Windows 10 vs 7

Kasimir

Title says it all. Is Windows 10 worth it yet?

I use Windows 7 still, and I have the last cpu generation of i5 that officially supported it. I have a roommate that needs a new comp, and available hardware is priced right against older stuff. All my internet browsing points to references written > year ago, so I don't know if all the bugbears were patched, or if persistent, unrestrained Cortana is bearable.

Thank you.

Rhyot

So, speaking from a technical point, Windows 10 isn't as bad as a lot of tech forums are making it out to be. I have a Win 7, Win 8 and Win 10 laptop at home, and I bounce between 7 and 10 quite often. The only issue I have personally with it is that there isn't a 'My Computer' logo anymore on the desktop, but that's easily traversed through going through the folders and selecting This PC or even C:

Overall, if you're wanting a new laptop, Win 10 really isn't all that bad. Its still user friendly. Just takes some time getting used to a much larger Window menu than Win 7 has. And you can disable Cortana, but its still not overly terrible. I've never run into an issue with Cortana.

Tiur

I use 7 and 10 daily, and while I prefer 7, 10 is nothing egregious. It's actually a little less annoying than 7 about updates, and it doesn't noticeably affect performance.

Rhyot

That's debatable, Tiur. I've noticed with Win 10, if it needs an update... it'll dim out your screen with a giant ass block of text that says "You need to update. Do it now or postpone it til later." While Win 7 just had a little pop up box in the bottom right.

Frustrating if you ask me, because if you're in the middle of typing something and you hit the space bar or enter right when this stupid popup shows up, your computer starts the process of updating. Its absolutely fucking annoying.

Diogen

Win10 has a lot of monitoring and control over the user; to the point where I'd verge on calling it invasive. You can quite easily turn things off like not sending your information directly to ad agencies, but other things like disabling forced updates and choking out "system monitoring" are much more difficult to deal with. Paranoid tech people are more concerned about the precedence the OS sets for the common user than any actual implemented features or abuse.

All that being said it's not a bad OS or much different from 7, and anyone who games seriously isn't going to have a choice but to upgrade eventually since newer directx versions are being gated behind having Win10.

The other major pro it has going for it is that it has a lot of security features to prevent some really nasty ransomware that is going around the net these days like the common cold.

Aishia

I'm on like 8 with gui stuff to make it more like 7 and I am pretty fine with it. I find a lot of the file architecture/transfers/etc work a lot better/faster than 7 did. (directory searches faster and etc too)

Zaila

Using 10 at work with updates occasionally drives me mad. It pops up with a big old "YOU NEED TO RESTART TO UPDATE!! COMPUTER WILL RESTART IN 5 MINUTES! CLICK NOW TO STOP AND CHOOSE A TIME TO RESCHEDULE!!" I choose a time for after work is over. An hour later it is back. And then if I happen to be away from my desk when it does it again, it'll start restarting all on it's own and that means I have no computer for the next 30-45 minutes while it updates (and my computer is essentially our intranet server, so it means we're all SOL for awhile). At work we have a few computers that are still 7 and we have had a lot of issues with getting the 10s and 7s to actually allow us to fully interact with one another (e.g. From my 10, I can open documents on a 7 but I can't save documents onto the 7 without being in a specific "public user" folder)

Those annoyances aside: I haven't noticed any issues with Win 10 versus 7 and I use it every day at work for basic browsing, windows office software, gimp, bookkeeping, etc.

Tiur

Sure, the block of text is annoying. But 7 gives me the "Update delayed" box and makes me choose a time. Invariably it pops up while I'm in the middle of something and reboots my box on its own. It also downloads in the background no matter how many times I tell it not to. Very frustrating.

Toz

I turned off updates on Win10 and run them manually when I'm good and ready (once a month ish) - but I'd also hear if there was a wtf huge security issue because that's what I work on anyway.

Xavin

I think it bears mentioning that windows 7 reaches end of extended support on January 14 2020, and Microsoft has officially closed the last of the free upgrade programs to get people onto windows 10. Ultimately, with windows 7 no longer supported on most pieces of modern hardware, I'd advise windows 10. Like Toz said, you can disable automatic updates and deal with it yourself. You can also rectify the privacy issues and there are myriad guides on how to do that on the internet. There are very few reasons to purchase a license for windows 7 at this point.

