Posted on 12/15/2016 5:05:04 AM PST by eastexsteve
A word of warning from a retired IT guy with vast experience in multi-platforms. The latest Windows 10 cumulative update dated 12/13 (KB3206632) has proven to be the death of of my Dell Dual Core 780 desktop. I should have heeded the warning signs from the last two big Win 10 updates on this box, as they were troublesome to install, and brought the machine to it's knees both times. But, I was still able to get the machine through the installs both times. This one though, put the machine face down in the mud, and I couldn't even recover it from a previous restore point. I had to do a complete reset and lost everything! Since it was a machine that began with Win 7, that means it cleaned it's clock all the way back to fresh install of Win 7. (Though, I did have a backup of all my data.) Well needless to say, I'll be spending hours re-installing and re-configuring software packages.
I've tried to be a big fan of Windows, since I have software that doesn't have a sister version for Unix/Linux and must run in Windows. And, I can definitely tell that Win 10 is more robust than Win 7. But, This has sent me on another quest to find a Linux replacement for some specialized software that I use.
This has definitely put me in the "If it absolutely positively has to work, don't do it on a Windows box" camp of computer users. Sorry Microsoft. I tried, and I tried hard.
“Samsung is as top-of-the-line as it gets. Steer clear of OCZ”
Thanks for that! I have been reading good reviews of the Samsung SSD machines, but I believe they’re beyond the budget. I don’t know what “OCZ” is, but shall find out shortly. Thanks again :)
MANY thanks!
I am such a techtard I consider myself fortunate if I can even articulate a question.
I'll bet those 50 Win10 lab machines are fairly similar configurations, or perhaps they are 50 instances of a small number of configurations.
The machines that have trouble with updates are most often individual machines with a one-of-a kind configuration of hardware and software.
In other words, the VAST MAJORITY of consumer machines. The ones to which Win10 updates are pushed and installed with prejudice, and on which the users are typically normal non-geek users.
I'm sure you understand that even if 3/4 of the installed Win10 user base reported no problems, that still leaves over 100,000,000 machines with potential problems. If only 1% of those actually experience problems, that's still a million machines.
IMO, Microsoft is again in the position it was in 20 years ago when it started dictating the hardware and BIOS requirements to run Windows 95. They simply cannot do enough testing on the rapid-release candidates to avoid problems caused by unexpected configurations. Period.
Even the "Insider" track stuff doesn't give them enough feedback.
They need to slow the hell down and stop trying to push out updates so damn quickly.
And they should bloody well stop long enough so that their engineers can catch up and UNDERSTAND what's going on inside the OS. You do recall that famous remark in the wake of the Vista release, where one of their top software folks commented that "No one understands what's going on inside Windows. No one." or something to that effect...
Agreed. Hardware designed to run Win10 runs Win10 well.
Win10 typically has trouble on machines designed prior to Win10. There's a reason:
Win10 is NOT designed for back-compatibility, whether at the hardware level, the software level, or the user experience level. It is designed to drag the Windows community into a new environment, kicking and screaming. And surprise, we hear them kicking and screaming.
> I absolutely recommend SSD. Samsung is as top-of-the-line as it gets. Steer clear of OCZ, IMO. I’ve had nothing but problems with them.
Agreed 100% on both counts. I won't use anything but Samsung, and haven't had any failures in perhaps a dozen installs. The only OCZ I had a few years ago sh!t the bed after a couple months.
Could not find Services Desktop ap or app, or desktop ap/p.
(they wanted to spell it with two pps.)
So I searched for Windows Update/s and coudn’t find any way to stop it from restarting on its own. Any other hints welcome.
thank you for that!
I had put together a new pc about a year and a half ago. I tried Windows 10 but I switched back to Windows 7 as Cortana caused the Start button to be unclickable. You could not right click on the taskbar buttons and Cortana would not work (from what I read as I did not use it)
3 times it happened to me and none of Microsoft fixes worked for long. There were issues with websites not loading while others did (all 3 browsers). The fix was to go back to Windows 7.
This problem as I found out was known during the Beta testing. In short they will never fix it.
Here is a very cheap pc that beats Microsoft Surface Pro.
The youtube reviews on the right side say wifi stops working but that is a KNOWN Windows 10 issue. Not hardware but software from Microsoft.
We Compare The Surface 3 to a RCA Cambio Windows 10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXAlvxUFeRQ
The RCA tablet was able to start up the video quicker then the Surface Pro!
