Windows 10 Fed up with Win 10

[floppybootstomp]

That does not sound like fun!

So that cheap Win10 key was probably a dodgy volume licensing key which shouldn't have been sold by the sounds of it. Cheeky.

Well, the fella I spoke to at Microsoft confirmed my activation code was an official one but for Win 10 Pro and NOT Win 10 Pro Education which is what my disc package was labelled.

So it seems the Amazon third party supplier are at fault with their labelling.

And I can't say I'm too impressed with Microsoft interacting with a motherboard BIOS in that way, very much Big Brother.

Right now I'm 50/50 about scrapping Win 10 and installing Win 7 with a Linux Distro on a dual boot setup. Unless I can wait til Friday and see what happens. They're supposed to be phoning me then.

 

[floppybootstomp]

Microsoft e-mailed me 4 days ago saying they'd phone me today between 10:00 & 11:00 to try and activate my Win 10. They didn't.

They did call at noon but I had to go out then on urgent business so declined their offer.

But the lady did say would I like her to call tomorrow between 10 & 12? So I agreed to that, I hope she does call.

If she doesn't call, definitely ditching Win 10 and loading Win 7 again.

Before all this kerfuffle I played Call Of Duty 4 on line most days of the week. It won't play now, since the new install. I loaded Win 7 on a separate disk on another machine and CoD4 played ok online on that.

Gears Of War 4 is supposed to play on Xbox One and Windows 10 but it won't play on my Win 10.

And I currently have a very up to date and well-rated machine.

More reasons why I've pretty much lost confidence in Windows 10.

I wish it wasn't like this, I do actually want the latest MS OS but it's frustration after frustration and I only have so much patience.

 

[Abarbarian]

Right now seriously considering going back to Windows 7 and using it just for games and using Linux Mint for everything else.

I never updated to 10 and am glad I did not. Been using 7 for main gaming and Arch linux for games that work on linux and all everyday stuff.
A friend uses Arch and if he needs any Windows stuff he runs it in a VM on Arch. As he has a very modern pc this works nice and smooth.

Apparently VM's are easy to set up and use on a linux host. Using a Docker to run Windows would be a good way to go I recon and even easier to set up and run I would think.

 

[floppybootstomp]

Microsoft Windows 10 Pro 64 Bit is now activated on my computer. Ta-da!

The MS lady called me at 12:20, tookover my machine and took 35 minutes to sort it.

Here's what the problem was: when I tried to activate the OS online using the activation process within Win 10 it asked me to enter my Microsoft account and then the password so I used the account I used with my Xbox One.

Then another screen pops up that says something like 'We'd like you to enter your Microsoft password again just to prove it's you'. So I entered the same password again and that's where things were going wrong.

What the second prompt wanted to see was the password I used to sign into Windows 10 when my machine is started which is not the same as the one I use for my MS account. Sayeeda (for that was the lady's name) talked me through this part of it and let me know I had to enter my signing in password. I think she'd sussed what the problem was.

As soon as I did that she completed the activation and signed out from remote control of my machine.

The only quirk here is that now, when I restarted the machine, I have to use my MS account password which is different to the one I was previously using, which in itself isn't a biggie. So now I can personalise Win 10 and set my own desktop picture

I still have 2 pressing issues though, I've learnt the reason I can't play Call Of Duty 4 online is the majority of servers use a Mod named CodX18 and if I haven't had it installed then I can't connect to any servers using the mod.

The normal procedure is when connecting to a server running the mod I will be prompted to install it then patch it from V17 to V18 but that isn't happening here, an internet server search for all game types only turns up 4 non-modded servers so I'm kinda snookered.

The mod is available to download and install into the CoD4 directory (within Steam) but it hasn't worked for me, it just keeps saying 'Can't install a file within itself' so I'm baffled.

My other issue is a copy of Microsoft Office 2010 I bought from Amazon and had activated and used since August last year. That won't activate now, it tells me the activation code is wrong. It didn't cost much, around a tenner I think so maybe it's an iffy copy. But if so how come it activated last August?

I only want this MS Office 2010 to open old Publisher files and a few work-related documents, I actually use Libre Office full time now but it's still irritating. I suppose I'll be phoning their helpline again to try and activate Office 2010.

I'm pleased my Win 10 is now all pucka but say it together:

'We all love Microsoft!'

 

[floppybootstomp]

And just discovered the sound had re-routed itself to play through the Monitor loudspeakers

Control panel/Sound/ made digital output default and now plays through my DAC again via Asus Xonar card.

 

[muckshifter]

'We all love Microsoft!'

It's a love / hate relationship ... if all's well, then we all just carry on, if not, we gonna tell the hole world.

oh, and I now have Win 10 1709

 

[floppybootstomp]

It's a love / hate relationship …

Very true.

