Category: Windows 10

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It Never Fails

Amid my gaggle of computing devices, I have a couple of Win10 computers, and I use them fairly regularly (right now, for example). One thing that annoys and amuses me in almost equal measure is the behavior of Windows Defender in labeling software of which I approve as “potentially unwanted software” and modifications I make to system elements (like the hosts file) as “dangerous,” when all those programs and mods do is limit Me$$y$oft’s privacy intrusions, tracking, etc.

I do go ahead and rescan those “dangerous” (to Me$$y$oft’s nefarious intentions) applications labeled as “PUPs” with trusted third party antimalware even though I scanned them with multiple trusted third party antimalware applications before I installed them, and invariably the third party software calls ’em good (because the only “malicious” behavior they have is limiting bad behavior by Me$$y$oft, of course).

So, far, the rule is invariable: safe, effective blocking of Me$$y$oft spyware is gonna be labeled as malware by Me$$y$oft. Of course.

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Better Than One Note?

Well, for me it is. YMMV, of course, but ANY time I can get a third party app that works as well or, preferably, better than a Me$$y$oft app, I snap it right up.

Zim Desktop Wiki. I installed it as a portable on a flash drive. Handy for me. Available in flavors for various OSes. Also handy.

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Just More Typical Me$$y$oft Woes

ACK. I hate Win10, sometimes. Usually it is. . . juuuust usable. But, when an installation needs repair, quite often I have found that a wipe/complete reinstall is needed. Refresh option? “Automagical” Me$$y$oft “repair”? Sucks dead bunnies through a straw. *meh* _Sometimes_ works. And yeh, there are other options, but usually they SDBTAS as well (Oh, you’ve made a .wim and expect to recover from that? You are so cute. . . ). If there is no usable THIRD PARTY full system backup, things get sticky. WinPE and a refresh/repair installation sometimes works. But sometimes, a fresh hard drive and full reinstallation of OS and all apps is just the only way to go. . . Resurrecting data files not found in a recent backup isn’t all that hard (especially if they’ve been mirrored to a NAS as well), but seriously, Me$$y$oft, why is Win10 so fragile and why do the built-in “repair” tools SDBTAS? Oh, right. Because you can do it and still expect users to continue to lap up the sludge. . .

If I did not need Windows for ONE app, I’d be gone on all my personal comps. (ONE app that WINE does not work well to use under ‘nix OSes *sigh*)

(Yeh, I resurrected a lil lappy a couple months ago w/a HD replacement/clone op, but this is different sitch.)

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Sometimes (Actually, Quite Often) Problems Can Be Interesting

*headache* An “old” (more than a decade) Windows Vista computer ended up on my to-do list yesterday (NOT mine *heh* I’ve never had a computer with Vista installed.) It needed to be upgraded to Windows 10. Yeh, sure it could have just had a modern ‘nix OS installed, but the user wanted to see if he could use it once again for gaming (still quite a powerful machine with great graphics), so Win10 it was. But a direct upgrade path to Win10 from Vista just doesn’t work all that well, so. . .

Oh, wait. he couldn’t recall his password, either. Fixed that first.

So, as I was saying, burned a DVD with his desired data. Then. . . no, despite having it as an option in the BIOS, the USB image of Windows 10 for which I had a valid product key would not boot, so. . .

Burned a bootable image of the USB drive to a DVD R(DL)–the last one I had on hand (‘cos I just don’t use those much anymore *shrugs*). Got to 36% of files copied on the installation and. . . borked. Retried and. . . borked.

So, what now? Easy-peasy. Looked up an installation disk for Windows 7 Ultimate in my archives, copied down a valid license key and installed that. (I still have a few legitimate ones for Win7 and quite a few other M$ OSes and products, from “back in the day”)

As soon as it booted, I inserted the USB drive with a purchased copy of Win10 (with legit license) and Bob’s your uncle.

Coulda been a PITA, but was. . . doable. Now to use my bandwidth and data allowance to configure a desired software suite, make Win10 usable, disable all the “phone home” crap, and. . . will have a happy camper.

Fun.

