6 ms·

I'm running two machines (a recent laptop and an older desktop with Windows 10). I've wiped both drives and did a fresh install of a recent Windows 10 vom USB S

by sddfd 8y ago

I'm running two machines (a recent laptop and an older desktop with Windows 10). I've wiped both drives and did a fresh install of a recent Windows 10 vom USB Stick. I haven't had any problems updating and even big updates are fast. This is in contrast to a Dell laptop I got for work and which regularily took 45min to update. If you have problems with your Windows 10, get rid of the crapware that came with your PC and/or do a fresh install from a clean image from MS (not one of the OEM rescue partitions/disks). I with MS would do something about all the preinstalled crapware, because it has gotten out of hand and is hurting the brand.

curiousgal 8y ago
What about the activation? Would Windows recognize the device automatically and not ask for a key?
- bhhaskin 8y ago
  Keys are stored in the firmware on the motherboard. Shouldn't be an issue.
- sddfd 8y ago
  Yes, it did on the desktop. I did buy a professional licence for the laptop though (it came with home).
- ocdtrekkie 8y ago
  8.1 and newer devices have the key in firmware, and PCs upgraded from older versions of Windows are recognized automatically by the activation servers. So in most cases if a PC has ever had Windows 10 on it before, you can just install without a product key and it will activate itself.
x0054 8y ago
Best I can tell the Dell image for XPS 9550 is just Windows 10 with minimal drivers. I think I'll try the fresh Microsoft Windows route, but I want to mirror the drive first, because I don't want to install windows all over again and set up all my apps if it doesn't work. What's a good alternative to something like Carbon Copy Cloner for Windows? I used to use Ghost, but that was a decade ago.
- jacob019 8y ago
  Live boot linux and use dd
  - jimnotgym 8y ago
    That is extremely good advice.
  - x0054 8y ago
    I'll give that a shot, that should work, theoretically. I don't really know all the ins and outs of the new secure boot stuff on windows, would have to read up on that. But theoretically that should work.
    - jacob019 8y ago
      ubuntu works fine with secure boot
- dabockster 8y ago
  > Best I can tell the Dell image for XPS 9550 is just Windows 10 with minimal drivers. I've worked in an IT shop before. Even if the image is just Windows 10 with included drivers, those drivers can include bundled programs and bloatware themselves. I used a Dell laptop in the past with Windows 8 that had a trackpad application which had to autostart and run in the background for the trackpad to work properly. No matter what, that program was guaranteed to be using at least 50MB of RAM. Upon upgrading to 8.1, I had a bunch of OS errors. Turns out, uninstalling and reinstalling the trackpad driver fixed the problem. OEM drivers aren't just the drivers themselves, but often instead an entire suite of programs that bloat your system and interfere with Windows' ability to take care of itself.
- ihattendorf 8y ago
  DriveImage XML[1] always worked the few times I needed it, and you can create the image while booted in to windows. [1]: https://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm https://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm
NiveaGeForce 8y ago
There was no crapware on my Surface Pro (mostly MS Store apps), and I also experienced issues, like this. https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/8g73kb/is_it_how_timeline_is_supposed_to_work/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/8g73kb/is_it_how... I still have the following issue, even though I never installed an insider build on this machine. https://wccftech.com/windows-10-1803-rtm-candidate-bug/ https://wccftech.com/windows-10-1803-rtm-candidate-bug/
kerng 8y ago
Agreed. Following random internet articles to disable Windows Updates is not a good advise. That same user might in a future post complain that a security issues aren't fixed, even though updates were explicitly disabled... My personal experience is that I had no issues updating multiple machines. Advise: Don't follow and change random registry keys and other things based on Google searches - it might become a problem in the future.
- x0054 8y ago
  Well, Windows 10 1803 update is a problem NOW. I'll take future problems over current problems. Also, disabling update service is a perfectly legitimate way to stop the updates from coming in. You can always turn it back on and control the update process manually, when you are good and ready, and have your HD backed up. You can do so on your schedule, not when MS chooses to spring it on you.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
    Exactly. And if Microsoft doesn't like users disabling updates, maybe it should stop releasing updates that break stuff.
    - jimnotgym 8y ago
      That is really easy for Apple to do, with a limited range of hardware they can literally test every device that is receiving the update. Much harder for Microsoft, who are trying to support a vast range of hardware.
      - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
        That's true. So why is it that 7 was so much more stable? Certainly at first I could say that it's just because 7 has been around for eons and 10 is brand new, but it's been out for years now and we're still seeing things break (anecdotally, r/sysadmin was emphatically not happy with the last couple of updates). Is it this thing where they've declared 10 to be the last version and so what we're seeing is major updates that would have been 11, 12, etc. including all the growing pains of a new release? Is it because Microsoft decided to throw out their entire QA division? I'm happy to agree that Microsoft has an extraordinary large problem space across which they try to maintain stability, but that doesn't seem to explain why they would have gotten worse at it.
nickjj 8y ago
Yep. I upgraded to 18.03 about an hour after it was live. It was a very fast and painless upgrade on a ~4 year old workstation (parted out by pieces). I was running 17.09 Pro edition prior to 18.03.
robocat 8y ago
Seconded on the reinstall by downloading the latest Windows 10 installation onto a USB stick. Wayyyy faster than trying to restore from factory image. On different laptops attempting to restore from factory image has failed, or taken more than overnight to get to current version. So far I have had 100% success fixing Windows update issues by doing a clean install from the latest Microsoft ISO.
jimnotgym 8y ago
I have to second this. Microsoft even has a tool to build the latest release onto a USB stick, which for me was the first time I have installed Windows and not had to wait for any updates at all. I had a couple of PC's which were upgraded from earlier versions of Windows when it was free. Installing from USB sure did free up a lot of disk space! Licensing headaches seem to have gone away too. I did one fresh install onto a different hard-drive and it just worked. There seems to be one Windows 10 update which forces a reboot, and then it never happens again. If you build your USB today I donlt think you will suffer that. Putting that aside this article misses one important point. Windows 10 is extremely backwardly compatible with earlier versions. At the day job we have a number of legacy apps, things built in VB6 for instance, and they worked first time on Windows 10. To be clear, we are talking about applications written around 20 years ago, which are still working on Windows 10. I don't run any Apple devices anymore but it certainly wasn't my experience that Apple cared about backwards compatibility back then. RE: same old regedit etc. The enterprise admins I know seem extremely pleased to see these old faithfuls in place. Where Windows 10 has added a new way of doing something (like the new control panel), it is very heartening to find the familiar old version running alongside. I think it is fair to say that enterprise loved XP, hated Vista, liked 7, hated 8 and tolerated 8.1. Enterprise seems very happy with Windows 10 so far.
tom_ 8y ago
I installed Windows on my laptop last year from a presumably-unmolested ISO I got from MSDN - and it took it 10+ goes, at one attempt per week or two, to update to 1709.

