Technology

beatings will continue until morale improves

Literally got a full screen pop up in the middle of work reminding me, that I, in fact, can't upgrade to Windows 11. Like no shit, I turned TPM off for that very reason. You'd think Microsoft would expect me to know at this point as this was the upteenth reminder hijacking my entire screen. I'm sure I'll get more of them.

I can't help but feel like there is some confirmation bias going on here in these numbers. Someone who still uses Kaspersky after all of the Russian government allegations is probably someone who also doesn't care if they can't update to windows 11 because they don't intend on spending more money for security patches.

I use Win11 on my main computer for work and school reasons. I need maximum compatibility and reliability and it has met those goals. Back in the day, I used to use Linux on my old laptops and I dual-booted it on my main PC. It has been awesome seeing how far it has come and I would like to get back into it some day.

That being said, a huge barrier for Linux and prospective new users is the community. The Linux community is highly combative and toxic and it absolutely sours what should (and could!) be a great experience. Almost every interaction I had while troubleshooting had some level of condescending attitude or outright hostility and there were numerous times I was directly insulted for asking for help - the most recent being a couple years ago when I was trying out a distro and had sound driver issues.

Makes me miss windows 7.

https://xkcd.com/528/

How much of this is people not wanting to upgrade vs not being able to upgrade because their PC isn't supported?

What?! Are they not emphasizing that the start menu has moved from the left of the screen to the middle of the screen? Really seems like that alone should hook people.

I got Windows 11 just because my work pc was Win 11. I learned where everything got moved. I use Bazzite Linux at home now. Loving it. Learned a lot and I'm still learning. Now I need to learn how to overwrite Windows 11 with an older version without fudging my GRUB (again, I really don't like having to fix that thing)

$10 says a future win10 update includes a killswitch. If it hasn't already

they did convince me to upgrade to linux mint 22 tho

Have the not learned anything? In 30 years of windows releases???

To get customers to upgrade, they have to release Windows 12. We only upgrade every other major version, because every other major version is terrible. Including W11.

It convinced me to ditch dual booting and to go full Linux

Yeah, because if I did then in another 5 years it would be the same thing with Windows 12. Then 13. And so on. So I'm ditching Microsoft entirely in October and moving onto Mint.

Microsoft has given users fair warning, and said that users can get a year of updates for free but eventually the company will have to face facts and extended support beyond October.

We can’t recall a time where Microsoft has done such a thing but these are extenuating circumstances given that most users just aren’t budging.

WTF is this guy talking about? Far as I can tell this is the Win7 playbook all over again. Looking it up, this was the timeline:

Jan. 13, 2015: Microsoft ended Mainstream Support for Windows 7.

Sept. 6, 2018: Microsoft announced the ESUs for Windows 7. The ESU program is a paid service that provides critical security updates for legacy products for up to three years after Extended Support ends.

August 2019: Microsoft announced a year of free ESUs, but only for select users, including customers with an Enterprise Agreement or Enterprise Agreement Subscription with active Windows 10 Enterprise E5, Microsoft 365 E5, or Microsoft 365 E5 Security subscriptions. This was limited to only Government E5 stock keeping units.

Jan. 14, 2020: Microsoft ended Extended Support for Windows 7.

Jan. 10, 2023: The ESUs reached their end of life on the first Patch Tuesday of 2023.

That's almost a decade of post-end of support updates. If anything, MS confirmed ESU before trying to shut down home user patches this time, so it looks less like terrified backpedalling. And as the linked article itself admits, the data they're reporting on shows a significant number of users still on Win7. The article waves it away as just "too many", but the original report says 8.5%.

Because, as it turns out, the kind of people using Kapersky antivirus software and the number of people who would not upgrade from a 16 year old OS that has lost support half a dozen times over the past half a decade show significant overlap. In the Steam survey right now Win 7 is only 0.07%, for reference.

While we're at it Win 11 is 60% vs 35% for Win 10. For all the headlines when Steam shows Linux growth you don't often hear over here that Win 11 went up by 0.5% and Windows overall went up by 0.36%, although it's worth noting that Windows has been pretty stable between 94 and 96% since the survey started.

I've said it before and I'll keep reality checking it: the Win 10 end of support process has been wildly overhyped, particularly among Linux-friendly circles. It is not meaningfully different to moves out of other "good" versions of Windows and it's not a catastrophic crisis point for MS, for better and worse. They'll keep support up for the people who need it for as long as they're willing to pay and most legacy home users won't even know their old Win10 is unsupported because it'll just keep happily chugging along with all the same malware it already has until something breaks and they have to buy a new laptop with a preinstalled Win11 or 12 or whatever.

The most the Win10 death hype is doing to hurt MS is create a flurry of social media posts that can convince tech savvy, Linux-curious users who were previously held back by lack of gaming support to give user friendly distros a try.

Win 11 launcher is pure shit.