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Finally Caved In

Admittedly, our diverse and “integrated: home network involves devices using (at least, by last count) six different OSes, though most are just different versions of Windows, Linux (and another ‘nix OS), and Android, but of the Windows boxes, only one was still using my fav, to date, Windows version, Win7Pro. Oh, well, no more. One hour into the upgrade, and the installation process notes 12% installed (though it lies; it’ll take quite some time to get it really installed, locked down, and configured). Amusing thing is that although I really only needed a valid license key, the least expensive license key from a genuine M$-authorized retailer was only available by purchasing a USB drive with the installation files. It was a little over $1 cheaper than purchasing a license key “with download.” Didn’t need the flash drive (have the latest installation files; I download them monthly just in case someone needs repairs that Win10 borks on–it’s happened more than once), but bought the flash drive/license key combo, ‘cos, well a lil over $1 cheaper and included a flash drive I could repurpose.

I only, finally, caved, because recent iterations of Win10 work pretty well with a music transcription software I consider an essential program (and no, it does NOT work well on a Linux box, no matter how much I have tweaked WINE–THE reason I kept that particular Windows box at Win7: poor Linux execution of Windows calls on that software and slightly hinky operation in earlier Win10 operation). Oh, and Me$$y$oft is making their noises about end of support for Win7. Still not real happy with some parts of Win10 (and utterly despise some others *cough* Cortana among those *cough*), but it’s good enough for some uses.

After that computer is set up right, time for monthly checks on the ‘nix boxes.

Just maintenance stuff.

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Pet Win10 Peeve

There was once a time when Windows 10 was not as bad at managing local network connections. Sure, it was a couple of orders of magnitude slower than Windows 7 in doing so, but at least, once sharing & etc. were “turned on” things were fairly easily (if, again, slowly) “seeable,” but as the inevitable and very nearly unavoidable “update” cycles have progressed, access to local network resources has regressed.

If saving a file from the internet, for example, it doesn’t matter what browser I use, whether a VPN is engaged or whatever, if I want to save it to anything BUT my local machine, I have to type in the IP address of the resource I want to save it to. Then, it I only have to just twiddle my thumbs waiting on Win10’s execrably slow access of LAN resources.

Similarly, if attempting to access other LAN resources (computers, NASes, etc.) via “Windows Explorer” file management. . . no network resources available, no matter WHAT I have set up in “Network and Internet Settings.” In fact, every now and then, at apparently random times, the stupid “Network Discovery is Turned off” error pops up. I check, and no, it is turned on. Turn off/back on anyway. Semi-fixed: no error popping up, but still have to either use manually-created shortcuts placed on desktop, on toolbar, etc., or type in the resource address. (Yes, as a result of Win10’s stupidity, I have finally given ALL LAN resources fixed IP addresses).

Oh, and yes, I have made sure all the dependent services, etc., are set to start automatically and are running, and that–again–network sharing is set properly for a “private” network, etc., etc. Me$$y$oft’s Win10 still screws it up, usually sooner than later.

It’s as though Me$$y$oft engineers have sat and thought, and thought, and thought, and said (collectively), “Here’s something that will REALLY screw with users. Let’s do it!”

#feh

Why couldn’t Me$$y$oft at least be like Linux developers and fix something and then move on to creating more problems.

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Me$$y$oft’s Windows Update Process Sucks Sewage

So, since I was closing in on 10,000 wins and no losses in what I call “Zen Freecell” (the “classic” Windows 7 version), Me$$y$oft decided to kill it on my Win10 box. Naturally. That’s not so bad, since I only played it while doing other things (watching a movie, listening to music, whatever) for relaxation. It’s not as though it were any kind of challenge. But it’s just a symptom of the kinds of things Me$$y$oft has taken to doing to users of Windows, such as the REALLY irritating things like resetting all the associations with non-Me$$y$oft software to only Me$$y$oft versions, if included with any sort of Me$$y$oft OS build. No thank you. Re-associating programs each time I open something Me$$y$oft wants me to use one of its crappy programs/apps to open is only likely to encourage me to move this box off their OS, too, no matter how much I need Windows to use ONE particular piece of software.

And all of that is after clearly and specifically designating a day and time for updates to be installed and having Me$$y$oft just effectively say, Screw you. I’m gonna wait until you are doing something productive and kill what you’re doing by rebooting to install “updates” no matter what I agreed to in the scheduling process.”

Me$$y$oft is trying to make me hate it and its products. And, you know, it’s working.

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Thought Experiment in a RW Situation

So, my Wonder Woman’s lil personal notebook began exhibiting some serious problems.

The “Black screen after login” issue
When video regained, extremely slow non-response (click, wait several minutes, whatever was invoked finally displays, etc.).
Hard drive light on, solid. Task Manager (again, problems loading TM) showed 100% hard drive usage, almost constantly.

