. Spybot, AVG and Vipre between them found
some 300 to 400 bad infections after Avast had declared a clean
computer... need I say more?
I tried adding extra hard drives and
found that one with a Smart problem caused Windows 10 to lock
up completely. I had to press the power button to get the computer
running, whereupon I needed to allow it to carry out a disk check.
The lock-up was like the type you get with a faulty CD. Surely
Windows software experts can arrange a timeout when a hard drive
problem manifests?
A few niggles. I didn't add a password
but despite this I get a password box waiting for me to type
a password. The mouse doesn't seem to work at this point so I
can't select the arrow on the right of the box. Pressing "Enter"
has no immediate result, but after a longish delay the desktop
appears. Maybe there's a box to untick somewhere to prevent this
hang-up? NOTE: I've had this problem since on several computers.
Restarting the computer takes an age.
Just a blue screen with a message. Has the computer locked up?
No it's just a matter of waiting... Booting up is quite fast
being 30 seconds to the password glitch.
I tried the old trick of stripping out
frills by selecting "best performance" and turning
off countless options. Sure enough this made the computer faster,
but I started getting an error message about a bad file in my
proxy software. At least it happened twice then seemed to get
fixed by itself.
I also tried to get Windows 10 repair
features to work. I tried a system disk without its boot files.
I got the message "can't fix the problem". Surely an
error like the one I presented should be fixable? If the repair
feature isn't first class I'm going to have trouble. Frequently
I get problems caused by customers with updating laptops. Either
the battery goes flat faced with "downloading 132 updates...
do not turn off", or they just close the lid and you get
hard drive corruption.
After a couple of hours trying out Windows
10 I decided to get rid of any of those little programs that
infiltrate themselves into ones computer. Where do I find "add-remove
programs" ? I looked in settings... nothing seems to be
relevant. No sign of Control Panel so I gave up. I guess it's
just unfamiliarity.
In summary. I need to be able to find
my way around Windows 10 before my customers bring their computers
to be fixed or just ring me up with questions. I'm pleased (at
this point) I didn't upgrade my Windows 7 installation but maybe
things will get better when I've discovered where the software
people hid the old features? It's been happening since they updated
Windows 95 to 98 so nothing new under the sun... NOTE: On
the NET you can find a collection of Windows 7 games. These work
normally on Windows 10 and a better option than the new versions.
I keep getting a message telling me
I'm running short of memory. Maybe all the unwanted bells and
whistles are gobbling up my RAM? Odd because I thought I'd switched
them off?
Lots of peripheral companies will benefit
from Windows 10 because they can sell "compatible"
versions to their customers. In that instance Windows 10 may
not be entirely free.
I'll add to this as I learn more.
Day 2
Computer booted up and flagged "Kmode
Exception Not Handled", file hssdrv6.sys then it rebooted
before I read everything.
Then it did the same thing again so
I bashed the F8 key and it came up with a list of things including
Safe Mode. I found Hotspot Shield in the programs and right clicked
the entry, whereupon I found Add Remove Programs, Control Panel.
I wondered where it had gone... removing Hotspot Shield fixed
the crashing. Maybe the vendor will sort this out?? I checked
the Registry and found loads of entries for hssdrv6 so removing
the program failed to delete Registry entries which I guess is
par for the course. I ran a Registry cleaner and deleted 262
entries. Bearing in mind my Windows 10 is less than 24 hours
old this seems a lot.
I went to the Internet to check on a
new version of my proxy server and was informed that "the
Internet was not available". It was OK yesterday. I noticed
on the bottom right it said "not connected", "connections
available", but when I looked my router was connected...
very odd. No matter what I did I couldn't fix this. Even deleting
the wireless adaptor, putting back the drivers and re-inserting
the router key failed to resolve the problem. Connected but not
connected. Windows failed to solve the problem but suggested
bad drivers, but these worked fine yesterday. Must be a Windows
glitch?
