No significant change in February usage numbers for Win10 or Edge

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Win10 may be up or down; Edge still moribund InfoWorld Woody on Windows
[See the full post at: No significant change in February usage numbers for Win10 or Edge]

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If you believe StatCounter, Win10 usage stepped up nearly a percentage point from 32.84% in January to 33.8% in February, … At that rate, Win10 will take over Win7 usage in less than a century,

At a percentage point per month, wouldn’t it be less than a year?

(If Windows 7 is decreasing by .3% per month: “Windows 7 … StatCounter says it went down a bit from 47.46% to 47.17%.”)

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Like HOW?! Now we know who uses Windows 10 :D.

0.3% x 12 = 3.6% per year.

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Yes, I did that bit of math. Did you do the rest?

In 11 months, Win7 is less than 44% and Win 10 is more than 44%.

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Well, yes:

http://gs.statcounter.com/os-version-market-share/windows/desktop/worldwide

W10 is 33.81%

W7 is 47.14%

47.14 – 33.81 = 13.33

13.33 / 3.6 = 3.7 years

 

is it less than a year?

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Aaaaarghhhh, my bad. Haven’t read it carefully enough :). You’re right.

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Actually, you’re both right… Less than a year IS less than a century… Just sayin’… ☺️

 

1 user thanked author for this post.

woody

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Same here.  I work for a large organization that buys computers by the pallet, and everything gets reverted to Windows 7, no matter what it came with.  Starting a new OS for everyone in the organization is very tricky, especially when so many of the programs are specialized interfaces for large uncommon machines.  I think they’d prefer to stay at just one OS for the next century, if possible, but they’re forced by the end-of-life problem.  I’m really glad I don’t work in IT, because I can’t imagine what they’re going to do when Win 10 is the only option.

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When things get more complicated, it gets better for IT 😉

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Doing a very rough bit of curve fitting it actually looks like 3 to 4 years to me…

Of course that presumes that Win 10 will take market share away from every other operating system but Windows 7, and that Windows 7 won’t do a nose dive when it falls off support, and finally that Microsoft won’t actually make Windows 10 better any faster than it is now.

I’d love to think that last factor will change, but the disappointment just keeps on comin’…

-Noel

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Wow I didnt think the last few months of giving Edge a chance would have brought such a, “Ahem,” dramatc rise in numbers. I havent seen an insiders build for a while (nope not in the Prog.) but I am guessing that the development of Edge is “still sleep walking” here’s 3 pet peeves yet to be satisfacorily addressed, failure to create a “right click” desktop shortcut and you can also add same functionality for “refresh page”. When you import the favourites from IE11 it creates a folder with them in rather than displaying them all in the menu. Yeah I know if you go digging theres a way to get them to display without creating a fresh folder but its hit and miss at the best of times and more than the average user wants to do. My fervent hope is that in future editions they dont drop IE11 and make us all have Edge or nothing. To that end the allow/blocking (covered in previous woody article) of 3rd party apps may even preclude installing other browsers. As usual the silence is deafening from M$. It really has got to the point on somedays that rather than percivere with Edge I just use IE11. For other browsers on offer yeah I give them a try once in a while but still a bit lacking in some respects whether unfamiliarity with the GUI or basically aesthetics but thats me 🙂

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With flatlining usage, where are the using going? There are about 20 million PCs sold every month. W10 should see steady growth for these sales alone. Flatlining means about as many are abandoning W10 every month as are added to the user rolls. Where they going?

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Elly, Noel Carboni, woody

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Windows 10 not gaining market share. That is a big story and here is why…

Because there is no Windows 7 in new computers any more, all new computer sales add to the Win10 count. The fact that the overall market share stayed flat can only mean more people have switched back to 7. Keep also in mind that there is a natural evolution that takes place as Windows 7 computers die. Win7 is sticking at the 47% market share level.

I believe the real underlying story here is that Corporate purchasing is rejecting Win10 big time. Corps are buying Win10 new machines and installing Win7 in them.

Unless they are all smoking some stuff at MS, they should be realizing that they have a significant problem. I expect Microsoft to put on another aggressive upgrade campaign.

CT

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At least 3 of my former business colleagues have recently purchased refurbished-off-lease computers just to get Windows 7 instead of 10… Two of those computers came from the refurbishers with Windows 10 installed, but with rollback rights my friends quickly exercised… All 3 say they will likely make the move to W10 somewhere down the road, but see no reason at all to give up Windows 7 before it reaches eol in 2020… I would not be surprised if this is taking place on a wider scale.

