Made the mistake of loading Microsoft “Widows 10 Free Upgrade” (Win10) on our main Windows 7 Desktop Box. Just one opinion from the dinosaur technologist... this "Upgrade" was a HUGH blunder. The look and feel is unnecessarily and significantly different. Seems more like change for the sake of change rather than a great vehicle that increases functionality or productivity, a grab for more $$ than for obvious system improvements. Win10 is once again far further removed from the hardware... little new can be seen in imbedded common applications or in operations of frequently used third-party programs. Some are likely aware of my strong personal interest in family genealogy... and thus often use Ancestry.com for family research. A Win10 browser banner boldly recommends you download & use other browsers like Firefox or Google Chrome... since there are technical issues between imbedded Win10 browsers and the complex Ancestry application. Been previously using the fine Chrome Browser for some time now anyway... but my gosh... just how bush league can Microsoft get? Very hard to get Win10 back to a Classic Widows look & feel... struggled with some of this... but suspect there is no way to make Win10 look & feel (or operate essentially like) say Windows 7 or 8. Win10 version may be fine for mindless smart phone users, but really sucks for folks capable of and desiring to be closer to the hardware to do work. There are just as many bugs in Win10 (relative to earlier Windows versions)... this suggested and proved in the humble opinion of this contributor by the near constant “critical upgrade” offerings coming in from MS Windows Update. Whatever mystery awaits a Windows 10 user are perhaps buried in re-written code on the fringes of the operating system core, new routines to be soon exploited by the great unwashed hacker community. The wiz-kids at Microsoft have done it again. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, over.
"The Gates Of Hell"
Strong Recommendation: Wait awhile - maybe forever - maybe just for several months - before downgrading your Windows 7/8 box to Windows 10 Operating System. Win10 may become more stable with the many update patches presently pushed out from Microsoft.
P.S. Edited the next day 17 Oct 2015:
A simple upgrade phrase: Boy, do I feel stupid! Why was this Microsoft Trojan Horse brought into this home?
There may be undisclosed operational differences (likely untested) between a new box with clean Win10 image and the Win 10 download to an "upgraded" older box. Pretty sure some remnants of the OS linger (perhaps with conflicting files). Oh yes, MS puts your old Windows version in a C:\\windows.old folder (for possible rollback). Prior experience indicated several differences between OS "upgrades" and clean OS installation on virgin or re-formatted hard drive (been there -- done that countless times before). I'm not aware of the usefulness of a possible OS rollback provision (alleged to be useful within one month of Win10 Upgrade). Suspect the rollback provision is itself not extensively tested and may in fact unsatisfactorily compound the Win7/8-to-Win10-to-Win7/8 conversion process. There was no full-disclosure -- just a simple warning banner posted prior to the Win10 upgrade -- with easy to follow instructions for quick Win7/8 rollback. Such simple warning in connection with the MS aggressive push to do Win10 upgrades would be the ethical corporate thing to do.
Not sure why I did the desktop Win10 upgrade -- too much time on a fool's hands I guess -- my box was fine under Win7. Will not be "upgrading" our Win7 laptop to this unacceptable Free Win10 Upgrade version. Bottom line – the best way to restore a previous OS may be to purchase a refurbished box from a certified PC re-seller.
P.P.S. Something else omitted in yesterday's post: it took the better part of a day to do the Win10 upgrade, over my 1.5 mbps DSL Internet Service. Then a few hours messing with look and feel configuration setup in a partially successful attempt to restore the way the box once operated. And we still struggle today to get the previous look and feel back. Recommend bypassing Win10 upgrade if your ISP sports decades old download bandwidth.
P.P.P.S. Oct 28, 2015. One of the latest Windows 10 updates (a/k/a: a software patch) regards the sloppy code and poorly tested Microsoft Edge browser. Microsoft boldly states: The vulnerabilities corrected ["patched"] allow information disclosure when a user views certain web-pages using Microsoft Edge. An attacker who exploits these vulnerabilities gains the same user rights as the current user.
Bottom line, a victim's information security and privacy expectations are compromised without this patch.
P.P.P.S. Oct 28, 2015. One of the latest Windows 10 updates (a/k/a: a software patch) regards the sloppy code and poorly tested Microsoft Edge browser. Microsoft boldly states: The vulnerabilities corrected ["patched"] allow information disclosure when a user views certain web-pages using Microsoft Edge. An attacker who exploits these vulnerabilities gains the same user rights as the current user.
Bottom line, a victim's information security and privacy expectations are compromised without this patch.
Oct 19 2015: Wanted to add that the Microsoft Community web site -- www.answers.microsoft.com/en.us is helpful in resolving operational (look and feel) issues between Windows 7 and Windows 10.
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