A pal rang to say his new Windows 10
had caused his RAID system to fail. Intel appears to have noticed
that their drivers are not 100% and you'll need to download their
latest which are circa Issue 14.
Later the same day. Still no Internet.
Windows tells me it's a driver problem. The driver for the wireless
adaptor is broken. I tried everything but it was adamant. I found
a wireless PCI card and fitted it. Windows said it couldn't find
suitable drivers so I downloaded these on my proper computer
and installed them. The adaptor declared it was in perfect working
order but still no network. Windows tells me it's an adaptor
driver problem. That's two wireless adaptors. Both u/s.
I unreeled an ethernet cable and plugged
it into the computer. "Cable connected", response from
the Realtek adaptor but Windows has a stuck record. "Driver
problem for the ethernet adaptor". By now I was getting
fractious. Things were fine yesterday. I'll do a System Restore,
but I can't find it. I tried MSCONFIG and used the entry point
from Tools. Luckily there was one restore point for 2nd August
so I tried it and hey presto it worked and suddenly the network
was connected. I could see my proper computer, despite it having
a different network name (strange), and when I opened Chrome
and clicked on a History entry the Internet was clearly working.
I looked at network settings and was able to connect both wireless
adaptors to my router. That made no less than three simultaneous
connections, including the ethernet, to the router. How odd.
A quick check on the Internet and I
found that simply right clicking the Windows Start button revealed
loads of useful things including Control Panel... welcome back,
I knew it must be there somewhere. So why couldn't Windows 10
figure out the network problem? Why did it blame drivers?
Next I need to find out why I'm offered
a password to sign in. Clearly it knows I don't have one because
if I wait the desktop appears.
It seems one has to run netplwiz, add
a password to one's account, then log in with the new password,
then remove the "use password", then Win 10 starts
with just a quick flash of the password box...
Day 3
I'm getting to know Windows 10 reasonably
well now to be able to advise on a few things. I tried some ideas
out and discovered a few interesting things. I had a damaged
hard drive removed from a computer. I'd managed after a lot of
effort to temporarily fix data corruption problems long enough
to clone the drive to a new one and this magically worked and
the customer was happy. What if I installed the damaged drive
on a test computer, got Windows 7 working and upgraded it to
Windows 10 then cloned it to a new drive?
I tried for ages to get the Windows
7 system running and gave up. What next? Well, at one point the
set-up reverted to a fresh install of HP Windows 7 so I tried
this. Sure enough the HP system installed but of course was a
bit muddled as all the drivers were wrong. Nevertheless I attempted
to upgrade this to Windows 10. I had read the key but I suspect
this key was an "OEM" key and these last only as long
as the computer on which it's installed so I was directed to
contact HP to resolve the issue. Continuing my experiments I
eventually got an upgrade running from a previously downloaded
Windows Professional 64 bit, but alas the Upgrade stopped at
31%. This was due to the hard disk which was of course faulty.
I decided at this point to give up gracefully.
Unplugging the bad drive I noticed another hard drive on the
table. I plugged it in and found it was OK so I installed a clean
copy of Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit. This is an early system without
updates, however, when I started an upgrade it went right through
without a hitch. I noted the key and was quite pleased as I thought
one needed SP1 to be installed before an upgrade was possible.
I then noticed another hard drive labelled "clean format"
so I repeated the exercise but this time added Registry Mechanic
10 and Vipre, because these are reported to be incompatible with
Windows 10.
After waiting an hour or so I had a
second working Windows 10. Oddly, it's key was the same as the
first version I'd produced. Vipre had been kicked into touch
but Registry Mechanic 10 worked a treat.
Day 4
Back in the workshop I needed to look
in an excel file to see if I had a particular transistor and
realised I hadn't updated the computer. I tried but discovered
the hard drive was acting up, in fact I'd noticed this before
and hadn't bothered to replace it.
Instead, I moved my previous computer
onto the bench. This has a decent hard drive and has a Windows
7 operating system.
