All or most of those things can be turned off at install and after. I was reluctant to upgrade from windows 7 for fear of having to re-install programs and such. Well i ended up having to re-format due to a virus so i decided to install everything fresh. Once i was done with everything i started to read up on Windows 10 and found out that there were things i could turn off at install. So i went ahead and did the windows 10 upgrade. First of all it went smooth and really did not take that long, second i did not have to re-install anything at all. EQ and everything was still there and worked fine with no problems. Now since i did not know about the things to turn off at the install of 10 i had to go a little deeper to find all the things i wanted to turn off. With research and some exploring i was able to turn off what i wanted, or most of it anyway. As for performance i noticed a big difference, things are a bit faster, snappier and start up is faster once you turn off the apps that are not needed at start up. Like all windows OS you have to set it to how you like it or to get what you want out of it. To me thats the fun of getting to know an OS upgrade. So far i have had a good/greatish experience with the upgrade and upgrade proccess. I am now fooling around with Cortana and i like it. I like the idea of running my computer with my voice. Keep in mind this is just my experience with Windows 10, others might have some problems.
It wouldn't matter right now anyway because there is a grand total of zero titles released that were developed using DX12. It might be nice to have two years from now.
Win 7 (6.1) will continue to receive security support until 2020. Win 10 (6.3) is in Mainstream support 'till then, and will have security updates until 2025. To those who are concerned about Microsoft tracking you, I certainly hope you are not using a smartphone of any brand, or a motor vehicle made since the mid 90s as you are being tracked by those devices.
If Gatesville follows previous patterns after the free upgrade period Win 7 and 8 will go on the same heap as XP, no now ya got no support and no choice. The entire program is intended to cut the supported base of Windows down to exactly one version.
I am sorry about the confusion. Yes i did reformat with windows 7 and re-installed all my programs and games. Once i was done with that i did the upgrade to Windows 10. As with all OS upgrades i thought i would have had to re-installed some programs and games once the upgrade was done and with Windows 10 that was not the case.
I upgraded from Windows 8.1 to 10 with a minimal amount of effort. Everquest seems to run pretty much the same, so I can't say that there was any real benefit to doing the upgrade, but perhaps in the future EQ will take advantage of some of the Windows 10 features to make things better. BACKUP EVERYTHING MAKE A COMPLETE LIST OF HARDWARE AND DRIVERS Not that I had any problems this go, but I have in the past ~ and I'm a firm believer in "Better safe than sorry." I took a 32g thumb drive and backed up everything before I even let it start the download of Windows 10. Knowing exactly what video card, NIC, sound card, etc, is in the machine prior to the upgrade is another safety net. Windows 10 detected everything of mine perfectly, but you never know...
If anyone wants to get rid of the Win10 upgrade popup, this works well, is easy to do and also a funny read http://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/windows-7-to-10-gwx-how-to-remove.html
The problem with this data collection has not one thing to do with what Microsoft collects the data for. Let's give them the benefit of the doubt and say their intentions are entirely noble. Ever heard of a data breach? Want to bet your privacy that Microsoft won't have one in the next ten years? The problem is COLLECTION, not INTENTION. Also, I can't find anywhere that Microsoft has said that opting out stops COLLECTION of data, only that they won't USE it.
On win 7/8, the data collectors are in the optional updates. Don't install those and you are clear still. If you did already install those, then doing a quick search for removing microsoft collectors/data miners will yield many sites that will walk you through removing those updates. Also, I ended up reverting back to win7. It was somewhat unbelievable to me that a current version of microsoft office wouldn't run properly on win10 and resulted in many crashes. In addition, there are some classic things I still like to use to this day that simply will not run under the limited win10 options. In a general sense however, win10 is a pretty smooth experience except, as someone else stated, it isn't clearly stated that turning off options turned off data collections. For example, turning off the automatic updates only turned off the optional ones, I still very clearly saw the security updates being patched in still without my consent, which in the business world is completely unacceptable as sometimes updates are incompatible with day to day activities.
