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I have been running the technical previews since the very start and I have to say I am quite surprised at the July 29th release date. Even today's builds are ri

I have been running the technical previews since the very start and I have to say I am quite surprised at the July 29th release date. Even today's builds are riddled with problems. They have a lot of work to do if they really think it will be consumer ready by the end of July.

agildehaus 11y ago
Update often is the new mantra. Unfortunately that sometimes means "we can ship crap!".
- chrisfosterelli 11y ago
  You're getting downvoted a lot, but you're not wrong. Game companies, like Ubisoft, have been getting a lot of heat in particular for this lately...
  - SuddsMcDuff 11y ago
    I stopped buying games by EA and Ubisoft about 5 years ago for this very reason - shipping incomplete & buggy software with the mentality "we'll patch it later". In EA's case, those patches didn't even materialize a lot of the time. I take it from your comment that they're still up to their old tricks... I'll continue my boycott of EA and Ubi
    - Silhouette 11y ago
      I used to love gaming on my PC, and today I have far more disposable income I'd be willing to spend for top quality games. Sadly, I haven't actually bought (or pirated) a AAA title on PC for probably a decade now. The last few I had were great fun until they crashed or otherwise fundamentally failed at just the wrong moment, at which point all that enjoyment would instantly evaporate and just leave me in a bad mood instead. And every AAA game I'd bought in the last year or two before I gave up was like that. Throw in almost ubiquitous DRM/anti-cheating software doing unknown and potentially very bad things to my PC behind my back these days, and I'm very sad to say that PC gaming just isn't attractive to me any more.
    - tracker1 11y ago
      I stopped when I started experiencing the pretty bad DRM early on, and the first time I wasn't able to rip a CD for my mp3 player because of it.
- kozukumi 11y ago
  Looks like you and I hit a nerve here on HN. You are right though. Microsoft will be shipping Windows 10 with an incomplete version of their new Edge browser with the promise of adding critical features such as extensions in the future. Basically Windows 10 won't really be feature complete RTM for another 6 months. Even if Microsoft want to pretend it is ready now. Edit: To clarify the "hit a nerve" bit, when I wrote this my post and agildehaus's were both down voted.
  - ulfw 11y ago
    Sounds exactly like OS X 10.10 Yosemite to me, where the promised Photos app (which really is nothing special) arrived many months later.
    - baldfat 11y ago
      But the answer is going to be that Apple Updates are free. Which is going to be the same reply for Windows 10 for the next year.
      - radiorental 11y ago
        Just to clarify. MS said users of win 7 & 8 will be able to upgrade for free to win 10 within a year. I believe I read somewhere that this will be MS's last release #. It will be a rolling release from here on out. I have not seen details on how they monetize that unless they switch to Apple's HW model.
        joshuapants 11y ago
        Microsoft has stated that most of the money they make from Windows is from selling licenses to hardware partners. Of course, they are also starting to move into an Apple-like hardware model (though of course they still allow third parties to make hardware).
        baldfat 11y ago
- unique_parrot 11y ago
  That reminds me of the win8 release. I got it after preorder on release day, installed it immediately, hit update and got something about 350MB of updates. WTF, on release day??? After 2 weeks I switched back to Win7 (which was a lot of work, because I didn't think of making a backup before, because I didn't believe what a pice of sh*t it could be).
  - tracker1 11y ago
    The RTM pressing is usually sent out a couple months before the "release date" ... Even then, XP was probably one of the worst at release, and wasn't really okay until SP1, and good until SP2, but people forget that. Vista was pretty bad too. The only version of Windows in my mind that worked really good out of the box was Windows 2000 (not ME), and even that had a conflict with some piece of software (cd burning program iirc)... Also, they removed the in-memory database between the final RC and release, which irked me to no end. I didn't really start using Windows 8 until 8.1, I touched a few machines (that didn't have touchscreens) with windows 8 early on and it sucked, server 2008 over RDP was worse... 8.1 with classicshell isn't bad.
BinaryIdiot 11y ago
Hmm I had the exact opposite experience. It seemed to work pretty flawlessly for me. What type of issues did you experience?
- kozukumi 11y ago
  Several BSODs, glitches with the virtual desktops, inconsistent fonts and layouts, multiple application (explorer) crashes, wifi connectivity problems, failures returning from sleep and standby, dozens of UI inconsistencies.
  - kelnage 11y ago
    That doesn't sound at all like what I've been experiencing on Windows 10 TP. I've found it remarkably stable - it's now my main OS on my gaming rig and I use it daily. Outside of the occasional game incompatibility (usually fixed by patches for recent games), it's been the most stable version of Windows I've used in a long time.
    - rplnt 11y ago
      TP is the more polished version. Weekly builds are worse, but I think that's to be expected and I wouldn't be worried. Only weird thing is the browser - I haven't seen a version that could be considered even beta-ready. No way they are going to release something better than IE in just two months.
  - taspeotis 11y ago
    Which "ring" of updates are you on? Fast (it's gonna break) or slow (it's gonna break less)?
    - kozukumi 11y ago
      I have both fast and slow ring installs. I have found many problems with both, more with fast obviously.
netheril96 11y ago
Maybe they try to emulate Apple again. Like how they have released Yosemite with so many deficiencies, one of which, the wifi problem still haunts my Mac after seven months.
noselasd 11y ago
"today's builds" arn't todays. They're months behind what MS are developing.
- joshuapants 11y ago
  Undoubtedly, but the issue is that they only have 2 months to take care of any bugs in their recent code. If the tech preview builds are anything to go by, the stuff that hasn't been released yet is going to need a lot of testing and fixing. I don't think it's insurmountable, but they definitely have their work cut out for them.
  - sangnoir 11y ago