The motherboard has a built-in graphics
interface but has a PCI-E slot, and I think it might have come
from a customer's computer years back. Anyway I upgraded it to
Windows 10 and found my first upgrade headache. The finished
upgrade left me with a white desktop background and clearly in
a low resolution setting. Unfortunately, the graphics of the
new Windows 10 don't readily cater for low res pictures and lots
of lettering and arrows an other things were missing. If I mention
white lettering on a white background I think you'll understand
the problem. Instead, I'll use a PCI-E graphics card which will
probably have decent drivers. It was after I'd tried two graphics
cards the penny dropped. This motherboard had a failed PCI-E
slot which is why I removed it from the customer's computer.
They'd insisted on using their expensive graphics card so I'd
supplied a new motherboard. What make of computer it was I've
long forgotten, but on the board is written MSI P6NGM, MS7366
Issue 1.0. I quickly established that the graphics is called
"MCP73".. but what is it exactly? Well, it's an NVIDIA
design, but try as I might I couldn't find a driver on their
website.
After thinking hard, I remembered that
NVIDIA have an auto-detect program. I quickly found this and
my troubles began.
Using Google Chrome I clicked on the
detect button. "You need Java", was the response, so
I downloaded and installed Java. None of this was easy because
I couldn't see most of the text and things like arrows were missing.
Java downloaded I tried again. This time a message came up stating
that I needed a newer version of Google Chrome. With difficulty
I downloaded a new version of Chrome. I say "with difficulty"
as I kept getting pop-ups and messages such as "Please tell
us how wonderful is the new version of Chrome", and "click
here to set up Internet Explorer 11" and "you've changed
to the Yahoo search engine from the Google one", and a large
white box with something written in white and a blank box (presumably
"OK"). Finally, I got a useful message saying that
the NVIDIA program needed to be run on Internet Explorer, definitely
not Chrome and certainly not "E"!
I switched to Microsoft's website and
located Internet Explorer downloads. There was Version 11. I
clicked on this and a message came up..."You need to be
running Windows to use this".. very odd, and then up came
another message... "Why don't you try Windows 10".
Something is clearly not right. I tried again and got the same
results so Microsoft must believe I'm using an Apple computer,
or something alien and not Windows 10?
I then remembered that I'd seen Internet
Explorer 11 appear briefly on my screen during my hunt for a
graphics driver but I'd closed it because it was asking me to
set it up and I was busy.
I found Drive C and started methodically
with old Windows. There was both Internet Explorer 32 and 64
bits in Program files folders but neither would open. I looked
in the new Windows 10 Program Files folder and again, there was
Internet Explorer. I found the exe file (I should mention that
in Windows Explorer, text was either light grey or shimmering
rainbow colours on a white background so identifying the correct
exe file was not easy) and it opened up like magic ... at least
this version knows I'm running Windows !.... I copied and pasted
the NVIDIA webpage to IE11 and clicked on the auto-detect button.
"You need to enable Java", it said, so I clicked on
"enable". Suddenly the auto-detect program ran and
there was the required driver... "GeForce 7150 or nForce
630i". Success... I clicked on "download" and
"run" and a few minutes later I was installing the
graphics driver. When the screen went blank for an instant I
knew it was installing correctly, and suddenly there was a lovely
sharp picture 1440 x 900. Perfect... But why the problem before?
The answer was now quite obvious... there are loads of white
symbols, like arrows, that are in coloured disks on white backgrounds.
Remove the coloured disks and you get white on white. I think
the MS developers missed this one, perhaps believing that every
graphics card would be satisfied with their standard driver.
Well, this is not the case.
In summary, it looks like Windows 10
is worth installing. You might find the odd driver problem and
you'll certainly lose a program or two. If it gets screwed up
or if you change your motherboard you might have to give MS a
call, but there's always Windows 10, SP1 to fix matters isn't
there?
