Microsoft’s Windows 10 is a privacy nightmare

sue.t wrote:
The anything-Cloud isn't in my future - I prefer to keep my stuff with me anyway and have a desktop that's made for it.

:) Well, the Yukon isn't exactly the normal environment. We have fiber to our mountain cabin though, so you might be surprised. Most city dwellers don't have that option yet.

I am not a Microsoft fan, never have been and never will be. But we live in a Microsoft (and Apple) world. As I see it, Windows 10 is Microsoft inching toward Apple's model, i.e. all things Microsoft in one big package.

I happen to prefer the Linux model, being an operating system with all apps (from wherever) running on top of it, but in a Microsoft world.

So I installed Windows 10 on my relatively new Lenovo laptop with 8.1 on it (just last evening). I didn't accept Windows browser, photo software, email, etc, etc and am now using my normal operating environment of Google Chrome browser, GMail, Google Cloud (My Drive), Google Photos, Google Apps, etc, etc. Oh, and StartIsBack (I dislike the new Windows splashy and screen covering mess).

I am a happy camper, the upgrade went without hitch and you can barely tell its Windows 10 rather than Windows 7. All the doomsayers about Windows 10 are overstating the issue.

Windows has gradually acquired an actually good disk imaging capability. I have used a succession of 3rd party apps to do this including Norton Ghost, EaseUS, DriveImage XML, etc. But the Windows 8 (and now 10) Secure Boot feature makes booting a Linux based recovery tool problematic so the Windows capability is much easier to use. Secure Boot is a needed security fix since without it a password on your system is no protection for your data.

I used Windows disk image capability (Reflect) to create a bootable USB flash drive with a Windows mini-system on it that is used to restore the image if Windows or the hard drive crashes. I then created an image of my Windows 8.1 system before doing the Windows 10 upgrade so I had a fall back plan if Windows 10 disappointed. Not likely I will be using it so it is time to create an image of my Win 10 system if I need to recover from a crash.

My conclusion is that both Windows 8.1 and 10 are perfectly good incremental upgrades to Windows 7 (and XP) that a lot of people are avoiding for personal and perfectly acceptable reasons. Even if they are misguided. :)