    > Undoubtedly, but the issue is that they only have 2 months to take care of any bugs in their recent code Parent is suggesting that what you think is "recent code" isn't recent at all (if you mean the tech previews). The leaked internal builds are more recent, but only relatively so.Therefore you can't extrapolate the number of current bugs remaining from tech previews.
    - joshuapants 11y ago
      Right, I got that. The tech previews are "old" code, that is, they've gone through testing internally and have been deemed ready for release to the public for further testing. It's reasonable to assume that anything newer hasn't been tested to that point yet, so they still have a lot of work to do on the things we haven't seen yet. It's also possible that this whole thing is a psyops campaign and Microsoft has been sending out purposely buggy releases while sitting on a build that works amazingly so that they can appear to have released an excellent product under a major time crunch. Unlikely, but fun to think about.
      - sangnoir 11y ago
        > It's reasonable to assume that anything newer hasn't been tested to that point yet, so they still have a lot of work to do on the things we haven't seen yet. I disagree on that part - I do not think that is reasonable. If I read correctly, your assumption is that pipeline for everything is: Develop > Test internally > polish > public testing > fix. It's also reasonable to assume that not everything needs to be tested by the public, and only those deemed to require public testing were included in public previews. There a lot of reasons to release 'old' code, especially on a large codebase. It's not that they intentionally send out "buggy releases while sitting on a build that works", but gating is complicated business.
DigitalSea 11y ago
It's the "lean startup" mantra often accepted in the startup world of "Ship early, ship often", but not the software world. Kind of ironic in my opinion.
- dagw 11y ago
  "Ship early, ship often" Is fine for some neat, but ultimately not that important, software or service I'm trying out. It's slightly more problematic for the core software they want me to base everything else I do on.
melling 11y ago
I'm a Mac user so I don't care too much. However, a lot of how Windows 10 will be perceived is from the online perception created. Most people in the world don't care about the little bugs, features, etc. They simply want to know if it's worth getting. If Windows 10 is reasonably good and tons of people upgrade from XP, for example, this will be a huge win for Microsoft and the entire community. If "reviewers" complain that Cortana can't read your mind and people start comparing her to Clippy, it will generate bad buzz that's not really justified. 9 out of 10 computers run Windows. Let's try to make it a version that's from 2015.
- Numberwang 11y ago
  A reasonable Mac user... I don't like it. Too bad they could not include free xp upgrades as well
  - tracker1 11y ago
    Tell that to someone who spent $5k on the last PPC generation Mac Pro...
- zanny 11y ago
  Unless MS changes their free upgrade policy to be every version of Windows since XP instead of 7 nobody using Vista / XP will upgrade because its expensive. Though the market share of XP has been dropping. The only real users left are those who don't know what an OS is and only uses it to check AOL in ie6 and businesses who are too stupid to upgrade their horribly dated software.
  - kisna72 11y ago
    I would say its mostly people whose bosses think upgrading from windows XP is a extra cost they dont need.
  - Someone1234 11y ago
    I have to say, in general, that Microsoft's "messaging" about how the free upgrade will work has been riddled with bad communications. It is like the XBone incident all over again. Instead of simply just spelling out with a very straight forward table what will be eligible they kept releasing vague and confusing press releases. I've read articles which have claimed (amongst other things): - Windows XP+ will be eligible (untrue). - Pirated copies of Windows will be eligible (untrue?). - Everyone can upgrade but there is a subscription fee (untrue). - Windows 8 and 8.1 gets the free upgrade only (untrue). And many others. Microsoft could trivially have let people know exactly what to expect a year ago when they announced this program. It is a good program, I mean free stuff, but the messaging on it was just awful. PS - I still, to this day, don't feel like I have a complete overview of what is and is not included.
castell 11y ago
Will Win10 ship with an optional Win7 theme? The "AeroGlass" theme was beautiful and my hardware is fast enough - sure some low end mobile hardware can't handle it. Will Win10 RTM still requires a Microsoft Outlook/Live/Passport/Hotmail-Account? The non-obvious small almost hidden "offline" profile option during Windows install wizard is not okay. It should be an equal option. And for OneDrive and Cortana there should be an option to disable them and remove them from the interface in all Win10 editions, not just an option in the Enterprise edition. It seems to me that Microsoft still doesn't care about a larger sizeable margin of the user base at all. Well I don't care that much about Win10, my beloved Win7 is supported til 2022.
- minot 11y ago
  > Will Win10 RTM still requires a Microsoft Outlook/Live/Passport/Hotmail-Account? The non-obvious small almost hidden "offline" profile option during Windows install wizard is not okay. It should be an equal option. It almost certainly will not. Even in Windows 8.1, I have had to disconnect from the Internet before creating the first user so Microsoft wouldn't fuss about it.
  - hobs 11y ago
    In 10 and 8.1 I chose "create an account" and then at the bottom there was a local user option. It still is obviously a dark pattern, but you shouldnt have to disconnect from the internet.
- bhauer 11y ago
  I feel the marginalization of traditional (local) accounts is a mistake. Microsoft is, in my opinion, squandering an opportunity to be the major industry player to disintermediate today's "cloud" and give control back to individuals, families, and friends. Because they think of managing local accounts from a 15-year old point of view clouded by overly-complicated Windows Domains, they are unwilling to conceive an interface for managing your family's accounts yourself in a secure manner. But it would be possible, and Microsoft should be the one major player saying: "We're going to provide you the tools to manage your information securely for yourself. Unlike Google and Apple, we don't want your information. It's yours and we value your privacy!" It's #5 from my 2013 rant on Microsoft: http://tiamat.tsotech.com/microsoft http://tiamat.tsotech.com/microsoft
cholantesh 11y ago
This makes me especially reticent to redeem the 'free upgrade' offer. I don't expect my machines to be bricked on update, but I'd rather play it safe until an acceptable level of stability is reached (per online response).