If you're concerned about any nefarious data collection even after disabling updates and all the Opt-Outs then block it at the router/firewall level, if you have that capability. At that point it won't matter what Windows wants to do; it'll simply be denied no matter what. Chorus, have you tried running your legacy apps in compatibility mode? Vetplayer, you may have "READ" all that online but you are misinformed and with your last post in this thread you're just spreading FUD. I'm no lover of Windows but 7 was at least a step in the right direction and 10 even more so. If we had a native EQ *NIX/BSD client I would ditch Windows entirely as EQ is the sole reason I have it on this box. That's probably not going to happen so it's a matter of sticking with Win10 for now, which EQ is running flawlessly on; perhaps even better than on 7. /To each their own.
Thanks for all this information. I should have expected something like this. Fortunately, I'm still on Win7 and now I'm going to stay that way until Win7 is no longer supported.
sure have, none of the modes offered in win10 work, not to mention it isn't stable with its own version of office. Could find a winxp or something, but meh, why bother when win7 runs so well still. Also, forced updates have already caused severe issues, which for users that aren't technically inclined caused them a lot of needless headaches. There is a lot of legacy hardware and software out there that is on either a 5 year or a 8 year life cycle. MS has completely ignored that common practice with the win10 release. As a professional that requires what would otherwise be considered outdated software, I simply can't have that inconsistency with the forced patching. Yes, I could block it manually and do any number of other band-aid tricks, but I *shouldn't have to*. There isn't any valid reason whatsoever for them to force updates. Yes, the majority of users won't know the difference, but as this sort of practice can cause things to suddenly stop working that were fine the last time you used them. That's a non-starter in my book. That being said, win10 and eq work fine together, unless you have the video driver bug. My nvidia board was not affected by it.
Under Windows XP 0 Problems. Under Windows 7: I had to buy a new version of the Developer's Toolkit. The new version was not 100% backwards compatible. You have to link in DirectX - no more wizards/sample code is convoluted and you need to have more than one version of DirectX on your machine. Privileges - I'm the only user on my machine. My EQ maps (among other tiles/directories) have decided they are read only. The folder and the files insist they are read/write. I (being my system's wheel) insist they are read/write too. Denied. OEM - SSD. Thank you so very much Micro$oft for making my purchase of a SSD not enjoyable. If I want my operating system on a newly purchased SSD on the system where my Genuine Micro$oft experience resides, that's what I want. You check my ID to see if I'm a pirate? How about your ID, thief who wants me to pay a second time for something I purchased? (M$ should require OEM manufacturers to provide a bootable operating system install CD which can handle a replacement of your boot hard drive). Loss of formerly "free" apps - media center, movie maker, Direct3D utilites. Adware - my computer is not your store in my living room. I'm a strong believer that nefarious conduct should be (legally) punished. If I could hurt M$ I would. No Win10 for me. For the first time ever (in 40+ years) I'm actually considering Apple and/or the importance of having a Windows Desktop computer in the first place.
I have a separate laptop dedicated for when I take classes at college. I had "upgraded" to Windows 10 on it. A week later, the laptop is now bricked. It won't turn on, it won't do anything. I can't even get to the BIOS, so I can put Windows 8.1 back on it. It literally crapped the bed. So, I personally don't recommend it.
Obsoleting your older Microsoft programs is a "feature" not a bug. They've been doing that with their Office program for years. That's why I use Open Office.
Wow the response to this thread has been overwhelming. I really appreciate all the information. I knew this was the right community to ask ;-) I've been toying with getting an actual desktop gaming rig, perhaps after the new year -- so I'm going to hold off on upgrading until then. I will then use my old laptop and upgrade to 10 as an experiment. I really like 7. It's been stable and easy to work with. Why mess with a good thing now?
For me, if you got Windows 7, stay with windows 7. If you got windows 8, or 8.1, the upgrade to windows 10.
If we had all wised up and switched to linux a decade ago, we wouldn't be in this mess in the first place!
