Windows 11: Microsoft's pointless update | Hacker News Reader

Windows 11: Microsoft's pointless update

computerworld.com

67 pointsbehnamoh57 comments

> If you're using Windows 11 Home, you must have both an Internet connection and a Microsoft account to run Windows 11 at all. No, Internet, no Microsoft account, no Windows 11. You can't set up a local user account or use your PC at all.

I feel like this is really burying the lede. This is another one of those gaps that truly makes me wonder how anybody thinks that Microsoft considers Windows anything but a toy OS, not suitable for doing any tasks that the user considers remotely important to them. (Another example is one I've brought up here before, where Windows 7 would restart your computer without your consent, in the middle of whatever you were doing, if you went long enough without updating).

The article goes a little too far -- the quoted statement isn't true. You can create a local account after the OOB experience finishes. You only need a Microsoft account during the setup process. It's still dumb but the author isn't telling the whole truth here.

While this is true, the user shouldn't be forced to setup near-required internet connection for the device to get it running. Seeing the dark patterns with Windows 10 has already motivated me elsewhere to switch to a Linux desktop at home.

The quoted statement is true if the MS account is required to get through the OOTB experience, no?

Hm, my read of the quoted statement is the same as my read of your comment. If you get a new Windows laptop and don't have an Internet connection, you can't start using it. Is that correct?

Yeah, that's right. Maybe I misunderstood his intent but I took "You can't set up a local user account or use your PC at all" at face value. You can set up a local user account and you can use the computer without an Internet connection; you just can't do that during the initial OOB process.

Yea, that would be beyond egregious. Imagine a laptop you couldn't use on a plane? I don't know if Microsoft has any product people working on Windows, but surely somebody at the company would notice the constant, universal condemnation that would engender.

You could always disable that sort of nonsense completely with Windows 7. That's (one reason) why Windows 7 was qualitatively better than the modern junk. Some of us actually do run multi-day jobs from time to time, and not having 100% control of your own computer in that environment is simply not an option.

That makes sense, but it doesn't really affect my point _too_ much.

It's still shocking to me that this isn't a widely-known workflow among non-techies, akin to installing an ad-blocker. The friend who dealt with the forcible Windows shutdown isn't in the tech industry, but has a very successful career in quantitative finance. Even in college, he's the archetype of a smart, savvy user who doesn't happen to be a domain expert.

It would be like me driving a car and having it shut down in the middle of a freeway, then hearing "you can disable that feature by doing <something only mechanics are even aware exists>".

Is it still possible to use Windows 7 on a home PC or laptop and have mostly normal functionality with regular software and etc? Or Windows 8? Serious question. I'd still prefer to avoid Linux (for now) but the Windows 11 nonsense is too much.

Up to a point, yes. We still have a couple of Windows 7 machines in use, partly due to having some expensive application software locked to them.

But as time passed and more of the ecosystem moved on, the limitations really started to show. As software developers, Windows 7 would now be very limited in terms of running modern tools and the latest versions of major programming languages and Linux or Mac are much better platforms today unless you're developing specifically for the Microsoft ecosystem.

It feels like such an opportunity for problems at already difficult times.

You have to install a new mainboard or hard disc due to failure. Your Wi-fi card is not supported on the install media, so you're already in chicken-and-egg mode to get it workable. In Win10 and before, once you got to the desktop, you would be able to pop in the terrible manufacturer CD which had some months old but nominally working drivers, and could bootstrap that to something that worked.

How do they handle that in Win11? Drag your PC to a wired socket and hope the Ethernet card works?

A soldering iron, a steady hand, and a JTAG controller.

I am not a Windows fan either but I kept my pitchfork in the garage after I watched a fair review of Windows 11, recently, and it argued MS seriously tried to streamline its messy UI, especially with respect to system configuration: https://youtu.be/_G4aql8_shw

Not sure why they couldn’t do this clean up using incremental updates of Windows 10 but maybe the underlying changes were actually too drastic and therefore too risky to ship in a rolling release.

People get used to the messy UI after a while and don't want it re-shuffled yet again. MS should give up on getting new consumers, they lost that game already. People have to learn Windows for work and use PC's at home after becoming familiar with them.

In short, people use Windows for familiarity, NOT user friendliness. MS may shoot their foot if they monkey with the first. Their UI overhauls are rarely significantly better anyhow. They have all the hallmarks of design-by-committee. MS, you can't do UI's anymore, givittup.

What other options have there been? Apple? It's too expensive for the majority of people. For decades Windows laptops is what the crowds could afford.

People use windows because linux is confusing and macs are expensive. windows is the "normal" computer.

From what I get between the lines when they answer some stuff in community calls on YouTube, and Learn, or over Github issues, is that the teams might actually be spread too thin, so they have been underdelivering for quite some time.

For example, WPF was completly ramped down because everyone was going to be doing UWP, failing that they had to restaff WPF, and it clearly shows the new team hardly knows the code, just check the issues on Github.

Now imagine stuff that goes even deeper into Windows code, like Win32, COM.

Why not incremental, I think this is their way to reboot Windows 10X, after it got cancelled.

Naturally most of us aren't going to buy a new computer just for getting rounded corners.

I upgraded to Windows 11 beta. I get green Blue Screens of Death. The right click button (contextual menu) does not cover all previous functionality so it has a 'show old menu' option to bring back what is lacking. Edge and Teams are installed by default. It feels like an UI refresh and not much more.

It's only a matter of time before we find out how much extra user spying they added in Windows 11, in exchange for having icons in the middle of the taskbar.

Seriously, switch to Pop OS now. Windows is not going to get better, only worse.

Will Pop OS run Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020? That's literally the only thing I use Windows for.