agildehaus 11y ago

Update often is the new mantra. Unfortunately that sometimes means "we can ship crap!".

chrisfosterelli 11y ago
You're getting downvoted a lot, but you're not wrong. Game companies, like Ubisoft, have been getting a lot of heat in particular for this lately...
- SuddsMcDuff 11y ago
  I stopped buying games by EA and Ubisoft about 5 years ago for this very reason - shipping incomplete & buggy software with the mentality "we'll patch it later". In EA's case, those patches didn't even materialize a lot of the time. I take it from your comment that they're still up to their old tricks... I'll continue my boycott of EA and Ubi
  - Silhouette 11y ago
    I used to love gaming on my PC, and today I have far more disposable income I'd be willing to spend for top quality games. Sadly, I haven't actually bought (or pirated) a AAA title on PC for probably a decade now. The last few I had were great fun until they crashed or otherwise fundamentally failed at just the wrong moment, at which point all that enjoyment would instantly evaporate and just leave me in a bad mood instead. And every AAA game I'd bought in the last year or two before I gave up was like that. Throw in almost ubiquitous DRM/anti-cheating software doing unknown and potentially very bad things to my PC behind my back these days, and I'm very sad to say that PC gaming just isn't attractive to me any more.
  - tracker1 11y ago
    I stopped when I started experiencing the pretty bad DRM early on, and the first time I wasn't able to rip a CD for my mp3 player because of it.
kozukumi 11y ago
Looks like you and I hit a nerve here on HN. You are right though. Microsoft will be shipping Windows 10 with an incomplete version of their new Edge browser with the promise of adding critical features such as extensions in the future. Basically Windows 10 won't really be feature complete RTM for another 6 months. Even if Microsoft want to pretend it is ready now. Edit: To clarify the "hit a nerve" bit, when I wrote this my post and agildehaus's were both down voted.
- ulfw 11y ago
  Sounds exactly like OS X 10.10 Yosemite to me, where the promised Photos app (which really is nothing special) arrived many months later.
  - baldfat 11y ago
    But the answer is going to be that Apple Updates are free. Which is going to be the same reply for Windows 10 for the next year.
    - radiorental 11y ago
      Just to clarify. MS said users of win 7 & 8 will be able to upgrade for free to win 10 within a year. I believe I read somewhere that this will be MS's last release #. It will be a rolling release from here on out. I have not seen details on how they monetize that unless they switch to Apple's HW model.
      - joshuapants 11y ago
        Microsoft has stated that most of the money they make from Windows is from selling licenses to hardware partners. Of course, they are also starting to move into an Apple-like hardware model (though of course they still allow third parties to make hardware).
        baldfat 11y ago
unique_parrot 11y ago
That reminds me of the win8 release. I got it after preorder on release day, installed it immediately, hit update and got something about 350MB of updates. WTF, on release day??? After 2 weeks I switched back to Win7 (which was a lot of work, because I didn't think of making a backup before, because I didn't believe what a pice of sh*t it could be).
- tracker1 11y ago
  The RTM pressing is usually sent out a couple months before the "release date" ... Even then, XP was probably one of the worst at release, and wasn't really okay until SP1, and good until SP2, but people forget that. Vista was pretty bad too. The only version of Windows in my mind that worked really good out of the box was Windows 2000 (not ME), and even that had a conflict with some piece of software (cd burning program iirc)... Also, they removed the in-memory database between the final RC and release, which irked me to no end. I didn't really start using Windows 8 until 8.1, I touched a few machines (that didn't have touchscreens) with windows 8 early on and it sucked, server 2008 over RDP was worse... 8.1 with classicshell isn't bad.

