Windows 10 - MicroSoft getting pushy.

[John 2]

Brilliantly conceived piece of software. Manfred/Dan, thanks for the heads up.

[xpatUSA]

For those still wanting to wait a while:

http://www.theguardian.com/technolog...tomatic-update

Reminds me of another large company

"You will go to the Cloud and cough up monthly whether you use it or not . .

. . resistance is futile . . we will assimilate you . . ."

[rpcrowe]

Since I am using Photoshop CS6 and will for the forseeable future (I own the program), I will continue to use Windows 7. AND... since I have both OnOne Perfect Photo Suite and NIK Software as my CS6 plug-ins, I don't feel any need to Upgrade CS6 to CC. AND #2... at my age, (75) I don't see me upgrading cameras from a pair of 7D and one 5D2 so I won't need to upgrade the ACR portion of Photoshop.

I HATE ADOBE... because, every time I try to upgrade, the upgrade fails and I am hanging way out on a limb. Trying to upgrade in order to open RAW files from an SX-50 HS bridge camera left my Photoshop in limbo. I am still hanging out on that limb with the Photoshop in limbo.



I had all kinds of problems with my computer the last time I tried "upgrading" my Photoshop. I will take care of the "partial" and "incomplete" upgrade of Photoshop the next time I have my computer technician over to service my computer.

I don't know if it has any connection but, right after I tried to upgrade my Photoshop to accommodate my SX-50 HS RAW files, I began getting messages that "YOUR COMPUTER IS NOT RUNNING GENUINE WINDOWS" and telling me to click to correct this.



I bought the computer with Windows installed from a reputable computer manufacturer. I am sure that the "NOT GENUINE WINDOWS" announcement is malware or virus, just waiting to jump into my computer if I click "RESOLVE THIS" button. Although it may just be a Windows 10 scam. It is a pain when you cannot trust Microsoft!

I have just located a YouTubd video in which a twelve-year old kid will instruct me how to get rid of that message.

[Tringa]

Richard, I had the "Windows is not genuine" message on one of my machines sometime last year. It appeared out of the blue, one time I switched on the PC and everything was fine, the next time I got that message.

I did a bit of research but could not cure it. However, it has had no impact on the PC.

The most annoying thing is that I built the PC myself and bought the copy of Windows 7 from one of the largest retailers of computer hardware and software in the UK.

Dave

[Geoff F]

Yes, I had similar problems after upgrading my camera from 7D to 7D Mk II and CS5 Raw wouldn't accept the new camera Raw files. Eventually tried to 'force' an upgrade of CS5 and ended up with it being downgraded to a 30 day trial version.

Then after doing a bit of research and running the results through a calculator I did upgrade to Adobe CC, but just the cheaper photography only option of CC plus Lightroom without all the extras which I would never use. Everything working fine now.

Incidentally, I still can't upgrade my operating system from 7 to 10 but, as other people have mentioned, I'm not at all worried by that!

[DanK]

Dan - I can vouch for it and have run it on several of our family's computers. I recommended it in posting #3 above.

Sorry--i had forgotten that when I came back to this thread

[Simon Garrett]

I've recently upgraded most of my machines to W10, more out of practical expediancy than out of choice.

I kept W7 on most of my machines until recently. I set manual updates only, and hid a whole list of W10-related updates to keep out the sneak-ware. I had W10 on one backup machine (a nine-year-old machine) so I could evaluate it, and my wife bought a new laptop in December which had no choice but W10. Then I upgraded my main machine to have 32G memory, and as W7 Home doesn't support more than 16G, I upgraded that too, and I'm now running W10 on most of my machines.

With the addition of something like Classic Shell (free) to put back a W7-style start menu, it's fine.

I don't like being pushed into it by Microsoft, and it has some irritations like automatic updates, but on new processors (Skylake onwards) it's faster (than W7) for things like graphics rendering.

I'm not advocating Windows 10, I'm just saying that IMHO if you have to use it, it's OK. It's not as bad as some make out (provided it doesn't trash your machine during the install, which seems to be fairly uncommon). And, IMHO, it's much better than Windows 8 (that's not difficult, mind you).