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Leading up to October 2016, I reviewed the configurations of every one of my 150 client computers. I isolated those that could last another 4 years and ensured they had Windows 7 installed, and did some upgrades. Then I identified every one that looked like its lifespan would not be 4 years and strongly encouraged those clients to replace their computers with brand new Win7 machines.

At this point: Not one has made a purchase since then. Every single one has Windows 7 installed. Some of those replacements were really good buys. Most of my clients have a set of DVDs that have an image of Win7 on their specific machines.

I have advised my clients that Win7 is the last Windows they will ever want to use.

As a group, every one of these computers is on Group W. Not a single Windows update since last September. Not a single problem. I should add that they are all protected by Bitdefender 2015 Antivirus Plus. My clients are happy people who have good computers that work well with a minimum of hassle.

CT

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Just out of curiosity – what is wrong with Windows 8.1, apart from a bit weird interface?

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really nothing at all wrong with Win8.1 However Win8 was a bit of a disaster (thankfully I missed that along with Vista) I dont know who thought about leaving out the start button on Win8 but it was a bad move as novice and reg. users alike invariably look for that on starting up. One of the machines round here runs all 3 Win7,8.1,10 quite happily all together on the same machine. The only problem is when it comes to update time you got 3 times the worry. Well mainly Win10’s antisocial habit of forcing the issue of updates that alas req. a bit of work to stymie. 3 different styles it makes a nice change once in a while to use somthing different 🙂

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In 2012, OEM Win 8/8.1 cptr hardware came with mandatory UEFI/GPT and Secure Boot, which made OS installation more complicated,
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/55699-63-easy-systems-windows-installed-disks

With Win 8/8.1 cptrs, the OEMs stopped providing Product Keys and free Install/Recovery DVDs, which were replaced by just a Recovery partition inside the internal HDD/SSD for the users to do an OS Refresh or Factory Reset, like for hobbled smartphones.
Many cptr dummies who experienced HDD/SSD disk failure could not recover their Win 8/8.1 OS.

Win 8/8.1 has the Fast Boot/Startup feature which can complicate certain processes,
https://www.howtogeek.com/243901/the-pros-and-cons-of-windows-10s-fast-startup-mode/

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I always build my computers myself, so no worries here :). And I have Fast Boot disabled.

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Just out of curiosity – what is wrong with Windows 8.1, apart from a bit weird interface?

Out of the same curiosity, what is wrong with Windows 10, apart from the same a bit weird interface like the one found in Windows 8.1?

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Quickly, like this? From memory:

Even harder to tweak, settings scattered more, harder to find features you know from previous versions.

Photo App is horrible and not color managed. Seriously, I had to bring back the acceptable Windows Photo Viewer as if you have a wide-gamut monitor, your pictures will all look horrible, stretching colors to extremes.

Calculator is slow to load and the previous one was fine thank you.

I see you want to go all apps MS, I get that and it makes sense in your vision, but the new apps are less good than the previous ones.

Harder to see which window is active if you don’t have a title bar like in Firefox, the color don’t change, only a small contour of the Window.

Logitech mouse I have feels weird, like floating and imprecise. I tried playing with the settings and disabling acceleration with a program, never got that comfortable feel I have on 7 with this mouse and ended up switching mouse.

This one is a big deal for me: Windows search don’t work anymore on 1607 unless you press documents to filter after searching if you moved the special folders to another partition using the supported way you described in an earlier post.

I don’t like Cortana, I don’t want it.

I don’t like Edge, don’t want it as default web browser.

Don’t want apps running in background all the time when not in use.

I don´t want that what I do on the computer, my searches and things sent to Microsoft, the usual things that has been said over and over.

I don’t like my OS to change all the time, I don’t like to be sent little messages about Cortana being able to help me find a restaurant now or whatever while I work, I don’t like that features upgrades don’t keep old drivers and that I have to manually reinstall the same old supported drivers after the feature install so the printer work again.

I don’t like that preinstalled software from manufacturers don’t necessarily disappear when uninstalled from program files. They are still in the star menu sometimes, broken. It is not clear if a driver can install some app at the same time and they are tied. Everything just seems more confusing if you don’t dig deep.

I don’t like to see car games, candy crush and other c*** on my start screen, I don’t use that.

I like Win-X, improved command prompt, I like newer version of Refs, I don’t really use DirectX right now but suppose it would go in the positives. What else do I care for in Windows 10? I am not sure I can find anything else, nothing is coming to mind easily.