Day 5
A major blunder. Not mine, but those
software writers working for MS. I turned on my computer that
had yesterday been converted from Windows 7 to Windows 10 and
was faced with a message "Installing Updates 100%".
Very odd because this message was there for something like 5
minutes. What is 100% exactly? I thought 100% meant whatever
it was is complete, but no, it took 5 minutes before a black
screen appeared and then...."Installing Updates 1%... do
not turn off your computer". Turn it off? I've only just
turned it on with a view to using it. The completion figure steadily
increased until it read 100% and then... another black screen
followed by yet more messages about installing updates.
I reckon it must have been around 30
minutes before I was actually permitted to use my computer. Come
on MS.. this is not good enough. It's one thing installing updates
when you're turning off a computer but to bar one's use when
switching it on.
What if it's a business and someone
needs to use the computer for a really urgent job?
Imagine on a nuclear sub... Sorry old
boy but the Captain tells me Northwood's sent a message telling
him we have to launch those pyrotechnic thingummys. Turn on your
computer and oblige pronto old chap.
Sorry Eustace but the screen tells me
the computer's installing updates and it's only 2% complete,
can we wait? Not really old chap... never mind it's probably
too late now anyway.
Oh yes, another glitch. Whenever I open
Chrome I get a message telling me it's "not default",
so would I like it to be? I click on the affirmative and am taken
to a window with default settings. Scrolling down to browser
there's only "e". No way of selecting Chrome so the
message ALWAYS comes up. This must be a fairly basic software
routine so why on earth isn't it working? NOTE: I found the
way to fix this later.
No use complaining because Windows 10
is free. You can always revert to Windows 7... no you can't,
at least not always because you might get a message along these
lines... "Cannot revert to Windows 7 because certain key
files were removed in the upgrade procedure".
Looking around the Internet I found
the fix for setting the default web browser. MS switch you to
Edge "e" as one of their "Express" options
(for "Express" read "MS preferred") and to
get back to Chrome you click on the "make default"
message in Chrome. This brings up the default program routine.
The trick is that the browsers are hidden in Apps. MS probably
didn't realise that Chrome, Firefox etc are browsers and assigned
them under Apps.
Illogically, click on the single browser
entry (Edge) and scroll down to "Choose an App", where
you'll find your old browser. Click on Chrome (or whatever) and
this will be set as the default browser. I bet at least one company
will be thinking "Anti-Trust". I might try Edge later
to see if it allows me to watch my IP camera.
LATER
I've been reading a few articles and
keep seeing the word "Free" associated with Windows
10 and "best ever" etc. This is really misleading.
Those who have paid for Windows 7 and Windows 8 are getting an
update because Windows 10 is basically a major update not an
upgrade. When is an update an upgrade I wonder? Well the manufacturer
differentiates very easily... updates are free and upgrades are
paid for. Using this logic Microsoft are treating Windows 10
as an update for existing Windows 7 and 8 users because it's
free. Why include Windows 7 I wonder? Well, for a time Windows
8 was a free upgrade for Windows 7 users and "Free"
meant it was an update. Microsoft had to deal with the negativity
over Windows 8 somehow. And of course when you move to Windows
10 you do this via an "UPDATE" from Windows 7.
I must have paid around £200 for
my Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit and a free Windows 10 Pro worth
£100 means I'll be out of pocket.
However... what about the zillions of
users of pirated copies of Windows 7? They get a free update
to Windows 10 and "free" is a real bonus because they
didn't pay a penny for a £100 new product.
I tackled my Toshiba P200-17 C laptop
today because, since its update to Windows 10, the LAN device
has been invisible. It doesn't even show up as "unknown
device".. it's just missing. I tried everything to resurrect
it but failed. Thankfully the wireless driver is reported to
be working so the thing is at least usable. At least it should
be but my BT broadband has stopped working.