BinaryIdiot 11y ago

Hmm I had the exact opposite experience. It seemed to work pretty flawlessly for me. What type of issues did you experience?

kozukumi 11y ago
Several BSODs, glitches with the virtual desktops, inconsistent fonts and layouts, multiple application (explorer) crashes, wifi connectivity problems, failures returning from sleep and standby, dozens of UI inconsistencies.
- kelnage 11y ago
  That doesn't sound at all like what I've been experiencing on Windows 10 TP. I've found it remarkably stable - it's now my main OS on my gaming rig and I use it daily. Outside of the occasional game incompatibility (usually fixed by patches for recent games), it's been the most stable version of Windows I've used in a long time.
  - rplnt 11y ago
    TP is the more polished version. Weekly builds are worse, but I think that's to be expected and I wouldn't be worried. Only weird thing is the browser - I haven't seen a version that could be considered even beta-ready. No way they are going to release something better than IE in just two months.
- taspeotis 11y ago
  Which "ring" of updates are you on? Fast (it's gonna break) or slow (it's gonna break less)?
  - kozukumi 11y ago
    I have both fast and slow ring installs. I have found many problems with both, more with fast obviously.

netheril96 11y ago

Maybe they try to emulate Apple again. Like how they have released Yosemite with so many deficiencies, one of which, the wifi problem still haunts my Mac after seven months.

noselasd 11y ago

"today's builds" arn't todays. They're months behind what MS are developing.

joshuapants 11y ago
Undoubtedly, but the issue is that they only have 2 months to take care of any bugs in their recent code. If the tech preview builds are anything to go by, the stuff that hasn't been released yet is going to need a lot of testing and fixing. I don't think it's insurmountable, but they definitely have their work cut out for them.
- sangnoir 11y ago
  > Undoubtedly, but the issue is that they only have 2 months to take care of any bugs in their recent code Parent is suggesting that what you think is "recent code" isn't recent at all (if you mean the tech previews). The leaked internal builds are more recent, but only relatively so.Therefore you can't extrapolate the number of current bugs remaining from tech previews.
  - joshuapants 11y ago
    Right, I got that. The tech previews are "old" code, that is, they've gone through testing internally and have been deemed ready for release to the public for further testing. It's reasonable to assume that anything newer hasn't been tested to that point yet, so they still have a lot of work to do on the things we haven't seen yet. It's also possible that this whole thing is a psyops campaign and Microsoft has been sending out purposely buggy releases while sitting on a build that works amazingly so that they can appear to have released an excellent product under a major time crunch. Unlikely, but fun to think about.
    - sangnoir 11y ago
      > It's reasonable to assume that anything newer hasn't been tested to that point yet, so they still have a lot of work to do on the things we haven't seen yet. I disagree on that part - I do not think that is reasonable. If I read correctly, your assumption is that pipeline for everything is: Develop > Test internally > polish > public testing > fix. It's also reasonable to assume that not everything needs to be tested by the public, and only those deemed to require public testing were included in public previews. There a lot of reasons to release 'old' code, especially on a large codebase. It's not that they intentionally send out "buggy releases while sitting on a build that works", but gating is complicated business.