[NorthernFocus]

Well, I finally succumbed to the irresistible force. Bought a new laptop with W10 on it. The change from W7 has been just as painful as I anticipated. Microsoft partnered with a third party vendor for a utility to migrate from old to new PC. I was skeptical as to how well the utility would work and my low expectations were justified. The app transferred files, photos, etc. very well. Of course those are the things quite easily done manually with a thumb drive. I succumbed to the advertising and paid the extra $30 to painlessly transfer all of my programs without having to re-install them. Yeah, right. I'd have gotten more satisfaction out of burning the bank notes.

There is a relentless push to force us all into cloud/mobile based apps. One victim of that effort is email. Thus far I have yet to figure out how to migrate my email files from old laptop to the W10 laptop. You can use Outlook online and migrate from old PC to that, but can't figure out how to get it from cloud to hard drive on new PC. Very frustrating.

If anyone out there has solved this riddle please speak up.

[Acorn]

I quite like Windows 10, although since installing my Spyder4 screen calibrator does not function correctly in spite of downloading the latest software from Datacolor, the manufacturers, and following other advice from them. I'm thinking of changing to Colourmunki.

[davidedric]

Re email.

Dan, I don't know if this helps, but a couple of years ago I gave up on Outlook as an email client and moved to (free) eM client http://www.emclient.com which I find better in every way. It was on the same computer, but it came with instructions how to export from Outlook and import to eM, which worked fine. I can't see why it wouldn't work between computers.

Dave

[John 2]

Dan, your outlook files are resident in your MS Office file set and therefor shouldn't be dependent on which operating system you use. It's normally merely a question of copying the files from your old computer and reinstalling them in the same place on your new computer. I've done it several times when rebuilding my desk top as I have upgraded. I can never remember quite how to do it and so I resort to microSofts help article here. I usually save the files to a separate HD but a thumb drive would work just as well.

P.S. M S make it sound complicated because they cover all of the bases. You may find this from PC World easier to follow.

[Cantab]

Dan, your outlook files are resident in your MS Office file set and therefor shouldn't be dependent on which operating system you use. It's normally merely a question of copying the files from your old computer and reinstalling them in the same place on your new computer. I've done it several times when rebuilding my desk top as I have upgraded. I can never remember quite how to do it and so I resort to microSofts help article here. I usually save the files to a separate HD but a thumb drive would work just as well.

P.S. M S make it sound complicated because they cover all of the bases. You may find this from PC World easier to follow.

Dan, I did much the same thing when I added Windows 7 as a dual boot to a computer that previously ran only XP. I found lots of helpful info on the internet about which files need to be moved so that your Outlook mail and address book end up on the new system.

[ionian]

I downloaded it when it was first available on my laptop, which is a couple of years old. The keyboard didn't work. I couldn't find an updated driver at the time and had to go back to 8.1. I expect I'll try again as I'm not a huge fan of 8 anyway.

[NorthernFocus]

Thanks for all the suggestions, folks. I wasn't previously an Outlook user. I've been using Windows Live Mail on Win7. The method of exporting/importing mail files or simply copying them to a new computer has always worked. But on Win10 there isn't a utility for the import and the files aren't in the same file location that they've always been on other versions. At least I can't find them there. The only way I could figure out to get the files off of my old machine was to export from Windows Live Mail on my hard drive and import to Outlook on the web. Still can't figure out how to get them onto the hard drive on the laptop. Doesn't seem like a big deal but when traveling it's awfully handy to be able to access stuff without being online.

The whole Microsoft system(i.e. Office, Outlook, OneDrive, etc) is designed to fit together very well. The problem is that if you don't use (and pay for) the whole system, then it breaks down. They are so focused on wireless tech that there is very little consideration any more for stand alone functionality. The whole system is self-perpetuating.

We've had the same internet service plan for the past six years. When we signed up I think it included 15Gigs of data. Over time, without our asking for it they've upgraded the service to 60Gigs and we've been "grandfathered" in at no extra cost. Nor have our on-line habits changed. We aren't big users of streamed content. But without any conscious changes in content usage, just the differences in website design, news delivery, etc., now we are near our 60Gig limit by the end of the month most times. It really is astonishing.

[DanK]

I use outlook, which handles this automatically--when you first log onto the server, it creates local copies--but I have an idea. Since you used to copy the local files normally, I assume you know where they live in Windows 7 and what their extensions are. how about this: Set up a copy of windows live on your windows 10 computer, and send some mail to yourself to create a NEW local folder on the windows 10 machine. Search the machine for that extension to find out where the file is stored under windows 10. Then copy the old ones to that location.