I reckon Microsoft will eventually follow
manufacturers like Symantec and in future their operating systems
will be subject to an annual fee. Wouldn't it be ironic if they
include Windows 10 in this switch... "from 2016 all users
will need to pay an annual license fee". It sort of makes
sense doesn't it? They can't charge a fee for Windows 7 but they
can charge an annual fee for Windows 10 because users got it
free in the first place. Those who didn't opt for the free upgrade
and paid for their copy will be subject to whatever terms and
conditions were printed on their package. You can probably see
which is the free version because I reckon the activation keys
will provide the evidence. All my upgrades appear to carry the
same key.
I decided to check my two laptops again,
both of which have benefited from a Windows 10 update leaving
their original files in place. One is based on the Atom processor
and nothing untoward in respect of its low power had been announced
when upgrading. This computer is too slow to be usable. The second
is a Toshiba 17" laptop with a solid state hard drive, 2
Gbyte of RAM and a dual core processor. It looked quite respectable
when the update was completed but there was no internet because
the LAN hardware has disappeared completely and, now BT have
fixed broadband the "working" wireless driver doesn't
work after all. I get a message telling me it can't connect to
my router. It took me ages to find a suitable Intel wireless
driver after trying a TP-Link USB wireless stick and failing
to find a Windows 10 driver for that either. In the end I changed
the USB stick driver folder name from Windows 8 to Windows 10
and suddenly the error message about the driver being one for
the wrong platform went away and the internet became available.
The Intel wireless interface was a puzzle because Windows 10
reported it to be OK and working perfectly but it wasn't as I
kept getting an error report and the Wizard failed to fix the
problem, suggesting a bad driver. After some initial difficulty
finding a new driver I continued searching and found one that
was reported to be for Windows 10. I downloaded this and ran
the installation file. This was a exe file rather than being
a set of drivers but whoever had produced this was lazy because
it ran then just disappeared without a word or by your leave....
A second attempt was the same but when I checked to see if I
could link to my router, and after putting in the security code,
it worked.
I've noticed that all the computers
that I've updated seem to be very busy when not running an application
(at least not one I wanted to use). Checking their status by
opening Task Manager I see that over 50% of the processor power
is being gobbled up by services. Clearly there's a problem because
with Windows 7 I generally see 98% idle time. Something is clearly
wrong so I'll investigate further. Part of the answer to this
problem is in the updating procedure. Near the end of the process
you're given a choice of "Express" or "Custom"..
the latter being in small font. Definitely choose custom because
you can kick into touch a whole host of INFILTRATION/HIJACKING
stuff. These are probably responsible for stealing loads of processing
power.
Much Later
I think there are quite a lot of bugs
in Windows 10. Hopefully these will all get resolved soon? If
I turn on my Toshiba laptop the wireless part doesn't work properly,
telling me it can't connect to my new Sky router. The easiest
(and only way) to fix this is to restart, whereupon it immediately
connects to the router and the Internet is fine... very odd.
I had my first customer Windows 10 problem
yesterday. He'd tried Windows 10 but didn't like it probably
because Control Panel is hidden away etc. Simple solution, he'd
thought... System Restore back to Windows 7. Oops, now it comes
up with a "non-genuine" message and dire warnings to
pay up etc. Also Microsoft Office wasn't working because Vipre
kept blocking access. Alas, no further restore points were offered
so the PC arrived here. NOTE: I understand MS pushed out an
update which caused a "genuine" operating system to
think it was a pirate copy.
The first thing to sort out was the
non-genuine message and the fact that Windows 7 wasn't activated.
This was straightforward and after a reboot it was activated
and genuine. Next, I installed the Windows 10 update. Now, I
must re-iterate the fact that you should NOT use the Express
Settings option at the tail end of the installation process.
Choosing the manual method reveals loads and loads of Microsoft
spyware. This stuff can render ones computer virtually unusable
whilst these spyware programs are "analysing" your
data. Once installation is complete, check the hardware status
because there may be missing drivers and therefore non-working
bits and pieces. First though use the simple trick of applying
"Adjust for best performance". This speeds up the computer
at the expense of stupid bells and whistles which may be OK when
a computer is brand new, but an awful handicap once the Registry
gets big.
