It's official: Windows 7 is THE best Windows version ever!

Mozilla is also improving its Telemetry, why not Windows?

 

Windows 8 doesn't abuse the "background intelligent transfer service" the way Windows 10 does. Until Windows 10, I never saw my bandwidth sucked by the OS when it was not doing anything. I'm not complaining about the telemetry, I'm complaining about using a resource, bandwidth, without authorization by the user in amounts sufficient to affect other uses and users.

I'm really over using 3rd party apps to do what the OS should be doing out of the box. It's so much simpler not to have to bother with installing such workaround utilities. None of my Linux systems have any at all. MacOS is pretty consistent too. For all the updates to the core, the GUI has been pretty much the same over the years so you don't have to relearn it over again if you upgrade to a newer version of the OS. The Linux command shell is a marvel consistency as well. It's basically the same to this day as it was in the Unix systems it was modeled on.

 

Well with Mozilla you can much easier disable it if you choose to. MS usually wants to somehow trick you to get to this data - that's why they constantly change how telemetry works, reenable settings you've disabled and similar. In that regard they're behaving similar to some other developers who try to trick their users into sharing more data than they really want.

 

I have never used Win 7, but Win 8 and 10 are probably the best when it comes to stability and you can still customize them both to work like Win XP. The problem is that Win 10 is too bloated, way too many processes which makes it a bit more RAM hungry. Plus it has a problem with DPI scaling and the Windows Store is a joke. Win 10 is good but it should have been way better.

 

Maybe of interest to some, the following is a comprehensive list of Microsoft-related applications that will connect outbound without firewall, or other, restrictions in place on my Windows 10 Pro, 20H2 system:

Code:

C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Windows Time
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Windows Update
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Microsoft Store Install Service
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Microsoft Account sign-in Assistant
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Connected User Experiences and Telemetry
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Cryptographic Services
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Background Intelligent Transfer Service
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Windows pushToInstall Service
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Windows Push Notifications System Service
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Windows insider Service
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Delivery Optimization
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Device Setup Manager
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Update Orchestrator Service
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - Network Location Awareness
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - DNS Client
C:\windows\system32\svchost.exe - DHCP Client
System
C:\windows\system32\compattelrunner.exe
C:\windows\system32\devicecensus.exe
C:\windows\system32\wwahost.exe
C:\windows\system32\mousocoreworker.exe
C:\windows\system32\smartscreen.exe
C:\windows\system32\apphostregistrationverifier.exe
C:\windows\system32\runtimebroker.exe
C:\windows\system32\backgroundtransferhost.exe
C:\windows\system32\backgroundtaskhost.exe
C:\windows\system32\taskhostw.exe
C:\windows\immersivecontrolpanel\systemsettings.exe
C:\program files (x86)\microsoft\edgeupdate\microsoftedgeupdate.exe
C:\program files\windowsapps\microsoft.windows.photos_2020.20120.4004.0_x64__8wekyb3d8bbwe\microsoft.photos.exe
C:\program files\windowsapps\microsoft.yourphone_1.21022.139.0_x64__8wekyb3d8bbwe\yourphone.exe
C:\windows\systemapps\microsoft.windows.search_cw5n1h2txyewy\searchapp.exe

BTW, I do have Telemetry and some other services such as Customer User Experince disabled in Group Policy. I also excluded Defender processes from this list.

 

thanks for this exhaustive list.

 

No problem. I don't have this sort of list for XP and 7 to compare to, but I'm sure 10 trumps them both in number.

 

Exactly this.

 

https://www.ghacks.net/2017/02/11/blocking-telemetry-in-windows-7-and-8-1/

So with Windows XP there are far fewer problems (however disabling Remote Desktop + Error Reporting might help reduce some semblance of telemetry).
In my case the use of Black Viper's Services Configuration + New Moon 28 + OSA + HOSTS file + No Web-Extensions:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1372288


practically cancels any possibility of telemetry.

 

i, too, am sure that it does.

 

I have special sentiment for Vista and XP but currently I'm using daily Win 7 and sometime Win 8.1. Win 7 gives me possibility to install, use and test a lot of interresting aps so by this is veru useful for me.

 

It's official: Windows 7 is THE best Windows version ever!