Win 8.1 is actually very good after tweaking a bit. I just don’t like the full screen start menu for psychological reasons as I find it distracting to not keep my background desktop and windows in view, but it can be easily undone with Classic Shell I think? No, the biggest problem for 8.1 and that is why I upgraded all stations I had for free to Win 10 is I think that support for 8.1 will drop quite fast from third-parties vendors like some did with Vista before the end of MS official support and I wouldn’t be surprised MS will have a huge incentive to stop supporting 8.1 once 7 is out and there is only a few percents running it. They should at least offer the free upgrade to 10 to the poor folks who bought 8.

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Yep, the Calculator is terrible – and each Win+”calc” open new instance, while under 8.1 it just brings the only instance to foreground.

But… I don’t like your approach towards 8.1 – if people keep uninstalling it because it’s not popular, it will not be popular.

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I understand your point about 8.1 but when July came, I thought it was better to get the free 10 and go back to 8.1 if it goes too bad later than be stuck with 8.1 when nobody uses it and regret not having taken advantage of the free offer. That happened to me with Vista. I liked Vista after tweaking it, but support has been dropped by Adobe even before XP because market share was too low so the few stations that had Vista were stuck with that issue. Shame on Adobe. I don’t believe it was that hard or costly to support Vista and that shows their disregard for their customers which is unacceptable especially for a big company that serves business users.

Ms really dropped the ball on this one, they should have offered a free upgrade to 7 for Vista users. They rewarded their early adopters by leaving them stuck with what had become a very marginal OS when in fact Vista and 7 were not that different. And since they are so similar, they should also have given 10 to Vista users. In reality, they used Vista’s home and small businesses users as unpaid beta testers to polish the unfinished OS turning it into 7 and then having businesses wait for that to hop from XP, never having touched Vista or maybe through software assurance so they got 7 anyway, leaving the SMBs and home Vista users with the problems.

You never know, maybe once Win 7 reach eol in 2020 there will be a big push towards 8.1 as the last good enough Windows. I doubt it, though. I predict there won’t be enough critical mass. Gamers need VR and DirectX 12 and to get the full benefits of this, you need 10. A lot of others don’t perceive 8 as that good because of the Start menu and the dumb charms menu. 8 was terrible in many ways but 8.1 is actually very good if you cut the c***. Unfortunately, it is a bit asking too much of common users to do that themselves.

Maybe corporations could use 8.1 for three years on a refresh due in 2020 if they can still buy it and that would give them 3 more years before something else.

In a certain perspective, I don’t think that 8.1 is that great because it still has that app store, and is more unfinished in terms of UI than 10, it doesn’t get the command prompt improvements… Its main advantage is it won’t change all the time, it doesn’t have Cortana and the spying Edge combo, but still, I think if your point is to send a message to MS that you refuse 10, it doesn’t really matter whether you are on 7 or 8.1 as long as you don’t use 10.

I highly doubt I will get those 10 stations back to 8.1. I think Ms will have a huge incentive to kill 8.1 in effect even if not officially. Once 7 is out of the way, they will push much more agressively their new way of doing things with their apps and everything integrated and they will find all kind of reasons why this doesn’t work as well on 8.1. Maybe I am wrong, but I don’t think 8.1 has a great future, unless there is a really big rebellion when 7 dies. I just think many will choose the theoretically unsafe path of unpatching. Big Enterprises will have tools to manage 10, others will contribute to make the Internet a less safe place along with their IoT stuff.

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I haven’t heard anyone in the corporate world to like 8.1. It is installed, not in many places, but it would certainly not be a choice against Windows 10. Even if they were considered equal, reverting to 8.1 would be considered backwards and unlike with Windows 7, there are no compelling reasons to roll-back 10 to 8.1.

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AlexEiffel

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Windows Photo Viewer is already installed in Windows 10 but not registered. 🙂
A bug or intentional implementation? Maybe an Easter Egg?

I found a good replacement for the old calculator which is named… Windows7 Calculator 🙂
This is a 32-bit desktop application and I copied it manually under Program files (x86) and created a shortcut to it in the Start Menu.
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Science-CAD/Windows7-Calculator.shtml

Some people copy the Microsoft implementation of the Calculator from Windows 7 and use that one instead.

Logitech mouse I have feels weird, like floating and imprecise. I tried playing with the settings and disabling acceleration with a program, never got that comfortable feel I have on 7 with this mouse and ended up switching mouse.

You don’t normally need a third-party program for disabling acceleration. I do it too by going to Control Panel and under Pointer Options de-select Enhance pointer precision.
I also set the Scheme on None and de-select Enable pointer shadow. I do the same on Windows 7 too.