So, I knew what the problem was, generally, but thought to meself, “Self, approach this as a moderately intelligent non-techie would approach it,” and searched the web on those behaviors. Sure enough, failing hard drive was the consensus among views.

Now, I could have dragged out some serious tools, but decided again to limit myself to the above parameters and just used whatever hard drive repair tools are built into Windows 10, invoking a hard drive scan and repair the easy way by shutting the computer down mid-boot a few times (it was taking almost 10 minutes to get to the login screen anyway,
so I just emulated the behavior of a frustrated non-techie, to wit:
“Maybe if I shut it down and restart it. . . ” *heh*).

Continue reading “Thought Experiment in a RW Situation”

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The Continuing Search for a New Web Browser

Since more and more sites are becoming even ruder about browser use–going well beyond simply browser sniffing, now–Opera 12.18 is starting to become a little more difficult to use as a default browser. It still does work fairly well, apart from aggressive attempts to lock “old” browsers out by some sites, but only in Windows 7 and 8/8.1. Windows 10 seems to simply not “like” it.

Sad, because it has many features other “modern” browsers–including Opera ASA’s “Chopera” (an Opera browser based on the Chrome rendering engine)–either lack or do not implement as well. Mouse gestures as clunky or just weird in most other browsers that implement them natively, and mouse gesture extensions have uniformly proven to be crap. Newsreader integrated into the browser, no add-in required? Nope. Granular–really granular–control of features/customization? Nope. Bookmarks that really work and can be easily organized? Nope. Even the best at importing Opera bookmarks and allowing organization requires laboriously reorganizing each separate folder and sub-folder, one at a time. That’s a bit tedious when one has a couple of hundred folders and thousands of bookmarks. (I treat bookmarking sort of like a library card file catalog: I want everything saved where and how I want it, organized into subject folders and searchable any way I want. Yes, I weed my “catalog” pretty regularly to eliminate dead links. Doesn’t everyone? 😉 )

I could go on and on, because there are many, many features baked into the “old” Opera that are just not present or are poorly implemented in all the other browsers I have tried. The one that comes sort of close to being a replacement, but even it doesn’t allow real customization, has clunky mouse gesture implementation, lousy bookmark organization, no built-in newsreader, and doesn’t let me choose my preferred default search engine, even though it shows a procedure for doing so! #gagamaggot

OK, so just checked again. Since the last time I tried and became disgusted with it, Vivaldi Browser at least does now import my bookmarks and does–almost–sort them, at least closely to their original organization. Manual sorting thereafter looks straightforward (though still tedious). But the rest? *meh* Notsomuch, it seems. *sigh* For example, it limits the number of “Speed Dial” columns to six. I prefer ten. Why bake in such stupid limitations? That’s just one of many such dumb ideas.

Still hunting.

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OS Gymnastics?

Nah, just some light calisthenics. Not even breathing hard(ly). *heh*

So, I started testing out Win10 on some old hardware about seven months ago on a box that had had WinXP, then Win7. *meh* Apart from all the “phone home” junk, as long as Classic Shell’s installed, not too bad compared to Win7/8/8.1, so when I got a new playcompy (the lil notebook I’m writing this on), I went ahead and installed Classic Shell to make its Win 8.1 more usable, then “upgraded” to Win10 and locked it down.

It works OK, for a Windows box.

So, my Wonder Woman kept asking me when she should upgrade her Win8.1 notebook (a sibling to this lil playcompy). This last weekend I said, “OK, if you want it, fine.” *heh*

So, clicked on the Win10 upgrade icon in her system tray and. . . Windows Update. Search. . . search. . . search. . . No updates found and. . . no Win10 upgrade, either. #gagamaggot.

So, downloaded the M$ Media Creation Tool and am now installing Win10 on her computer with that. Probably should just have downloaded the ISO, but just don’t really care all that much. Maybe later.

Even though the M$ Media Creation Tool works, this upgrade was no faster than any other Win10 upgrade I’ve done, clocking in at around 2.5 hours from start to mostly finished. Another hour locking it down, uninstalling crap apps my Wonder Woman will NOT use, configuring Windows Update to NOT update w/o a user request, etc., will take another hour or so, counting double-checking to make sure the configuration actually takes. (Win10’s kinda sneaky about changing configs behind the user’s back, sometimes. No, really.)