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Thanks for answering Kirsty and OscarCP.

I’m not usually “lazy” about reading existing posts to find answers however, this time, my outreach to you was out of desperation and frustration more than anything else.   Seeing there was now a section on Apple products on this great AskWoody forum, I thought I’d ask the question outright, thinking someone might have a more “efficient” channel of communication with Apple rather than the more “official” mainstream one.

I really like and depend heavily on my iPhone but I’m so dissappointed to see what direction the OS is taking.  Why can’t these developers make something simple and efficient instead of always trying to add “bling”.

Note to Moderators: You can close this thread, question answered!

Thanks.

[John in Mtl]

Despite 5 years of working on it, Windows10  is  still   UGLY.

“Nothing about the Windows 10 desktop is helping to integrate applications. Nothing about the OS is getting easier to use or more stable or more secure.

Each new release is just being bloated with more and more junkware that can’t be turned off, presumably to help sell the next gen of hardware.” – Noel Carboni

… My thoughts exactly!  Thanks for spelling it out, Noel.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 3 months ago by John in Mtl.

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Kranium, ryegrass, doriel, Fred

Another thing to consider is the kind of internet service you have.  As an example, I still use DSL at home, so its a residential DSL. Those are usually limited in the upload direction to +/- one tenth to one quarter of the downolad speed because its an “asymmetrical” line, purposefully limited by the ISP so as to discourage home users from running web servers, among other things.

If you are on cable it might be different but I doubt it if its a residential service.  Business service and lines are usually “symmetrical”, so whatever your download speed is, the upload speed will be close to that.

What you are aiming to do with cloud based backup is to upload to the cloud; so if you have residential (asymmetrical) service, expect it to be rather slow in uploading gigabytes of data!

IMHO, from a strictly security point of view, one should never install an OS while the box is connected to the internet and not yet patched with security updates.  That’s my modus operandi anyways.  Of course, you need access to another machine to download the patches, drivers and other software and store them on suitable media for use on the new box; so it might be a problem or a hassle for some people.

[John in Mtl]

Here’s another example of tricking users into thinking an option is not available: at the beginning of the summer, Ebay changed the colour of the  check box “stay signed in” from blue to light grey – the kind of light grey that suggests the option is “greyed out” and thus not available (when in fact it is!).  Of course, the check mark is in the box, effectively tricking you into thinking you have no choice but to stay signed in to all of the linked accounts.  This way, Ebay, Google & Facebook  can keep tracking you everywhere you go and gather interesting data about you!

• This reply was modified 5 years, 7 months ago by John in Mtl.

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radosuaf

Wow, such history here! Great.  My favourite program in the 80’s was Ashton Tate’s dBase. Incredible what you could create with this thing.  Even better was when Nantucket came around and made Clipper, the dBase compiler.  Ah the good ‘ole days of pioneering IT !

Today I was looking around for reviews for a product I wanted and got sidelined into watching some YouTube stuff and found this little gem:

Brand NEW IBM PC AT + Model M! Unboxing & Setup

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLy_jEbuY-U

this guy found a reseller on Ebay in 2017 that had a whole warehouse of these brand new IBM AT’s, fresh from the factory…  built in the 80’s, and is creaming his pants as he opens the boxes and checks out the contents, then plugs it in and turns it on after 30 years and… it works flawlessly !  He sure has a very nice pristine condition piece of history now.

I still have a new AT motherboard in its antistatic bag, kept it with the idea to some day frame it & put it up for display.  I wish I had kept the old keyboards I had for the AT, they were the best ever built – lived the tactile feedback and the subtle “clickety-click” the keys made.

 

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wdburt1, BobbyB

I feel sorry for all of you Win10 users.  I don’t currently “absolutely need” windows10, so I’m drama-free on a safe, secure, stable “old” Windows 7 Pro* and can keep working 24/7 without any interruptions or glitches whatsoever.

* = when “Pro” actually meant something!

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Elly, Noel Carboni

You know, IMHO just because Microsoft no longer does its “job” in a competent manner, they deserve all the bad press and hoardes of unhappy customers wielding insults at them, that they can get.  If there is enough critical mass their stock value will diminish, and this is what needs to happen – hurt them in the pocketbook – for a change in corporate culture to ever be taken seriously.

This level of incompetence is just insane!

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lurks about, dononline, flackcatcher, Elly, Cybertooth, WildBill

I guess Microsoft no longer thinks it’s their responsibility to provide a decent backup solution.

Yeah but in Win-10 you absolutely have to have Candy Crush, now THAT is important.

(Sorry, couldn’t resist taking a jab at MS and that OS)

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wdburt1, BobbyB

Well, this is another good reason for me to stay away from Windows 10.  Thankfully, we still have viable alternatives to that abomination of an OS.  The thing just is not worth the maintenance and babysitting hassle.

“When in tarnation tests this stuff? Win10 version 1803 bluescreens on brand new Surface Pros? Un-be-lievable.” (PS Woody: shouldn’t the 1st word be “who”, not “when”?)

Unbeleivable is right!!  This is the first time in my long windows career that I’ve ever heard of a disk not being compatible with an OS, excluding the times when there were valid technical reasons spelled out well in advance.

I mean… come on Microsoft, ***??

Edit to remove content.

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Elly, flackcatcher, BobbyB, woody

Amazing chart Woody !  All that history in one picture.  The good ‘ole TRS-80, Apple II, the Amiga, Commodores, and all the windows machines …  My first computer: an OSI Superboard (in 1979 I think) and a few years later a hand-me-down S-100 buss modular orange box with a real mechanical keyboard -:) running CP/M, woohoo!!.  Personal computing sure has come a long way since 1977.  The early years were quite an adventure, where we were discovering everything that could be done with this amazing technology, starting with the very mainstream “8086”, and if you were rich you added an 8087 math co-processor; bumped up your RAM from 6k (yes kids, that’s a whole 6,000 bytes of memory) to 640k for about 600.00$.  My first big project was a theatre lighting board using the Apple II – imagine that, controlling the lighting dimmers with a computer and being able to store all your scene presets in memory.

 

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Elly, BobbyB, Cascadian, fk5353, WildBill, columbia2011, HiFlyer

bobcat5536 wrote:

If they were really serious about making it better, they would change it to Version 1903.

Hehe, if they were really serious, they would start all over again -or- strip it of all the telemetry, snoopware, 90% of apps, ads, forced updating, bloat of all sorts, etc…  My 2cents

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Karlston, Moonbear, Elly, Microfix, Great Lake Bunyip, flackcatcher, Cybertooth, T, Noel Carboni, lurks about

I’m glad Windows 7 and 8.1 still have plenty of life left in them

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HiFlyer

_Reassigned Account wrote:

Well we all know that Windows 10 has become the red headed step child of operating systems. You can tell him no, but he will still get his way some how. I have resolved myself to the fact that my Windows 10 PC is not mine anymore, its Microsoft’s. I have somehow accepted in all the gibberish EULA that Microsoft can do whatever it wants to my PC.

Somehow, ‘ole Winston Churchill’s words still resonate with me. “We will defend our land and our skies…  …We shall never Surrender!“. So, stuffit, Microsoft!

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HiFlyer