Next, I looked at the MS Office shortcomings.
Most of the files were present but I noticed Excel was missing
(and no doubt other stuff as well?). This is Office Pro 2003
and after a repair from a CD in Drive D everything worked normally.
I rebooted and opened My Computer, Computer or whatever Windows
10 now calls it! and was surprised to see Drive C and Drive E
but no Drive D. Try as I might I couldn't get it back, despite
trying lots of suggestions around the Net. I deleted stuff in
the hardware list and rebooted but still no sign of the missing
DVD optical drive. Finally I could see Drive C and Drive D but
no Drive E. This customer has neatly labelled all the various
drives so I could see that what had been Drive E had now stolen
the Drive D name. Exasperated, I switched the SATA cables around
so that Drive D (which was labelled Drive E) was now labelled
Drive D. After a reboot everything clicked back into place. Both
DVD drives (which are indentical) were working and carried the
right labels, and both drives showed up in Disk Management. Clearly
a Windows 10 glitch. Maybe something wrong with the Plug &
Play software?
Next, I kicked "E" into touch
and selected Google Chrome then deleted loads of those stupid
shortcuts in the area displayed when the start button is pressed,
leaving the weather forcast, news and Pictures. Now the end result
looks much like Windows 7. Bootup and shutdown are fast and the
PC is nice and responsive. Alas, Vipre had to be removed and
Registry Mechanic 10 (which is not supposed to work, and in fact
locked up) also had to go.
I just need to point out that most of
the useful technical things are revealed when the start button
is right clicked.
Just the one question remains. Having
restored to Windows 7 why did the operating system become de-activated??
I may have stumbled on the answer which was a bad Windows 7 update
from MS.
Bloody Updates
Pardon the French, but Microsoft programmers
seem to have no concept of a typical customer. The majority of
people using a computer will turn it on and wish to do a specific
thing with it. For example, open a laptop and check the time
of a train.
I turned on my Windows 10 Toshiba laptop
the other day to check something I'd seen on the TV. It booted
up and displayed a screen with writing saying "Configuring
Windows... do not turn off power". All I want to do is to
have a quick look on the Internet, but no such luck... Eventually,
after displaying 100% for an eternity the thing rebooted and,
oh no, a similar "Configuring" message came up again.
I think it was something like 20 minutes before the desktop appeared.
Firstly, with a laptop you either work
from its battery or plug it into a mains supply. What if the
battery was low but entirely adequate for a quick check on train
times? Tough! By the time "Configuring Windows" had
got underway your battery would be flat and, with no mains supply,
the Registry might be stuffed.
Last night, when turning off my Windows
7 PC I noticed an exclamation mark. An update is clearly going
to be installed I thought... I turned off the PC and went to
bed. The following morning the PC took 20 minutes "Configuring"
itself before the desktop appeared. Later a friend called...
my PC stopped working he said, so I turned it off and tried a
repair.... "Is it a Windows 7 system", I asked... Of
course it was, and he'd not waited till the "Configuring"
had finished and was now in a pickle... the PC wouldn't boot
up. This is a very common problem. Lots of people do not sit
watching a boot up process. They turn on their PC and make a
pot of tea. Returning 5 minutes later and seeing what is apparently
a frozen "Starting Windows" after 5 minutes they just
reboot.
Sometimes recovery is straightforward
but sometimes a new intallation of the operating system is necessary.
Microsoft MUST sort out their update
philosophy. Computer users must be getting fed up with having
to sit and wait for something, which is after all, an error in
the software, to be corrected. The public would be absolutely
irate if say, when turning on say a coffee maker or a TV set
or even starting their car they were told to wait 20 minutes
while a software error is fixed first. Microsoft operating systems
should not be sold to the public until all the bugs are fixed
and, if this isn't feasible, at least have these updates carried
out in the background rather than at bootup or when turning off
a computer.
