SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Submitted via IRC for TheMightyBuzzard
Microsoft blocked the delivery of Windows Updates recently to Windows 7 and 8.1 devices powered by a next-generation processor.
The company announced the support change in January 2017. Broken down to the essentials, it means that Intel Kaby Lake and AMD Bristol Ridge processors are only support by Windows 10, and not older versions of Windows.
To hammer that home, Microsoft made the decision to block Windows Update on Windows 7 or 8.1 PCs with those next generation processors.
The company introduced patches, KB4012218 and KB4012219 for instance, which introduced process generation and hardware support detection on Windows 7 and 8.1 systems.
Windows users who run Windows Update get the unsupported hardware error prompt when they try to scan for and download the latest patches for their -- still supported -- operating system.
GitHub user zeffy made the decision to take a closer look at how the actual blocking is done on the operating system level.
Details on exactly what was done are available in the article.
Source: https://www.ghacks.net/2017/04/18/bypass-for-windows-update-lock-for-modern-processors-found/
This will be especially handy for those whose machines were entitled to updates but were mistakenly blocked from receiving them.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday April 21 2017, @08:12PM (6 children)
Bypass for Windows Update Lock for Next-Gen Processors Found
Begin Rant() {
Software that constantly fights against you is called euphemistically "PUP" (potentially unwanted programs), or more plainly malware.
Unless you relish a constant arms race and fight against malware (Maybe it's your hobby? Maybe you're a masochist? Perhaps an ego thing?), the generally recognized industry best practice in dealing with malware is to remove it and to guard against its recurrence.
Otherwise, you must always be on guard, knowing that the malware that you knowingly have installed can at any time cause you problems. I don't say "unforseen" problems because I am forseeing them right now for you; you can't say "but I didn't know!"
Malware does unwanted things without regard to the instructions or desires of its user(s).
Now try that sentence with the word "Windows" in place of the word "Malware". Yes, Windows does unwanted things without regard to the instructions or desires of its users. It's malware.
Windows can be replaced with a free operating system [distrowatch.com] to solve and to prevent these problems. It's galling that that is even necessary, but Microsoft has over the years introduced hostile measure after hostile measure designed to deliberately break Windows remotely, to get Windows to spy for them (and not transparently, either), and to deliberately break Windows features and break software and software compatibility, with no signs of their stopping anytime soon.
While any given free OS will not be identical to any particular version of Windows, there are broad areas of feature overlap with none* of the malware aspects. Looking at free operating systems [distrowatch.com], interest/popularity roughly corresponds with how much luck people have had with a particular free operating system.
A larger community of users also generally corresponds with a greater availability of assistance when needed. Note that some communities know nearly everything but communicate at a more technical level (e.g., Arch) while others' knowledge may be less deep but more accessible to beginners (e.g., Mint). Others may fall somewhere in between (e.g., Debian, Fedora).
While many are forced by professional or educational(!) requirements, there are some who willingly use Windows and fight against is as if that were natural and normal. It's not. If you knowingly choose to use Windows, you are part of the problem.
*Free operating systems historically do not contain malware, except possibly for Ubuntu: Trusting them is hard to recommend after the default-phone-home-local-searches issue and their disastrous response to it ("no big deal"). Yes, being spyware is a big deal, and so is being malware. No OS is worthy for general use that has or promises such misfeatures.
}
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Friday April 21 2017, @09:41PM (3 children)
While many are forced by professional or educational(!) requirements,
Yes, including me.
there are some who willingly use Windows and fight against is as if that were natural and normal.
wait what? No there aren't. There are LOTS of people just willingly using windows who don't fight against it at all. But I don't think many people at all spend their days fighting with windows who AREN'T forced by other requirements to keep using it.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday April 21 2017, @10:52PM (2 children)
there are some who willingly use Windows and fight against [it] as if that were natural and normal.
wait what? No there aren't.
With respect, yes there are.
Reading the comments of articles like this [techsupportalert.com] and this [lifehacker.com.au] and this [reddit.com] you find person after person who acts as if fighting against your operating system is the most natural thing in the world; and some of them seem positively giddy at "getting one up" on Microsoft by disabling or reconfiguring some small part of the crapstorm that is contemporary Microsoft privacy and functionality policy. You don't see them as much on tech-savvy sites, unless by tech-savvy you mean "assume Windows is the center of the universe". But they're out there, keeping Windows alive by pretending that the emperor has clothes.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Saturday April 22 2017, @01:17AM
Decades ago I saw it on mainframes -- users fighting their systems and refusing to switch. Specifically, on CDC Cyber systems. They were difficult to work with. But people had becoms so used to the hoops they had to jump through that they refused to go through the process of learning too navigate an entirely different set of hoops on s different system. It took forcibly dragging some of them to a better-designed system (in this case, a Vax) before they realised that all the pain was unneessary, and their friends moved over too.
Now back then, I suspect, none of the problems were there because CDC had a policy of abusing their customers.
Given the commercial cultural evolution since then, I cannot be convinced that Microsoft (and the systemd pushers, for that matter) are entirely innocent.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Saturday April 22 2017, @03:42AM
i don't know that i agree. They may not be aware of linux and other alternatives, so fighting windows is the only option they have. They may not be aware that linux will work for them... but that assumes it would and honestly for most of those people i would argue it would probably wouldn't. People who 'fight' windows tend to be at least power users or gamers; so even if not really that tech savvy, they still likely use more advanced programs and tools, or games etc that are dependent on windows.
They aren't people who just need a working web browser.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Saturday April 22 2017, @01:10AM (1 child)
For one market -- the use of Linux outside the usual Gnome desktops -- the approach of systemd is causing some of the breakage problems attributed to Windows. Lots of things still work, but system administrators who are need to work deep within their Linux systems have been reporting serious breakage.
Of course, it is still possible to use Linux without systemd. But several of th main distros have given themselves over to it wholesale.
Systemd appears to be something like a Windows wannabe.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 22 2017, @05:23AM
systemd = MicroSft sponsored sabotage of the Linux world.
I am concerned about MS joining the Linux Foundation, as well as the re-alignments at Canonical / Ubutu for "commercial" focus... is Shuttleworth preparing to sell out to MicroSoft? That woulod be a complete train smash for Linux, something that would have Satan Nutella licking his H1-B legacy lips.