Windows 10: Considering win10, need to know a few things

My 2 cents worth, most everything is still available on Win10 but just may be in a different place such as familiar accessories are in Start, W section, Windows Accessories such as Paint and Internet Explorer and on the right-click menu of the Start button such as Command Prompt [x2], Control Panel, Disk Management, etc. It can't hurt to do a little exploring but then we've had to do some of that through several versions of Windows.

 

*Ditto

 

Windows 10 was designed, not to intentionally take away your customizability, but to make it cheaper for Microsoft to maintain it.

The reason MS requires you to update is so they don't have to test updates against every possible windows configuration with every possible set of updates in a myriad of permutations. That was unworkable, and was causing all the update problems that were common in Windows 7 and earlier. Yeah, this is Microsoft being selfish, but it's also resulting in an overall more secure OS with less problems from updates (although there have still been a few, like the infamous USB filesystem problems after the November update).

Likewise, the telemetry is there to help them find problems faster and create fixes (and I've personally seen this happen... when one new Insider build caused an inaccessible boot device, they found the problem and fixed it within a few days). They're seriously not snooping on you, one of billions of people using their software.

Desktop OS's will always be around, but the fact is, they are becoming less and less profitable as more people are moving to mobile devices for 100% of their computing. MS has to find ways to make Desktop OS's cheaper to maintain if they want to keep making a profit on them.

 

My experience is that Win10 will break due to certain updates if you've tinkered with certain things.
For example I disabled Cortana and Edge by renaming the exes. Did that shortly after installing, almost 2 years ago, and
at the same time uninstalled all the MS apps. Can't be sure, but I don't remember doing any registry tweaks.
All was fine until the version 1607 updates. Then my machine was hosed. Unpredictable inputs from KB and mouse.
No failed updates according to the logs. Had to re-install Win10. First re-install of a Windows in about 10 years.
So I'd say Win10 is more "tender" than 7 or XP, and you have to keep that in mind when tweaking.

 

Well I am not sure just how you disabled your UAC, but I just turned it off in my control panel, and my App Store still works just fine.

 

One of the consequences of MS's "Keep updated or else" strategy is that they no longer test every possible configuration, which means if you go off and tweak things, those situations are no longer tested situations. And, quite often, especially in the case of permissions changes, you can hose up your system completely.

The point being, in my experience, the vast majority of people that have problems with updates and upgrades are people that have fiddled with their systems. So do so at your own risk.

 

At your own risk agreed plus for goodness sake keep backups. Not that I have ever needed them, as not had one single problem with updates on my Win 10 PC's, despite have culled what I don't need. There is a big difference between fiddling which I would never recommend and knowing exactly what you did and how to undo it if anything goes awry.
Also advisable to check any so called tweaks with a reputable source before blindly hacking the registry.

 

That does not completely disable UAC, you need to make a registry change. That's when the App Store no longer works.
Code: Location: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System Key: EbableLUA Value data: 0[/quote]

 

[/quote] They way I did it, works just fine for me. I know about how to turn it off in the registry. *Smile