For me it is and always will be WINDOWS 8.1

 

Ditto here, and I'm already getting things in order to return to it - for the 3rd time. I want to like Windows 10. I've tried three times to like it, and I'm finding it not getting any better, or faster. It's okay, and it's stable, and it has some built in security that 8.1 can't match. It just doesn't 'do anything' for me, if that makes sense. Win 8.1 besides being faster seems friendlier and more intuitive, to me anyway.

 

Windows is criticized for having the Internet Explorer web browser integrated into the
Windows shell from Windows 98 onwards. With integration security, vulnerabilities in
Internet Explorer could also create security vulnerabilities in Windows, which could
allow an attacker to exploit Windows with remote code execution.

Windows Vista didn’t do well in the market and two years later, Microsoft released a
polished version of Vista and named it as Windows 7. Critics claimed the OS was a major
improvement over its predecessor. It was a major success for MS. Even in 2021 W7 still
has a somewhat sizable market share that's larger than W8.1 according to StatCounter.

 

I think Win 7 has a much larger marketplace than 8 or 8.1. Users hate Windows 8, and they don't realize 8.1 is different. I don't remember the numbers, but I think Win 8/8.1 has barely 15% of the market. Maybe smaller than that. And 8.1 is a fine operating system. It takes barely a minute to get rid of the tiles nonsense and get to the desktop, which is very Win 7, and Win 10 like.

 

In my Windows 10 Pro setup, I've disabled the following Telemetry or Reporting settings in Group Policy, or where full disabling is not an option, I've mitigated as much as possible utilizing the available options to do so:

Code:

Allow Cortana
Allow Cortana above lock screen
Allow search and Cortana to use location
Allow Use of Camera
Configure Solicited Remote Assistance
Use Windows Hello for Business
Allow Telemetry
Configure collection of browsing data for Desktop Analytics
Configure Default consent
Configure Error Reporting
Customize consent settings
Disable Windows Error Reporting
Do not allow web search
Do not allow Windows Messenger to be run
Do not automatically start Windows Messenger initially
Do not send additional data
Do not show Windows tips
Don't allow this PC to be projected to
Don't search the web or display web results in Search
Turn off Microsoft consumer experiences
Turn off Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program
Turn off Windows Mobility Center

...and still Windows 10 is a Telemetry hornet's nest, as can be see by the whopping 32 processes in my above post attempting outbound comms. As @Minimalist stated a few posts above, Microsoft does try to trick the user into thinking these Telemetry "Features " are disabled, when they really aren't.

 

Bill Gates. you can just hear him now. giddy as all get out. Look at those fools, I suckered them all hee hee and even the government. Got my loot and living the carefree life until the end.

So true too. Not a single industry is dominated as his brainchild O/S. And no one even had the guts to compete, effectively that is. Apple is a joke in it's own way. One would thought long time ago to fashion a better O/S to overtake windows.

Yeah I know Linux. But really, DISTROS? Bahhhh

 

Linux. There must be a hundred or more different distros, and all competing against each other. Their other downside is, even though Linux is much easier to deal with today, it still isn't Windows easy. It still doesn't offer the software some of us need and use. Or, it offers similar software - open source - which is cumbersome and klutzy in some cases and, resurrecting a comment I've seen here at Wilders and other places concerning some programs, the GUI's aren't attractive.

 

I counter Linux is easier to use than Windows in every way except software made exclusively for Windows such as M$ Office formats & Gaming. An over exaggeration yes, but true none the less.

 

It should burn everyone's butt Gates got away with the largest one man heist ever.

Just goes to show that the days of Orville & Willie Wright never ended. It just needed another nerd with all the resources to corner a market all on their own then scoot with the loot and funnies.

 

for my money, macos is a better os than winos.

 

Easily. It was always a better system. For my money Linux is as good as macOS in many respects; and even better in some. I've recently upgraded to Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. Ubuntu seems to get better with every release. At least Mac improves generally with newer releases.

Windows was always up and down. XP wasn't bad, but Vista was a train wreck of epic proportions. Win 7 wasn't bad at all. The less said about Win 8 the better. I realised it was time to wave goodbye to Windows when they started to shag with Win 7 updates and change the updating settings on my computer. The pushing of Win 10 fiasco was finally the last straw.

I've been Windows-free for quite a while now, and never been happier or felt safer (remind me again what AV's were lol).

 

i'd have made the switch to linux already, had i not been totally dependent on ms' ecosystem.

 

I was lucky in that respect; MS has nothing I need.

 

what office suite do you use?