I don’t use any of the apps as I run as full administrator and they would not launch. I don”t have any interest in running Edge. I had enough of it since the times when I was running the Insider versions. Firefox and IE11 for sites requiring the ActiveX functionality like the Catalog are more than enough.
I also have the Store and Cortana disabled in Group Policy.
If you need indexing to work on the moved system folders or any other folders, you have to go to the Indexing Option in Control Panel and add the desired locations there (as Administrator).

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Elly, AlexEiffel

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I also have the Store and Cortana disabled in Group Policy.” – tell that to “Home” users.

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Elly

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I have already told them long time ago.
They should upgrade to Pro or use whatever Microsoft has reserved for them and let Microsoft manage their computer and not complain. Or use a different product.

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Thanks for the tips. I prefer to avoid third-party software as much as possible and always was able to cope with the OS for the basic install part, but this time, I had to consider them. I didn’t install Classicshell until Win 10 because it fixes the search issue.

Please note I went to indexing options to add the folders, I always did that in all versions relevant, but it is not a problem of indexing. It is a bug that if you move special folders and then search, your search result won’t appear on best matches and you will have to manually click on documents each time to see it. How lame! I use a 1607 French version. It didn’t do that on 1511 I think. If you use classic shell to search, it just works.

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I didn’t install Classicshell until Win 10 because it fixes the search issue.

Which search issue?!

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The one we had the conversation about. That if you move special folders to second partition, no search results from there appear in the best matches and you need to click on documents to see them. I find that incredibly irritating as I constantly use Windows search.

Yes, I did change the indexing options properly and moved the folders using the supported way. This is on 1607 french version. don’t know if it works in English.

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ch100

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no search results from there appear in the best matches

I might not understand the issue. I am an administrator more than a user 🙂
I think the quoted extract is the relevant part, which I will try to understand. Specifically, right now I don’t quite understand what means “best matches”. However I believe that it is what appears first after typing in the search box. Because I rarely use that search, except for applications and normally use the one in File Explorer for files, I ignored this issue.
I was not even aware that files should come up under that search.

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Yes, you got that right. This is what first appears after you start typing in the search box brought by pressing the windows key only. Please note you probably need to have Cortana enabled for the bug to manifests itself. I disabled web results and set Cortana settings related to max privacy using the GUI, no weird tricks. I moved the special folders using the supported way, I changed to indexing options to make sure the documents are indexed, hey they show up if I filter by document.

It is terribly annoying for someone like me that searches that way efficiently literally hundreds of times per day. So I tried classic shell for the first time (never bothered with it before but I should have) and it solved the issue.

I reproduced the issue very easily on a few computers.

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And may we ask you what, as a user, not a sysadmin, you like about Win 10 vs before? and maybe what you dislike?

And maybe consider the Pro version, not enterprise since users at home normally can’t have access to Enterprise.

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Elly

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@ch100 does it take you that long to find an answer or you didn’t know I was referring to you when I asked? ?

I respect your right to stay silent, but I am genuinely interested in knowing what you think. It wasn’t a rhetorical question. I am sure the community here would benefit from what you think.

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Pro version has almost all features of Enterprise.
I am not providing examples based exclusively on Enterprise, unless unintentionally, by mistake.
What is missing, the policy Disable all apps from Windows Store?
Has anybody tried the policy from Windows 8, under System\Internet Communication Management\Internet Communication Settings

Turn off access to the Store?

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And may we ask you what, as a user, not a sysadmin, you like about Win 10 vs before?

It is really not important what I think about Windows 10 as a user.
And I am not into promoting products, but rather in clarifying how to use correctly a given product, good or bad as perceived by its users.
For me, Windows at all levels, but mainly the server version, is a brand/product in which I am specialised and which pays those who understand it, sometimes quite well.
Windows 10 is the next version due to be adopted and it doesn’t matter if it is better or worse from my point of view, it will get adopted regardless. I am not a typical user and I can use any OS for home use. For Linux, I prefer the Red Hat development because Debian/Ubuntu development to me looks less “professional”, more like a “home” product, although there are nuances and I am fully aware that this is not entirely true. I don’t currently use Linux though, except for some Enterprise products built on top of Linux.
Do you feel better now?

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AlexEiffel

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I can give you 3 examples of home Windows systems then never really got widely adopted:

a/ ME

b/ Vista

c/ 8

I do hope 10 follows the same path :).