DigitalSea 11y ago

It's the "lean startup" mantra often accepted in the startup world of "Ship early, ship often", but not the software world. Kind of ironic in my opinion.

dagw 11y ago
"Ship early, ship often" Is fine for some neat, but ultimately not that important, software or service I'm trying out. It's slightly more problematic for the core software they want me to base everything else I do on.

melling 11y ago

I'm a Mac user so I don't care too much. However, a lot of how Windows 10 will be perceived is from the online perception created. Most people in the world don't care about the little bugs, features, etc. They simply want to know if it's worth getting. If Windows 10 is reasonably good and tons of people upgrade from XP, for example, this will be a huge win for Microsoft and the entire community. If "reviewers" complain that Cortana can't read your mind and people start comparing her to Clippy, it will generate bad buzz that's not really justified. 9 out of 10 computers run Windows. Let's try to make it a version that's from 2015.

Numberwang 11y ago
A reasonable Mac user... I don't like it. Too bad they could not include free xp upgrades as well
- tracker1 11y ago
  Tell that to someone who spent $5k on the last PPC generation Mac Pro...
zanny 11y ago
Unless MS changes their free upgrade policy to be every version of Windows since XP instead of 7 nobody using Vista / XP will upgrade because its expensive. Though the market share of XP has been dropping. The only real users left are those who don't know what an OS is and only uses it to check AOL in ie6 and businesses who are too stupid to upgrade their horribly dated software.
- kisna72 11y ago
  I would say its mostly people whose bosses think upgrading from windows XP is a extra cost they dont need.
- Someone1234 11y ago
  I have to say, in general, that Microsoft's "messaging" about how the free upgrade will work has been riddled with bad communications. It is like the XBone incident all over again. Instead of simply just spelling out with a very straight forward table what will be eligible they kept releasing vague and confusing press releases. I've read articles which have claimed (amongst other things): - Windows XP+ will be eligible (untrue). - Pirated copies of Windows will be eligible (untrue?). - Everyone can upgrade but there is a subscription fee (untrue). - Windows 8 and 8.1 gets the free upgrade only (untrue). And many others. Microsoft could trivially have let people know exactly what to expect a year ago when they announced this program. It is a good program, I mean free stuff, but the messaging on it was just awful. PS - I still, to this day, don't feel like I have a complete overview of what is and is not included.

castell 11y ago

Will Win10 ship with an optional Win7 theme? The "AeroGlass" theme was beautiful and my hardware is fast enough - sure some low end mobile hardware can't handle it. Will Win10 RTM still requires a Microsoft Outlook/Live/Passport/Hotmail-Account? The non-obvious small almost hidden "offline" profile option during Windows install wizard is not okay. It should be an equal option. And for OneDrive and Cortana there should be an option to disable them and remove them from the interface in all Win10 editions, not just an option in the Enterprise edition. It seems to me that Microsoft still doesn't care about a larger sizeable margin of the user base at all. Well I don't care that much about Win10, my beloved Win7 is supported til 2022.

minot 11y ago
> Will Win10 RTM still requires a Microsoft Outlook/Live/Passport/Hotmail-Account? The non-obvious small almost hidden "offline" profile option during Windows install wizard is not okay. It should be an equal option. It almost certainly will not. Even in Windows 8.1, I have had to disconnect from the Internet before creating the first user so Microsoft wouldn't fuss about it.
- hobs 11y ago
  In 10 and 8.1 I chose "create an account" and then at the bottom there was a local user option. It still is obviously a dark pattern, but you shouldnt have to disconnect from the internet.
bhauer 11y ago
I feel the marginalization of traditional (local) accounts is a mistake. Microsoft is, in my opinion, squandering an opportunity to be the major industry player to disintermediate today's "cloud" and give control back to individuals, families, and friends. Because they think of managing local accounts from a 15-year old point of view clouded by overly-complicated Windows Domains, they are unwilling to conceive an interface for managing your family's accounts yourself in a secure manner. But it would be possible, and Microsoft should be the one major player saying: "We're going to provide you the tools to manage your information securely for yourself. Unlike Google and Apple, we don't want your information. It's yours and we value your privacy!" It's #5 from my 2013 rant on Microsoft: http://tiamat.tsotech.com/microsoft http://tiamat.tsotech.com/microsoft

cholantesh 11y ago

This makes me especially reticent to redeem the 'free upgrade' offer. I don't expect my machines to be bricked on update, but I'd rather play it safe until an acceptable level of stability is reached (per online response).