[NorthernFocus]

I use outlook, which handles this automatically--when you first log onto the server, it creates local copies--but I have an idea. Since you used to copy the local files normally, I assume you know where they live in Windows 7 and what their extensions are. how about this: Set up a copy of windows live on your windows 10 computer, and send some mail to yourself to create a NEW local folder on the windows 10 machine. Search the machine for that extension to find out where the file is stored under windows 10. Then copy the old ones to that location.

I tried that, Dan. There aren't any files with the same extensions used by Win7 Live Mail. If you are using the version of Outlook that is included in MS Office, it is different than the mail app that is bundled with Win10. They appear to be making a concerted effort to ensure that paid software and free apps don't cooperate. No surprise I guess

[tao2]

It's old news that Win 10 is being "sneaky". Microsoft's objective is the millions of folk who don't update their PCs regularly, then blame MS for all their woes. They are taking the Big Brother route tae protect PCs, not tae control them. Ye can accept or reject that route or remain with yer OS of choice, there are alternatives - Apple/Linux.

It's been made perfectly clear that, in order tae have a trouble-free installation, all MS iterations must have all the latest updates installed before WIN10 is downloaded and installed. There will still be teething problems with a percentage of installations. Many folk hark back tae Vista and all its problems, what they don't talk about is the 12% of users who had major problems with the much -loved XP and that's down tae humanity's selective memory.

The great majority of incompatibilities with Win 10 and software, really is down tae the software manufacturers delays/failures in updating drivers...it was always thus (and is for all OSs). A number of posts here are along the lines of "ah tried this and something broke, then ah read the proper instructions and it worked". OSs don't break PCs, people break PCs.

Have a read here for a few recurring themes on the web...

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2008385

http://www.askvg.com/genuine-windows...tivated-again/

https://imgur.com/gallery/3Iy8AwQ

http://www.theguardian.com/technolog...blems-worry-me

from a year ago...http://www.windowscentral.com/report...67-million-pcs

To those having email problems. Ah use ...Thunderbird and have done since its inception, no spam, no viruses, only mail. Ah would recommend it tae all - again read all the information and make an informed choice.

No PCs have been hurt preparing this piece. Ah do not work for MS but believe clarity is essential and not regurgitated, apocryphal tales....

[Mike Buckley]

To those having email problems. Ah use ...Thunderbird and have done since its inception, no spam, no viruses, only mail. Ah would recommend it tae all

A note to all: I had an issue with Thunderbird not working properly and Boab new exactly what to tell me about how to configure it. Immediately after following his instructions, Thunderbird worked flawlessly on my system and has done so ever since. He knows what he's talking about.

[NorthernFocus]

...The great majority of incompatibilities with Win 10 and software, really is down tae the software manufacturers delays/failures in updating drivers...it was always thus (and is for all OSs). A number of posts here are along the lines of "ah tried this and something broke, then ah read the proper instructions and it worked". OSs don't break PCs, people break PCs....

I did quite a bit of "market research" to decide which laptop to buy. The only thing I had decided was that it had to be small and light, at least two USB ports, and with tech specs capable of running LR. I was open to virtually any manufacturer. And of course I wanted it at minimal cost.

I read dozens, if not hundreds, of user reviews. One thing that I noticed across the board is that there was no model/manufacturer that was getting high marks overall on the newest model machines. Another thing that was odd (statistically speaking) is there were very few average rated reviews. Everyone seemed to either love or hate their new machines. And most of the haters were due to major malfunctions right out of the box. The three most common complaints were video drivers/locked screens, wireless adapters not working, and wonky trackpads. There seemed to be an inordinate number of problems with hardware being incompatible with Win10 straight from the manufacturer. It's really astonishing that the machines even make it through a QC check and get shipped. But apparently they do.

The only reasonable explanation that I could arrive at given the statistical anomaly mentioned above is that all of the manufacturers still had older bits of hardware in stock that were incompatible with Win10 and said hardware was making its way into the laptops. Presumably at some point drivers will get updated and/or inventory will work its way through the supply chain. In the mean time there are a lot of consumers getting the short end of the stick unless they purchased from someone with a liberal return policy.

[Mike Buckley]

I did quite a bit of "market research" to decide which laptop to buy.

I did the same thing before buying my laptop a couple months ago. I went with red.