I managed to get Call Of Duty 4 online working. After the Win 10 activation I uninstalled CoD4 from Steam including the folder that was left behind then re-installed the game.

I then added all the user maps , the modded Punkbuster folder (Punkbuster have stopped supporting this game), one modded file and my user profile.

This time when I searched for servers, dozens of them were listed and the first server I connected to installed the latest CoD18X mod.

I did lose all my ranking despite adding my up to date profile but after a few hours playing I've progressed about 5 ranks already, so soon I should be back to how I was prior to all this bother.

Tomorrow I think I'll try and activate MS Office 2010.

 

[muckshifter]

Tomorrow I think I'll try and activate MS Office 2010.

not permitted ... it's a Bank Holiday, have the day off, rest the blood pressure.

 

[floppybootstomp]

Seems ok now apart from a couple of quirks - every now and again the sound (Asus Xonar DGX PCI-e into a DAC then amp/speakers) defaults to the Monitor loudspeakers and when I go to print a document from Libre Office Win 10 has made the default printer the PDF reader (Foxit) after I've set the default printer to my networked wireless Brother colour laser.

Damned annoying. I've installed Spybot Ant-Beacon so haven't been troubled with update nags.

I haven't tried activating MS Office 2010 yet and tbh I may not even bother. I've installed an old copy of MS 2007 on my bedroom computer which includes Publisher and that version opens all my saved Publisher files so that'll do. It's all I need it for.

If I need to create new Publisher type files I shall use Scribus within Linux. I'm going to install Linux Mint on the bedroom computer as a dual boot with Windows shortly.

 

[Terry James]

Windows 10:

Hard disk activity led is constantly flashing, Win 7 does not do this. This can only mean that Microsoft is constantly monitoring me and/or writing to the parent operating system.

Win 10 upgrades would kick in when I was gaming online and make my game activity prone to heavy stuttering and in some cases freezing, which is terribly frustrating in the middle of a firefight, especially when you’re winning.

I finally figured out how to 1) Reschedule upgrade times and 2) Turn off upgrades altogether. But still I’d get the same gaming effect as although MS were not installing upgrades they were still monitoring. And sure enough when I excited my unplayable game and returned to the desktop there would be a popup window from MS saying ‘You need to install some updates’ or similar.

So in the belief that maybe some overkill would cure this problem – which is a bit daft I know – I allowed the download and installation of the latest Win 10 ‘Insider Preview’ release which is basically the latest Win 10 beta release. This made the problems a little better but did not entirely stop them.

Since the insider preview installed I’ve also been receiving lots of popups, all different ones, but the main two are ‘Would you recommend this Windows Insider Preview Release to a friend?’ and ‘What’s your favourite new Windows 10 feature’ to which my answers, atm, would be ‘No I ******* wouldn’t’ and ‘None of them’

It’s still trying to push Cortana and the Edge browser, very very irritating. And hard disk activity led is even more active since the new install.

On Saturday evening MS, after I allowed permission, installed a lengthy upgrade to this new version of Win 10. I have been playing Borderlands 1 offline again and ever since the Win 10 ‘upgrade’ this game has been stuttering and freezing, despite me having the latest Nvidia drivers installed.

I think this may be the final straw, I’ve been using Win 10 more or less since the day it was released but to my mind it has proved itself to be a whole lot more inefficient and annoying than Win 7. In my opinion Windows 7 was the best OS MS ever released. Rock solid, stable and light on the data gathering and constant monitoring/upgrading.

So, I am seriously considering going back to Win 7 as I am sick and tired of Win 10. This is not a throwaway ‘threat’ or idea, I mean it, and I’ve already starting backing up non-cloud savegames for the swap.

I really wanted to like Win 10 and I would always prefer to have the latest version of any OS and I even paid for a version of Win 10 after the initial ‘freebie’ but enough is enough, what’s the point of getting annoyed and irritated using an OS that seems to be doing it’s best to totally rub me up the wrong way?

And just by way of mentioning, my original paid copy of Windows 7, after changing to Win 10 from Win 7, still installs using the original code and also will download and install any available Win 7 updates. And I’ve saved the Win 7 Service Pack One to a disk.

I’m not anti-Microsoft and neither am I a fanboy, I’ve given them a fair crack of the whip but I can’t stand this any longer. I’ve said it before but I would probably use a Linux Distro exclusively if it wasn’t for only being able to play some games on a MS OS. I also realise that one day the latest game releases will not play on the outdated Windows 7 but C’est La Vie, we’ll deal with that problem when the time comes.

 

[Terry James]

Hi floppy, I did exactly that on one of my PC’s, and regretted it. I managed to get it back to Win 10.

I agree with you whole heartedly re Win 10 intrusions & that Win 7 was the best but going back to it, it was not as good as I remembered, and not as good to use as Win 10.