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You are right about all those operating systems, but think about timing.
Windows 10 will replace primarily Windows 7 as Windows 8 and its enhanced follow-up 8.1 were never adopted widely.

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ch100 says – You are right about all those operating systems, but think about timing.
Windows 10 will replace primarily Windows 7 as Windows 8 and its enhanced follow-up 8.1 were never adopted widely.

According to millions of “obstinate” Win 7 users, Win 10 is worse than the not-so-good Win 8/8.1, in terms of loss of user control and privacy; … and so Win 10 is not worthy as a replacement for Win 7.
Many Win 7/8.1 users are getting ready to transition to Mac or Linux in 2020/2023 if things remain the same. Some already have.

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Elly

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That is true, but bear in mind that (as Noel wrote one day), Windows 7 will just not fall apart on Jan 14, 2020 – as far as I recall, Firefox for XP is still supported for a few months, 3 years after the OS was officially “dead”.

Of course, businesses will jump to a supported version of Windows – but home users not necessarily so.

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1. Forced updates.

2. Metro bloat that cannot be removed, even with PowerShell.

3. Forced application installs (Candy Crush Saga and so on…), I know there’s a registry hack for that but:

a/ I don’t like the approach

b/ we don’t know for how long will it work

4. Telemetry/privacy issues.

5. Cortana.

6. Resource usage (compare memory usage on a clean install at desktop – W7 vs. W8.1 vs. W10).

7. Scaling issues – at least on my ThinkPad T460s with Pro dock.

8. Ads.

9. Control Panel/Settings mess. On part of that, I find Settings terrible, compared to Control Panel.

10. Completely useless Start Menu (but 8.1 is no good either).

11. Removing useful shortcuts (“Screen resolution” in desktop right-click is already gone, Control Panel under Start right-click will disappear in Creators Update).

Is 11 reasons enough?

2 users thanked author for this post.

Microfix, Elly

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I normally do not reply to anonymous users, but I see that you put effort in your post.
First 10 issues are perceived problems, not real ones, but you are entitled to your opinion as end-user of the OS.

11. Removing useful shortcuts (“Screen resolution” in desktop right-click is already gone, Control Panel under Start right-click will disappear in Creators Update).

The last one is something new for me and raises interesting questions and this is the only reason why I reply to your post as anonymous.
Does anyone know if more functionality was moved from the Control Panel to the Settings applet? Or the Control Panel can be accessed via the Setting applet in the Creators Edition?
This is something that many of us who normally upgrade to CB immediately after release will have to figure out soon.

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That’s an interesting way to put that – “perceived problems” :). If MS deciding what they are going to install on YOUR computer is not a problem and ads within the operating system are not real problems then shouldn’t be surprised 25% of Windows users actually want to use this beta stage “OS”. And not even get paid for free beta testing.

Soooo… with all that cons (even if “perceived”) – are there any pros? I can come up with just one – W10 is that 3 – 5% faster in games. End of the list :).

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How do you conclude that the first ten issues are perceived problems and not real ones?  They’re real to the poster.  You don’t have to agree with them to recognize that they are very real problems to others.

As for me, not having the same level of control over updates that I do in Win 7/8 is a problem. MS wrecked a lot of this by foisting monthly rollups on us rather than the individual updates that have served us well for more than 20 years, but there’s still one saving grace: On 7 and 8, I can get security-only updates, which is all I want anyway.  Security patches and bug fixes are supposed to be all MS provides for 7 in the first place, but unless “it doesn’t have enough adware” or “it doesn’t spy on users enough” are bugs, we know that MS can’t be trusted.  The ability to select security-only updates is important, and that’s something you can’t get with 10.

Telemetry that can’t be turned fully OFF is a problem, and it’s a further problem if I can’t trust it to stay (mostly) OFF.  I’ve heard Microsoft’s excuses about why it’s harmless and why I should not care, and I have rejected them.  I didn’t ask for excuses; I asked for an OFF button.

Windows 8 confused a lot of people with its bizarre dual-mode UI.  When a Metro app opened and brought them to the Metro interface, they could not see where their Win32 programs had gone.  “Did they close?” asked many new Win 8 users.  “Have I lost my work since the last save?”  “How do I get back to what I was doing?”

Of course, in time, people would start to understand the schema, but it’s the polar opposite of the intuitiveness that’s supposed to define a good GUI.

Windows 8’s GUI was really a poor attempt at bringing “apps” to the desktop, but that’s a poor idea anyway, so I suppose it’s fitting.  If you want to run “apps” alongside Win32 programs, Win 10’s way is better, as the apps are integrated into the desktop environment and not consigned to their own separate mode.  That’s part of what I do not like about 10– since I won’t ever be using any “apps,” I don’t want them integrated.  I want them gone!

