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Microsoft has been criticised over its Windows 10 software by consumer rights group Which?.
The body said it had received hundreds of complaints about the upgrade, including lost files, emails no longer syncing and broken wi-fi and printing.
In some cases, it said, users had had to pay for their computer to be repaired.
Microsoft defended its software and highlighted that it provided help online and by phone.
"The Windows 10 upgrade is a choice designed to help people take advantage of the most secure and most productive Windows," said a spokesman.
"Customers have distinct options. Should a customer need help with the upgrade experience, we have numerous options including free customer support."
Which? surveyed more than 5,500 of its members in June, and said that 12% of the 2,500 who had upgraded to Windows 10 had later reverted to an earlier version.
It's not a surprise to anyone on Soylent, but this is the sort of thing that causes conventional wisdom to shift.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Friday September 23 2016, @01:35PM
Windows XP what I assume everyone here considers an amazing thing and a mistake for MS to ditch.
15 years ago it was safe to assume most people "here" used some form of linux, at least at home, and the arguments were about whether debian or slackware was the true OS.
Sometime in the mid-00s the clientelle changed.
However regardless, there were plenty of people talking about the newly released windows XP. Just for fun here's some comments from when XP was launched:
I'd agree, except I guess the only problem is the people who aren't really aware of what they're getting into until after they buy a copy of XP and install it.
Despite all the marketing information and even a few screen shots I looked at online, I had no idea what the XP overall "feel" would be until I installed a release-candidate 30-day trial for myself. The average user doesn't wipe their hard drive and install 30-day trials of operating systems, just to decide if they should buy it or not.
(For the record, I wiped XP off my drive after giving it about 5 days. My wife refused to use it, saying it looked too "cartoon-like" and was noticeably slower launching several programs she commonly uses. I could deal with the new appearance of things, but I really disliked all the attempts to coerce me into using MS products for everything. It installed MSN messenger by default, and each "mouse-over" to the shortcut in the system tray reminded me to click to sign up and activate it. Then, they kept bugging me to go to their web site and sign up for a Passport account, to use their .net functionality. Uh, no thanks.)
Parent
About a month or so ago, a rep from Microsoft called me to give me the pitch for XP and how it would make 'everything so much better.' I actually had a great deal of fun with that call. Essentially, I told him that I had absolutely no intention of going to any XP product anytime soon. He courteously informed me that if I didn't it would cost us way more when we finally upgraded. I responded by saying that 'anytime soon' was just my nice way of saying that I'd never goto XP. He balked at that one and asked why. I told him that, frankly, I didn't care one bit for MS's licensing practices, the quality (or lack thereof) of their products, the inherent insecurity of their products and a few others that I can't remember. When he asked what our intentions were, I told him that we would stay with the 2000 line for a couple years. After that we would begin evaluating alternative operating systems and applications -- primarily Linux. I then told him that our core application was a client server model that already had a web based front end and could easily be ported to Apache & Oracle or MySQL. As for Office and messaging applications, I told him that there were many solid alternatives to Exchange already on the market and StarOffice would work just fine for our Office Suite needs. At that point he said "Oh. Thank you for your time." and hung up.
XP will be the doom of Microsoft. One day in the future, XP will be studied along with the Apple III, IBM Micro Channel Architecture, and Intel/Rambus as an example of corporate arrogance trumping common sense with DISATEROUS results.
As one /. poster has put it (brilliantly, I might add), that with XP, Microsoft has done to itself what the DOJ never could have done: Release a product that will ENABLE competition, and possibly ruin the company.
XP is the product of the two biggest sins a corporation can commit: arrogance and contempt. It's arrogant in that it's overpriced, offers NOTHING new over WIndows 2000, and in fact, takes away from it.
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Friday September 23 2016, @02:17PM
I think there were much more important battles to fight.
* tabs vs spaces
* emacs vs vi
* kde vs gnome
* rpm vs deb
* lilo vs grub
etc
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Friday September 23 2016, @04:50PM
* tabs vs spaces
* emacs vs vi
* kde vs gnome
* rpm vs deb
* lilo vs grub
The only battle there is lilo vs grub, the rest only have one answer.
(Score: 2) by curunir_wolf on Friday September 23 2016, @07:09PM
I am a crackpot
(Score: 2, Insightful) by manyon on Saturday September 24 2016, @09:16PM
i know right, so why grub gets installed all the time is beyond me :-)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 23 2016, @08:06PM
This was my point and I was too tired to find the quotes. Thank you.
It is at the 'it sucks' part of the release cycle for them (for the techies). Yet most of the market is moving towards it. They are gaining 1-3% per month. That is the rate people replace their computers. MOST people do not care. Those who wanted to upgrade either did so or were unable to do so at this point.
It frankly is just 'different' than the previous versions people have been using. We as a tech community are *very* conservative with things that already work. We do not mind trying new things. But deploying them full scale? Not so much. We move very very very cautiously.
The only complaints I am getting from 'normal users' is 'they moved stuff around again'. Not much else. Its windows. It does an 'ok' job at being a operating system. Just like most others out there. It also happens to run most of the software people want.
My father wanted to move to win10 but for some reason his computer just would not do the upgrade. I spent about 5 mins looking into it and said 'dont bother'. What he has is fine for what he does. When he buys a new computer he will get win10 then. He was fine with that. He probably could get away with some linux distro and not know the difference. There is little reason to bother with it and makes it a pain if he takes it in somewhere to get fixed.