I am still considering changing Linux, but on the couple of times I have tried it (I use mainly Excel & Word) I could not get on with the Linux spreadsheet.

 

[floppybootstomp]

I am now back to a 'normal' version of Win 10 and seem to be getting along with it ok. The mysterious 'printer defaulting to PDF reader' quirk righted itself, I know neither how or why. As for office I now use Libre Office Writer and Calc as my main office software (their equivalents of Word & Excel) and yes, they were awkward to get along with at first having been used to MS Office all those years but like any Software after some use I'm now comfortable with Writer & Calc.

In fact, thinking about it, each new version of MS Office took a little getting used to. I do have an old copy of MS Office 2007 which is used solely to email quotes to contractors and companies and I use Publisher to view and use old Publisher files. But even MS Office 2007 won't open Publisher files from around 1997.

Gear of War 4 STILL won't work in Win 10 for me though and I'm using a fresh install. I've given up with that one.

One recent anomaly: I just bought a game named Yooka-Laylee from GoG in a sale for £10.49 and it's meant to work with an Xbox 360 controller, which I use, but it didn't. So I installed the latest controller driver for Windows 7 64 Bit (the latest driver available from Microsoft - none listed for Win 10) and the controller now does work within the game. But to be fair that probably would have happened with Win 7 as well.

I now use Win 10 on my main computer and Win 7 and Linux Mint Cinnamon V18.3 64 Bit on my bedroom computer. The bedroom computer is based around an early i7, a 4-core, possibly one of the first generation. Win 7 is working fine with it but I currently can't get my Auzentech X-Fi Prelude 7.1 sound card to work in Linux Mint, I'm going to have to search for a solution for that one.

 

[crazylegs]

Wow after reading that little lot, I'm glad I'm still using my Win 7 Home..Trouble free of course for the last umpteen years now..
Mr Flopp's I do hope you are now trouble free with your installation!

 

[Trex]

The latest Windows Updates (2 separate cumulatives) literally locked me out of my own system, stating 'Your password was changed on a different device. You must sign in to this device once with your new password, and then you can sign in with your PIN.' After attempting several other approaches to this issue, excluding system restore, I was literally forced to "hack" into my own system. I'd hoped to alleviate the problem with less time and effort using some of the advanced startup options, but I was ultimately unable to access Command Prompt or Safe Mode.

In the end, I burned a Windows 7 Recovery disk on a separate computer, but struggled to get the computer to boot from it. I had to change the boot sequence, completely eliminate the hard drive as a boot device, and still received the 'non-bootable device' message. After letting the system fall back to its last resort, a boot selector called Infinity 2.2, it took opening the DVD drive, immediately closing it again, then selecting HL-DT-ST DVDRAM as the boot device before I was finally looking at a Windows logo, spinning the circle of dots as it loaded the files.

Still, short of initiating a system restore, nothing worked. Refusing to roll back to some recent restore point, I resorted to more unorthodox methods which I am hesitant to describe or explain here... suffice it to say I highly doubt it would be posted in Microsoft forums, and it definitely wouldn't be something Microsoft Support would walk you through or suggest. The majority of advanced users would likely be able to guess the steps involved anyway. I'm not withholding for any other reason than it being a potential violation of this site's rules, policies, and/or regulations. None of this is the point, anyway.

My point is... I still like Windows 10. I realize I hold no sway with anyone here, but if you haven't already developed eye strain from reading the first couple chapters in this novel, perhaps you would consider the backstory to all of this. Aaaand on that note, here it is:

I loved Windows 7 too... and, like a massive amount of others, I refused to upgrade to 10 even if they were offering it for free. Microsoft offering that free upgrade actually convinced me even further... like... yeah, right... since when do they give their OS out for free unless you buy a new system? In a nutshell, I was one of those stubborn, bullheaded people adamant to remain with what I know and loved. Something happened not long after that... causing the purchase of a new system, and, inevitably, it came with Windows 10.

I had every intention of completely formatting the hard drive but... I didn't have a Windows 7 disk and they wanted $100 for it back then. My mind was so made up that I was still going to pay the C-note to get Windows 7 but while I was biding my time saving the cash, I had tinkered around Windows 10 and eventually, to my surprise (total surprise) and evident enough to overrule my bias in favor of Windows 7, I liked Windows 10.

Just wanted to share that... because I was pretty much the same way. But yeah, its true they keep plugging one hole in the dam wall while causing two other holes to bust open, shooting water in all our faces. But hey... it serves as a catalyst to learn and familiarize yourself with the OS that much more. At any rate, I'm not 'doggin' your comment... actually, I agree with you. I loved Windows 7, and the free upgrade to 10 they offered way back when was a 'beta' of the OS, released with the intent to have the public 'test' it for them.

They've come a long way though... I honestly like it better than Win 7... just wanted to share that should you still be bias towards it.