Ishin

I used to use 7 and enjoyed it quite a bit. I have 10 on my bigger for-games laptop, and while it's not bad, the UI feels hella clunky and shit. Stuff's really hard to find. I kinda feel like 10 was made for tablets and shit and it feels like they tried to port it to PC, rather than making a version of 10 solely for PC or whatever, if that makes sense. I haven't noticed anything terrible about it, though.

Jensen

I have 10 at work, and I don't really enjoy the switch from programs to apps. Product and services advertisements in my start menu and desktop also bother me a lot. For what I do at work, 10 seems to run fine, though I've had weird saving issues with some of my work documents that never seemed to occur with 7.

I still run 7 at home and am ultimately hoping vulkan become mainstream so that I'm not locked in to windows if I want to play games.

Aishia

I'll hype 8 I don't care. FIGHT ME.

Xavin

@Aishia I actually didn't mind 8.1. That said....it feels clunkier to me than 7 or 10 does. Also, @Jensen I'm pretty sure you can turn off those targeted adds because I don't get them and I'm running 10 pro on my work machine and my home rig.

Lin

I'm always mystified on the feedback on Windows 10 - I feel like I somehow got a version different from everybody else's. When I upgraded from 7, it set up everything just the way I had it, from color schemes, to my taskbar being on the top of the screen, to my 24-hour clock. There were a few small hurdles to get used to, like using the Settings menu instead of Control Panel for certain things, but aside from that, I think they delivered on making it a natural and organic experience.

Call me one of the few proud users, with no regrets whatsoever.

Mykellah

Basically, Windows 10 is awful if you care at all about security or privacy. In terms of the user experience, though, it isn't that bad.

And I say that as a FSF member and daily Linux user.

Lin

Mykellah said:

Basically, Windows 10 is awful if you care at all about security or privacy. In terms of the user experience, though, it isn't that bad. And I say that as a FSF member and daily Linux user.

I'm not saying my PC is safe from the NSA, but a little Googling and a few minutes of tweaking and I was able to iron out most of the privacy issues.

Satomi

To my knowledge, the people who believe in true privacy run Linux..

I think they also use the TOR Browser..

and they VPN everywhere..

(so I'm told)

Mykellah

Eliadon

I'm a little late to the party, but Windows 7 is a gigantic security problem waiting to happen. You will, over time, be vulnerable to more and more exploits that people find. This is not ideal, even if Windows 10 is super Big Brother.

There are a lot of bits you can Google to fix that, though.

Alternatively, join me on Ubuntu 8)

Kasimir

Eliadon said:

Alternatively, join me on Ubuntu 8)

Wouldn't that make Mudlet my only client?

Mykellah

TinyFugue works on linux too.

Tiur

fAkEtOLIA is upstairs on my Ubuntu 6, is all I'm saying.

Aishia

Don't keep saying things like that.

Lin

Honestly if I could run Clip Studio and all of my Steam games I'd be on Linux in a heartbeat.

Aishia

"If there were plants, animals, oxygen, and water on the moon I'd live there!"

Mykellah

If Adobe Photoshop and Corel Draw work on it fine with WINE I don't see why something else like that wouldn't.

Kasimir

Mykellah said:

If Adobe Photoshop and Corel Draw work on it fine with WINE I don't see why something else like that wouldn't.

GIMP any better?

Mykellah

Kasimir said:

Mykellah said:

If Adobe Photoshop and Corel Draw work on it fine with WINE I don't see why something else like that wouldn't.

GIMP any better?

My only regret is that I only have one LOL rating to give. The GIMP is stuck in the early 90s and determined to stay there. Depending on your needs, Krita is a great app for digital art though.

Tiur

Addon note: Nearly bricked my ipod because Windows 7 declared an unskippable update in the middle of updating the ipod. I hate how windows handles updates SO MUCH. I turn them off, and they turn back on.

Satomi

Tiur said:

Addon note: Nearly bricked my ipod because Windows 7 declared an unskippable update in the middle of updating the ipod. I hate how windows handles updates SO MUCH. I turn them off, and they turn back on.

The best way to handle windows updates is to treat it like a virus that keeps coming back. >.> Regular maintenance.