by sddfd 8y ago

curiousgal 8y ago

What about the activation? Would Windows recognize the device automatically and not ask for a key?

bhhaskin 8y ago
Keys are stored in the firmware on the motherboard. Shouldn't be an issue.
sddfd 8y ago
Yes, it did on the desktop. I did buy a professional licence for the laptop though (it came with home).
ocdtrekkie 8y ago
8.1 and newer devices have the key in firmware, and PCs upgraded from older versions of Windows are recognized automatically by the activation servers. So in most cases if a PC has ever had Windows 10 on it before, you can just install without a product key and it will activate itself.

x0054 8y ago

Best I can tell the Dell image for XPS 9550 is just Windows 10 with minimal drivers. I think I'll try the fresh Microsoft Windows route, but I want to mirror the drive first, because I don't want to install windows all over again and set up all my apps if it doesn't work. What's a good alternative to something like Carbon Copy Cloner for Windows? I used to use Ghost, but that was a decade ago.

jacob019 8y ago
Live boot linux and use dd
- jimnotgym 8y ago
  That is extremely good advice.
- x0054 8y ago
  I'll give that a shot, that should work, theoretically. I don't really know all the ins and outs of the new secure boot stuff on windows, would have to read up on that. But theoretically that should work.
  - jacob019 8y ago
    ubuntu works fine with secure boot
dabockster 8y ago
> Best I can tell the Dell image for XPS 9550 is just Windows 10 with minimal drivers. I've worked in an IT shop before. Even if the image is just Windows 10 with included drivers, those drivers can include bundled programs and bloatware themselves. I used a Dell laptop in the past with Windows 8 that had a trackpad application which had to autostart and run in the background for the trackpad to work properly. No matter what, that program was guaranteed to be using at least 50MB of RAM. Upon upgrading to 8.1, I had a bunch of OS errors. Turns out, uninstalling and reinstalling the trackpad driver fixed the problem. OEM drivers aren't just the drivers themselves, but often instead an entire suite of programs that bloat your system and interfere with Windows' ability to take care of itself.
ihattendorf 8y ago
DriveImage XML[1] always worked the few times I needed it, and you can create the image while booted in to windows. [1]: https://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm https://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm

NiveaGeForce 8y ago

There was no crapware on my Surface Pro (mostly MS Store apps), and I also experienced issues, like this. https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/8g73kb/is_it_how_timeline_is_supposed_to_work/ https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/8g73kb/is_it_how... I still have the following issue, even though I never installed an insider build on this machine. https://wccftech.com/windows-10-1803-rtm-candidate-bug/ https://wccftech.com/windows-10-1803-rtm-candidate-bug/

kerng 8y ago

Agreed. Following random internet articles to disable Windows Updates is not a good advise. That same user might in a future post complain that a security issues aren't fixed, even though updates were explicitly disabled... My personal experience is that I had no issues updating multiple machines. Advise: Don't follow and change random registry keys and other things based on Google searches - it might become a problem in the future.

x0054 8y ago
Well, Windows 10 1803 update is a problem NOW. I'll take future problems over current problems. Also, disabling update service is a perfectly legitimate way to stop the updates from coming in. You can always turn it back on and control the update process manually, when you are good and ready, and have your HD backed up. You can do so on your schedule, not when MS chooses to spring it on you.
- yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
  Exactly. And if Microsoft doesn't like users disabling updates, maybe it should stop releasing updates that break stuff.
  - jimnotgym 8y ago
    That is really easy for Apple to do, with a limited range of hardware they can literally test every device that is receiving the update. Much harder for Microsoft, who are trying to support a vast range of hardware.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
      That's true. So why is it that 7 was so much more stable? Certainly at first I could say that it's just because 7 has been around for eons and 10 is brand new, but it's been out for years now and we're still seeing things break (anecdotally, r/sysadmin was emphatically not happy with the last couple of updates). Is it this thing where they've declared 10 to be the last version and so what we're seeing is major updates that would have been 11, 12, etc. including all the growing pains of a new release? Is it because Microsoft decided to throw out their entire QA division? I'm happy to agree that Microsoft has an extraordinary large problem space across which they try to maintain stability, but that doesn't seem to explain why they would have gotten worse at it.

nickjj 8y ago

Yep. I upgraded to 18.03 about an hour after it was live. It was a very fast and painless upgrade on a ~4 year old workstation (parted out by pieces). I was running 17.09 Pro edition prior to 18.03.

robocat 8y ago

Seconded on the reinstall by downloading the latest Windows 10 installation onto a USB stick. Wayyyy faster than trying to restore from factory image. On different laptops attempting to restore from factory image has failed, or taken more than overnight to get to current version. So far I have had 100% success fixing Windows update issues by doing a clean install from the latest Microsoft ISO.

jimnotgym 8y ago

I have to second this. Microsoft even has a tool to build the latest release onto a USB stick, which for me was the first time I have installed Windows and not had to wait for any updates at all. I had a couple of PC's which were upgraded from earlier versions of Windows when it was free. Installing from USB sure did free up a lot of disk space! Licensing headaches seem to have gone away too. I did one fresh install onto a different hard-drive and it just worked. There seems to be one Windows 10 update which forces a reboot, and then it never happens again. If you build your USB today I donlt think you will suffer that. Putting that aside this article misses one important point. Windows 10 is extremely backwardly compatible with earlier versions. At the day job we have a number of legacy apps, things built in VB6 for instance, and they worked first time on Windows 10. To be clear, we are talking about applications written around 20 years ago, which are still working on Windows 10. I don't run any Apple devices anymore but it certainly wasn't my experience that Apple cared about backwards compatibility back then. RE: same old regedit etc. The enterprise admins I know seem extremely pleased to see these old faithfuls in place. Where Windows 10 has added a new way of doing something (like the new control panel), it is very heartening to find the familiar old version running alongside. I think it is fair to say that enterprise loved XP, hated Vista, liked 7, hated 8 and tolerated 8.1. Enterprise seems very happy with Windows 10 so far.

tom_ 8y ago

I installed Windows on my laptop last year from a presumably-unmolested ISO I got from MSDN - and it took it 10+ goes, at one attempt per week or two, to update to 1709.