Windows 8’s wacky dual mode makes it relatively trivial to do that.  Boot directly to desktop (enabled by extensions like Classic Shell, or natively by the 8.1 update), get rid of any apps that would pull you back to the Metro interface, block access to the Windows Store, replace the start screen, use Classic Shell or something similar to kill the hot corners that bring up Charms (the Windows option won’t eliminate the lower right one), and you’ve got a fairly app-free Windows.  There are still a few Metro-styled bits I haven’t yet exorcised, like the wifi connections dialog, the ctrl-alt-del dialog, and the “these programs are preventing shutdown” dialog, but it’s not as bad as what you’re stuck with in 10, where MS has replaced, seemingly at random, various Win32 dialogs with UWP-themed ones.

I don’t want Windows ever deciding to uninstall anything I’ve installed, and I don’t want it overriding my driver choices or my choices for system settings.  I have things set the way I want them for a reason.  I certainly don’t want Windows deciding to put apps on my system without my consent, nor do I want any advertising– ever.  Sure, you can disable the ads… for now.  But with all the liberties Microsoft has already taken, can we be confident they won’t add new ones, or else change my settings to allow the existing ads to reappear?

A commercial product should not have ads.  As long as MS is charging anyone (OEMs included) for Windows 10, it should be absolutely ad-free.  No ifs, ands, or buts about it.

Windows 8.1 can be made to conform with what I expect an OS to do reasonably well.  Windows 10 cannot, at least not without hacks that go deep into the OS and risk destabilizing the whole thing, and that will need to be reapplied each time Windows 10 decides to download a new build that has 20 features I don’t want to go along with the security fixes I do want.

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Elly, AlexEiffel, Canadian Tech

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@ch100 “I normally do not reply to anonymous users”…

Is CH100 your real name ?

Incognito comes in many forms.

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FWIW, “Woody” isn’t my real name, either.

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Woody, at least I know you under few nicknames 🙂
There are far too many “anonymous” and I lose track with which one I have a conversation.

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woody

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I agree ch100. The title anonymous leaves me cold too. Not because the person wishes to be anonymous, just as Woody, ch100 and CT, but because it is a name that may be shared by a large number of people. Hence there is no way to know who you are hearing/speaking to.

I have to presume that the person who chooses to be named anonymous, does not want a response to anything he/she says.

I wonder if some of those people are just too lazy to bother creating a moniker.

CT

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woody, ch100

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Arrrrghhh…. If you insist…

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woody

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🙂

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Many are anonymous for security reasons. (No offense, Woody). Trackers, and so on. Is it possible to set up Anonymous A, Anonymous B, etc? (In answers to specific posts)?

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anonymous wrote:

Is it possible to set up Anonymous A, Anonymous B, etc? (In answers to specific posts)?

I don’t believe that is possible… An anon poster is always able to sign off their posts with their own individual style, and that way they can be separated in a sense, as a few do already.

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Many are anonymous for security reasons. (No offense, Woody). Trackers, and so on. Is it possible to set up Anonymous A, Anonymous B, etc? (In answers to specific posts)?

Just pull the network connection, then pull the power plug, turn off the lights, check for cameras and infrared cameras around your house and within 1 km distance, microphones under the table, in your car, in your pockets and take a walk in the park while watching around carefully.
Even so, someone determined enough can identify you just by posting here as anonymous and this is not so complicated. 🙂

At the end of the day you should show more respect to those posting here.

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Cuts out a few ad trackers and malware, should a nasty ad slip through. You are entitled to your opinion, not a matter of disrespect. Kirsty’s suggestion is a good one. Duh, if someone wants to know who you are…You don’t use adblockers and so on? Anyway, each to their own. One of the good things about Woody is the choice offered.

Semi-Anon

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Elly

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anonymous wrote:

Trackers, and so on. Is it possible to set up Anonymous A, Anonymous B, etc?

Good point, but I don’t think trackers are a problem, unless your internet service provider is tracking you – in which case posting anonymously won’t make any difference.

I’d like to pursue this topic. Lots of people are afraid of signing up because of snooping. I’m concerned about that, too! But it’s important that you understand how very little is being kept on this site.

Could you pop over to this Topic

https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/a-note-on-anonymous-posters/

and let me know why you’d prefer posting as, say, Anonymous B – as opposed to posting as, say, just B? I’d really like to understand!