RCA Cambio 10.1” 2-in-1 Tablet 32GB Intel Atom Z3735F Quad-Core Processor Windows 10 $108....
http://tinyurl.com/zy88zf3
It seems to be there on the six different Windows 10 PCs I've checked so far. Just type in a search in the Cortana window for "services". Are you by chance NOT the administrator on your PC?
I find “services”, there is a long list of many names. Just can’t find desktop ap.
I suppose I am the administrator. DH’s IT guy at the fire department put Windows 10 on my laptop.
As I said, I am a techtard. I can ask the IT guy if I can’t find a way to stop the auto restarts.
I did find some Windows Update options, but nothing that changed the automatic restart.
That's basically what it did to my desktop. It seemed to have hosed the boot record entirely. The two big Windows installations that I still work with part time are running it in a virtual machine environment. We were assuming that was the bullet-proof way to run it. Thanks for the heads-up. But, if it hoses your VM server, then, you are truly hosed.
The method I described earlier for modifying the Windows Update service to "Manual" is a good, safe way to avoid the automatic update problem, and still allow you to manually trigger an update when you want. Although this is what I did, I still sat right there after manually triggering an update, and watch it kill my desktop without any indication that there was a problem.
The bottom line is that my particular desktop exceeds all the hardware requirements for Windows 10. If Microsoft isn't sure, then they shouldn't publish the requirements.
Well then, try this:
Right click on the Windows icon in the lower left screen.
Choose "Control Panel"
When the control panel opens up, choose "Administrative Tools"
When the Administrative Tools windows appears, double left click on "Services" listed in the right hand window
Scroll down the list until you see "Windows Update"
Double left-click on it, and make the changes I described earlier to change the start setting to "Manual"
Thanks, I’ll try it.
It already was on manual, which is odd, since it is clearly automatic. Oh well...
Sadly, Microsoft takes control of your computer to do updates and you have no power to opt out. My new laptop has Win. 10 and I despise it!
I have an older desktop with Windows 7, but a very slow processor. I need to check to see if it’s possible to replace the processor with a faster one. Probably not. :(
bookmarked
Understand that Microsoft is essentially damned if they do, damned if they don’t. On the one hand, people want all their old crap to work on a newer operating system. Microsoft makes concessions to allow older hardware to work, but they have to protect their kernel. Older stuff required more permissive kernel environments to work. Vendors don’t want to support that older stuff, so they say that Microsoft’s new OS doesn’t support it. Microsoft is the bad guy.
On the other hand, people want a rock solid, secure operating system to prevent their personal information from being stolen to to protect them from themselves when it comes to viruses, malware, etc. To get that, Microsoft has to lock down the kernel and make the operating environment more secure which, by most measures, makes it less permissive. This means that older hardware doesn’t play as well, and subsequently, Microsoft is blamed for making a crap OS.
Can’t have it both ways. Windows 10 is their most secure OS by nature of the hardened kernel in concert with secure boot environments enabled with UEFI. We could go back to open BIOS with MBR-based disks, but modern criminals know how to compromise those systems with little more than an email saying that grandma’s secret lasagne recipe is in the attached Word document.
Our training lab environment is a mish mash of older desktops that we’ve done our best to keep standard but often have different mice, keyboards, and even motherboards. The secret sauce is configuring the domain to keep everything standard and prevent our users from elevating their rights.
Once people start using Windows similar to how Apple and Linux works where the default login is a simple user while execution of administrative programs requires elevation, Windows will be much more secure. But then we’re back to the OOBE of Vista which everyone bitched about and MS had to pare back, because those UAC pop ups were apparently too much for the average person to work around. *SMH*
Funny you should mention that. My old computer experienced a major motherboard failure of some type last week. I went out and bought an inexpensive Dell Inspiron 3650 preloaded with W10.
The new computer has on-board Intel graphics. My old NVIDIA GT620 graphics card had me spoiled as far as good color rendition, etc. The only way I could get the new machine to recognize the NVIDIA card was to go into the BIOS and turn Secure Boot OFF and enable Legacy ROM. The graphics are much better.
Guess I'll just have to run the risk.
:)
If it's on "Manual" there's no way I can see that it would automatically update. If you have any doubts, go back and choose to "stop" the service, and I know there is no way it will automatically update. Just remember, you will have to start the service again before you can even do a manual update
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