It runs fine on Arch Linux, so it shouldn't have problems with Pop OS or other distros.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OgPjOh_zPx0

Check also:

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/

https://appdb.winehq.org/

https://www.protondb.com/app/1250410 is the best source to find out how any given Steam game will run on Linux.

You can also use Proton to run Windows games and apps outside of Steam.

Yes. Linux run most games now. In practice there are a few small bugs here and there so Windows is still prefered for some games but I can play 90% of them on Linux with no issues at all.

Consider a distro that uses Plasma Desktop instead of GNOME.

The new contextual menu is great in places like the desktop, where after choosing ‘show more options’ you get… the exact same options, in the old style.

I was semi interested in a native Teams (wishful thinking that it may be a little less resource intensive) until I found out it’s the ‘personal’ version only.

I mean I’m not sure I could have come up with a better transitional design that has to keep the old UI around for compatibility.

>Some otherwise-fast processors can't run it. And without Trusted Platform Module (TPM) 2.0, you're going nowhere. Out of the half-dozen Windows 10 systems I or my partner owned in 2020, not one could run Windows 11.

The 8th gen processor requirements are really craziness. what kind of mainstream operating system is supposed to not run on four year old hardware?

Android

Microsoft contributing to the burning up of the planet.. in a few years they'll EOL Windows 10 and millions of fast-enough computers will become e-waste because people will be too lazy to learn Linux.

>and millions of fast-enough computers will become e-waste because people will be too lazy to learn Linux.

No they won't. People will happily continue using Windows 10 and 7. Anybody that wants to sell software to Windows users will probably understand that many users won't be on Windows 11 and will therefore offer versions for 7 and 10.

Well, 2021 might be the year of the Linux Desktop afterall.

If Linux somehow manages to run Adobe Cc suite, AAA games and surpass anti cheat restrictions on major games. Yes probably.

Many AAA games already run on Linux and anti cheat restrictions are on their way with some already being here (epic released their anti cheat for linux like a month ago) due to steam deck.

What many AAA do you speak of? Many steam tops are Borked, And there is no support for EA, Blizzard and Activision games on linux. If if some manage to run, the setup is so horrible for a normal user. Even if the anti cheat restrictions are on the way I don’t see Linux as desktop contender in gaming at-least in the next 2-3 years.

> what kind of mainstream operating system is supposed to not run on four year old hardware?

With hardware lasting at the very least 3 years, expecting no a new OS to also work on the last equipment you bought cannot be considered “crazy”.

Well it runs very well on older platforms, it's just not allowed to.

My PC has a 6th generation Intel. Years ago, I subscribed to the dev channel of Windows 10 because I wanted to try WSL (the first one). I kinda forgot to "exit" the dev channel, and a few months back my computer was upgraded to Windows 11 silently. No issues since then, except that now I need to reinstall Windows 10 apparently. I was only upgraded to 11 to get a taste of it as a thank you, but now that it's been released it's over. Honestly, if they knew from the start I would have to roll back, a prompt would have been nice before updating. Or just let me keep 11 since it works.

Mandatory microsoft account and online connection needed to install the OS? No thanks!

Noted that it's only required for W11 Home, not Pro or Enterprise

Shouldn't be required for Home users especially.

Well technically, it makes more sense for it to not be in Enterprise especially.

And it was already the case with Windows 10 Home.

Windows 10 Home does not require a microsoft account or online connection. The part during setup, where it asks you about your account, can be skipped.

They’ve actually fully removed the skip option at this point AFAIK. It got hidden away deeper and deeper and is either removed or it’s hidden so deep I can no longer find it. East workaround, however, is just to install with internet disconnected. If it has no internet connection it won’t block the install but will instead prompt you to create a local account.

It sounds like they’ve removed _that_ loophole in Win11.

Another thing that Windows Home requires a MS account for, even if you've got away with not using one: FDE.

But those corners, look how nicely round they are!

Even for Windows developers it hardly has anything worthwhile, note that most of the new stuff is UWP with WinUI 2.6 and not WinUI 3.0, as they still have a pile of bugs and missing features to take care of.

I bet some higher ups decided it was time to release Windows 11 no matter what, specially after Windows 10X being dropped.

It would have been a really good idea to integrate ReFS (optional) in all Windows-editions.

However, the Windows11 presentation touched my heart, Microsoft is for me now a lifestyle brand and not just a software producer anymore...it really touched me.

My CPU has a special feature where I will not be bugged with prompts to update to Windows 11.

The reason why is obvious, it just isn't for the consumer: Microsoft needs to significantly raise the support requirements going forward, without telling a bunch of people their now "current" computer is being dropped based on how old it's processor is. Windows 11 exists to offer a final support coda for a lot of old PCs that Microsoft doesn't want to maintain support for.

Also, banner features like Android app support aren't part of launch, so there's only minimal change currently.

Not just pointless: dumb. It doesn't support Skylake or first-gen Threadripper, which happen to power almost all of my machines but one, which uses third-gen Threadripper and will never see anything other than Linux.

Pointless for users. Not so for the business.

Yeah, it’s all marketing fluff around “we’re bumping the version because we want to delete a huge chunk of 30 year old code and can’t do that mid-version.

I'm dreaming of a day my workplace giving me a Windows 11 machine that I can install WSLg on. Maybe 5-6 years from now.

Curious why not? Won't WSLg be included with wsl2 on windows 11?

Pointless? They had to bring out a new version due to the TPM 2.0 requirement. They could not possibly put that into Windows 10, because millions of devices don't have TPM 2.0.

The rest is just everything around this one thing that requires a version upgrade compared to just adding it to Windows 10.

https://archive.ph/dwquU

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