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AlexEiffel, Elly

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There is a post number next to every reply. Just like this one.

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I suggest you either use a throwable email to register or just sign something at the bottom of the message. Then we know who posts and it remains basically anonymous.

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Elly, woody, ch100

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ch100 wrote:

There are far too many “anonymous” and I lose track with which one I have a conversation.

It’s not that difficult to use the [Quote] button on a new tab within the browser to reply to your chosen ‘anonymous’ user. 🙂

But a quote and reply button would certainly help.

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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Asking questions and participating repeatedly as anonymous (the same user) shows lack of respect for those who post regularly here.
A one off post is in order, but to keep doing so after a while, it is not.

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Yes – more settings are moved to Settings

No – MS starts to pretent Control Panel does not exist :).

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ch100

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@CT

I believe the real underlying story here is that Corporate purchasing is rejecting Win10 big time. Corps are buying Win10 new machines and installing Win7 in them.

You see, the problem is that big corporate normally invests in new machines for the next 3 years which covers the “free” warranty from the hardware manufacturer. Beyond that, the support calls tend to be as expensive as the hardware and due to regulatory compliance, many large enterprises just destroy perfectly good hardware or in some cases sell at auction after the warranty period expires. I have seen a more recent trend to keep the hardware beyond the warranty period and not repair it if it fails, but this approach involves certain operational risks.
Windows 7 on the other hand has no more than 3 years of manufacturer extended support left, after which, the support fees with the vendor will increase exponentially. Again, many large organisations will not allow the use of an unsupported OS beyond that date, due to security concerns and regulatory compliance and will either pay the required fees or discontinue the use of Windows 7 (and Windows 2008 R2).
Which leaves those organisations with the option to invest now in hardware and install Windows 7 and discard that hardware and software in January 2020.
What will happen next?
I know what will happen… 🙂
Windows 10 on internal virtual hardware – VDI or VDI in the Cloud, which is very much the same thing, “Private” Cloud vs Public Cloud.
Not everyone is concerned with that productive market and not everyone has enough visibility of it.
The biggest losers will be the PC hardware manufacturers, while the server market will survive and likely survive well, producing hosts for the virtualisation market in which the main players today are Citrix, Microsoft and VMWare, but the first two are likely the winners in the medium to long term.
Home users? I don’t know, it is open for debate, but in the end I think that they will move on with the times and adopt Windows 10, either in the Cloud or locally on their own PC like it is today.

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AlexEiffel

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Sure looks like a long road for Microsoft with Win 10 and Edge. Of course eventually Win 10 will gain ground, not a whole lot of choice. But dropping the free part of the upgrade certainly killed off any enthusiasm. Maybe people are foolishly thinking a do over is in play for Win 10 like Win 8? Hardly a possibility for a Win 7.5 kind of do over. I can only hope for a reasonable third party fix someday but ain’t holding my breath. Edge on the other hand is flat out DOA, not a chance it’s ever going to win back much. Chrome would have to stumble a lot to push users over to Edge. Most would probably try something else first. Does anyone think Creator release of Win 10 will help? I just do not see it happening for Microsoft.

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ch100 wrote:

Which leaves those organisations with the option to invest now in hardware and install Windows 7 and discard that hardware and software in January 2020.
What will happen next?
I know what will happen…
Windows 10 on internal virtual hardware – VDI or VDI in the Cloud, which is very much the same thing, “Private” Cloud vs Public Cloud.

I’m sure some large organizations are still installing Windows 7 on new machines, but by no means all are doing so. What’s the big management hurdle to actually using the Windows 10 they paid for?

What would be the advantages of virtual in 2020? I can only think of disadvantages like laptops, travel etc.

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ch100

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I think it is rather the cost of desktop hardware and enhanced manageability which would make virtualisation very attractive for CIOs. Also the ease of updating in the context of Windows as a Service is another selling point for virtualisation. This means update once and deploy the updated image vs doing thousands of discrete updates on physical hardware every few months.
I am convinced that most current projects for new SOE have Windows 10 in mind and none or very few have Windows 7. I have more visibility of this market than most other posters and readers here.
But on the other hand, I don’t see any urgency to upgrade, people are taking their time, assess the feasibility, pretty much like in the dying years of Windows XP.

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If Windows 10 Cloud replaces Windows 10 Home, that may shake things up a bit.

