Comment by the_pwner224 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by the_pwner224 | Hacker News Reader

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The bloatware is universal across all non-Apple computers. You can download a Windows 10 ISO for free from Microsoft's website (apparently they've started blocking it if your User Agent indicates that you're already on Windows, but that's trivial to bypass). Download ISO, burn to USB, reinstall Windows and you get rid of all the bloat. The license key is embedded in the hardware these days.

That said, MS gives ridiculous freedom to drivers. It auto-installs drivers for my 9560's audio and Thunderbolt controllers. The audio drivers include a 'Waves MaxxAudio Pro' application that stays in the system tray; stopping it makes the audio stop working. The Intel TB drivers also have a permanent unremovable notification in the system tray.

What's worse is that when you plug in a Logitech Webcam, Windows automatically downloads drivers (which are not necessary if you're on Linux since webcams use the same standard protocol), and then the Logitech drivers pop up a giant popup window asking to install their bloatware application (which is not required for the camera to work). What else does Windows let hardware manufacturers autoinstall onto your computer? Keyloggers? Rootkits?

Why would they block you from downloading windows if you're already on windows?

For what it's worth, I successfully downloaded that windows iso from microsoft less than a week ago from a windows machine, and used it to reformat that same machine without any issues or workarounds.

They don't block you.

They offer to download Media Creation Tool, which itself either downloads the ISO, burns DVD or makes an USB with installer for you.

There is one subtle difference between the ISO you can download and what the tool downloads: the ISO contains install.wim file, which is larger than 4 GB (i.e. it won't fit on FAT32 usb, if you are going to make it yourself; it is fine with UDF, when burning), while the MCT image contains install.esd, which uses different compression and fits into FAT32.

TLDR: if you want USB stick with installer, use the Media Creation Tool. You won't be able to make it easily from the ISO (aside from wim-splitting, esd-recompressing, or using NTFS if your UEFI supports it).

Oh, that's cool! Seems like it's not malicious then (though it may be the case that the media creation tool doesn't allow you to download a higher level of Win10 - the normal ISO download allows you to install Win10 Home OR Pro during setup, unless your computer has an embedded license key in which case it automatically installs that version).

That also explains why I always had to flash the ISO to a USB stick with Rufus (inside VirtualBox) - just `dd` or `cat`ing it onto /dev/sdX never worked.

If your target is UEFI boot only, you don't need any special tool to make the install media. Just copy all the files to a filesystem supported by UEFI and you are good to go. The FAT32 support is mandatory, and the UEFI bootloader looks into the efi directory in the root to find the boot files. Some UEFI implementations also support NTFS, but that's optional, so it cannot be used on universally usable boot medium.

The magic boot sector that all those tools like Rufus create, is needed only for legacy boot.

The Windows 10 ISO from the download is using UDF filesystem and is intended for burning. If you dd it to a block device, very few firmwares support that from non-optical drive. Prior to 1809 release, it's install.wim was smaller than 4G, so you could make UEFI installer by just copying all the files to USB drive, but since 1809, the easier way is just to use the Media Creation Tool. The harder way is to recompress install.wim into install.esd, or just use NTFS if your firmware has the support (e.g. Intel NUCs do).

just wipe the drive and install linux to free yourself of that madness

True, but you typically have the best experience if you're not installing to the latest and greatest hardware.

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