The day after the above updates. My
PC was very slow to boot up and eventually a message came up
saying update 141 of 141 was being applied to the Registry. Bearing
in mind ANY Registry update might go wrong, 141 of them seems
not a good idea...
Stolen hard drive space
I paid good money for my hard drives
running Windows 7. The last thing I need is Microsoft stealing
part of them, which it's done by installing two enormous folders
on the root of Drive C. One's named $Windows.~BT and the other
$Windows.~WS.
I noticed also that an Outlook PST file
was sitting in the "BT" folder. I moved this out to
the Desktop.
If you try to delete these or their
contents you won't get very far, but by using a piece of code
run under Command Prompt you'll be successful. The reason for
the problem is the security system built into Windows. Would
you believe MS have bagged loads of files and declared themselves
the "owner" and you cannot do anything with them, let
alone delete them. That is unless you take ownership of the files
yourself, which is what these routines are designed to do...
copy and paste these lines into CMD:
takeown /F C:\$Windows.~BT\* /R
/A
icacls C:\$Windows.~BT\*.* /T /grant administrators:F
rmdir /S /Q C:\$Windows.~BT\
and:
takeown /F C:\$Windows.~WS\* /R
/A
icacls C:\$Windows.~WS\*.* /T /grant administrators:F
rmdir /S /Q C:\$Windows.~WS\
Now you'll be able to delete them. Note
that the first folder takes ages to complete its change of ownership
so just hang on until it's finished and you get the flashing
cursor...
Now, when I Send/Receive in Outlook,
I get a message that the PST file that I'd moved has gone missing.
I wondered whether to ignore this message or to put back the
PST file. Oddly the "BT" folder was still there (but
empty). Did I forget to delete it? Anyway, I moved the PST file
back from the Desktop to the BT folder and now the message doesn't
appear. So Microsoft is messing around with my E-Mail settings
as well as stealing my hard drive space... this is not good enough!
In fact if Microsoft can find my email
summary file and make a copy in their new "BT" folder,
could they not upload a copy to their own servers? Messing around
with people's emails should be made a criminal offence... then
again I'm pretty sure it is already..
If I choose to wipe out my expensive
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 and replace it with a half-baked cheapo
Windows 10 so be it, but I haven't so I treat this invasion of
my computer seriously.
Second
Thoughts
A customer rang me to say that
his computer had started upgrading to Windows 10. As far as he
knew he hadn't asked it to.. it just started by itself and would
I stop it. Well, the easiest way to stop it is in fact to just
let it finish, then reverse the process.
When it's almost completed installation
an Express button appears, which if selected fills your computer
up with loads of ghastly Microsoft invasive programs. Never select
Express, instead look for the Custom option written in much smaller
font on the left then deselect everything. At least you'll be
able then to quickly reverse the entire process, unless of course
you'd like to try Windows 10. It's not bad when the express options
are not installed... To reverse the process go to SETTINGS, UPDATE
& SECURITY and RECOVERY.
Having just reversed the process
for one customer, a second customer rang and explained his laptop
had overnight installed Windows 10 without asking and now his
PC was doing the same!!!
It seems Microsoft software
engineers have made Windows 10 upgrade an automatic update. It's
about time someone took Microsoft to task and claimed against
their reckless behaviour. How about criminal damage for starters?
Not only does the update install automatically it apparently
decides what to install. When you deliberately install Windows
10 you'll get the option (although this is hidden away) to deslect
invasive stuff that really slows down your computer.
Another Windows 7 user called
me about a printer problem. It seems Windows 10 had installed
itself without his knowledge and his printer didn't work because
no driver was available. His anti-virus had been kicked into
touch also. Fortunately we were able to reverse the upgrade process.
I then checked my own Windows updates and found a "recommended"
update sitting there with a tick in its box. I removed the tick,
made the update "hidden" and turned off Windows 7 updates. |