There have been some published surveys on the commitment to W10 by IT Pros, IT Managers and CIOs, but nothing more recent than 2015 that was worth a read. The overall consensus of larger corporations in 2015 was that they would be more likely to start in late 2017 or early 2018, giving themselves two years to complete the migration. However, with the recent announcement to the LTSB licensing, that may have changed a few plans. I assume Intel/Skylake (maybe Kaby Lake) and AMD/Ryzen is what will be up for grabs on the hardware front in 2017/2018- decisions, decisions and some dirty dealing will be afoot. Both these companies break every competition regulation on the books. W10 flat lining right now is no surprise to me.

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I don’t understand how people get excited over these statistics moving a little this way or that, especially when they move the opposite way every other month, and the stats gathering services differ from one another by a good bit.

With sample sizes of literally millions the margin for error shouldn’t be a percentage point or two. It should be a tiny, tiny fraction. That should tell you something’s not rigorous.

If someone were tracking my usage, they would chalk up stats that show I run Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8.1, and 10, and another OS not even in the Windows family. Does that match the reality of my usage? No. I actually run Windows 7 on one piece of hardware (from which I don’t browse the web at all) and Windows 8.1 on another. THOSE are the systems I’ve chosen to depend on for real work, day in and day out. All the others are on test virtual machines.

And we haven’t even begun to talk about how browsers could spoof User Agent info. Or how some folks’ IP addresses change because of being mobile, or DHCP address reassignment, or…

Broad strokes. That’s all these stats can hope to show.

Broadly, we can clearly see that Windows 7 usage is remaining stable, and that Windows 10 adoption is mostly stagnant. Not exactly what Microsoft hoped, but exactly what they should expect given an OS that’s technically no better than its predecessors.

-Noel

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Elly, Microfix

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Noel Carboni wrote:

I don’t understand how people get excited over these statistics moving a little this way or that, especially when they move the opposite way every other month, and the stats gathering services differ from one another by a good bit.

Mark Twain springs to mind. 🙂

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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…and we have the latest Steam Survey!

 

Wow, Win10 x64 falling below 50%, W7 x64 gaining 1.7%, pure madness :).

If you compare Dec to Feb, it’s W10 (32b &64b) -1.60% and W7 +1.84%. Nice, although I’m a bit worried about 8.1… AMD has already stopped releasing 32-bit drivers for Windows 8.1.

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Elly, woody

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anonymous wrote:

…and we have the latest Steam Survey!
…I’m a bit worried about 8.1… AMD has already stopped releasing 32-bit drivers for Windows 8.1.

I know what you mean – a well-tweaked 8.1 is arguably better than similarly prepared 7 or 10 systems.

AMD (ATI) has been removing features in their drivers (as seen on 8.1) for some time. I had to stop with Catalyst 15.11.1 myself (FWIW I don’t game) to avoid loss of calibration features. At least that version is perfectly stable.

-Noel

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Luckily I’m on NVIDIA’s side of the fence :). But it’s sad to see manufacturers dropping drivers for a system that is still in mainstream support.

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Noel Carboni wrote:

If someone were tracking my usage, they would chalk up stats that show I run Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8.1, and 10, and another OS not even in the Windows family. Does that match the reality of my usage?

You either use them or you don’t. If they can be tracked as active each month, then you’re using them.

Noel Carboni wrote:

All the others are on test virtual machines.

Does that mean they shouldn’t be counted? (I can’t imagine why.)

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Oh, I did think about that aspect. But it’s more like a 99% / 1% thing.

And I do differentiate being willing to base one’s hardware system on (and trust one’s critical data to) a particular OS, vs. being willing to run that OS in a throwaway environment.

-Noel

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Elly

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Avast Q1 2017 survey:

Win7: 48%

Win10: 30%

Win8.1: 11%

Win8: 3%

Details here: http://files.avast.com/files/marketing/materials/pctrendsreportjan2017.pdf

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Interesting radosuaf. I note that for some reason, I could speculate, Win7 remains at the same percentage as it has been for many months now. Speculation on my part is that the gains for Win10 are coming from the Win8/8.1 group. That actually is easy to understand because the move from 8 to 10 should be far easier.

CT

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New results for March – Net Market Share:

Win 7 – 49.4 % (up again)

Win 10 – 25.4%

Win XP (!) – 7.4%

Win 8.1 – 6.7% (this looks bad)

 

Steam:

Win 10 = 53.3% (up 2.5%)

Win 7 = 35.2% (down 2.2%)

Win 8.1 = 8.3% (no change)

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Noel Carboni, Elly, Canadian Tech

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Wow, W7 is actually growing even in MS statistics! 3rd consecutive month…

https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/store/windows-app-data-trends

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