99% of business machines have not upgraded to Windows 10, according to study

nerp

Diamond Member
Dec 31, 2005
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Many big companies are about to begin migrations to Windows 10. Windows 7 will fade away gradually, not entirely for at least a decade, but they will. Just watch.
 

Yakk

Golden Member
May 28, 2016
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Oh they'll be forced to at some point in the next decade against their will, but that's how profit works.
 

thewhat

Member
May 9, 2010
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Not surprising in the slightest. Even if you ignore the potential privacy concerns and ads, Windows 10 has simply not shown to be a reliable/predictable OS yet. If there were any doubts, Anniversary Update made that clear.
And the new features 10 brings are either not interesting to most businesses or not worth the trade offs.
 

thewhat

Member
May 9, 2010
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First of all, not all business are using the Enterprise version.
Second, telemetry still cannot be completely disabled on Enterprise and ads still get installed out of the box (but you can prevent them being installed in the future, unlike on Pro).
Microsoft does not offer a clean iso free of all that nonsense. Maybe you can customize/create one yourself. But at the very least it's a bit of a nuisance and extra work, even with Enterprise.
 

tcsenter

Lifer
Sep 7, 2001
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Doctor's office I have done some work for uses an EMR and scheduling program that runs SQL 2000 and not supported on anything later than XP so running Virtual XP mode on W7 for four client workstations. The server is straight-up XP. Others have tried using SQL 2005 with it but doesn't work. He paid like $7500 for the application license(s). Tightwad Punjabi doctor won't upgrade, says it works so just get PCs that can run XP, until he retires I guess I don't know.
 

jimbob200521

Diamond Member
Apr 15, 2005
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Our company just finally upgraded our old Core 2 Duo 2gb RAM machines to Windows 7 because XP support stopped. I think it'll be a long while before we see Windows 10. At that point, a PC upgrade would be needed, I'd hate to see a C2D machine like we have here try to run Windows 10.
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
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Our company just finally upgraded our old Core 2 Duo 2gb RAM machines to Windows 7 because XP support stopped. I think it'll be a long while before we see Windows 10. At that point, a PC upgrade would be needed, I'd hate to see a C2D machine like we have here try to run Windows 10.
I upgraded the secretary's C2Q to Win10, and it works pretty well. I don't use it, but aside from the spyware, and other crap you get with proprietary software, it's left a favorable impression. If I wanted to run Windows, I'd want to run 10.
 

Commodus

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 2004
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I upgraded the secretary's C2Q to Win10, and it works pretty well. I don't use it, but aside from the spyware, and other crap you get with proprietary software, it's left a favorable impression. If I wanted to run Windows, I'd want to run 10.

Sending potentially revealing data to the mothership isn't inherent to proprietary software. Mac users are just fine, thanks!
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
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Sending potentially revealing data to the mothership isn't inherent to proprietary software.
Of course it is. You have no idea what Apple's doing because you can't look for yourself. You have to take their word for it. Regardless of what Apple or any other company does today, that can change at the stroke of a pen, and they don't have to tell you.
 

Commodus

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 2004
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Of course it is. You have no idea what Apple's doing because you can't look for yourself. You have to take their word for it. Regardless of what Apple or any other company does today, that can change at the stroke of a pen, and they don't have to tell you.

Whether or not it changes is one thing, but the point being: it's not a guaranteed aspect of proprietary software, and macOS doesn't do what Windows 10 does.

Also: yes, you can look. You can monitor software's network traffic; the data might be encrypted, but you'll know that something is going out when you perform certain tasks or leave the OS running. There's also the question of theory versus practice. Sure, open source software lets you inspect code, but how many people actually do that? When are Jane and John Typical User going to examine code with a fine-tooth comb to see if Apple is reading their contact lists? The answer, of course, is "never." It's completely unreasonable to expect an everyday user to learn code thoroughly enough that they can make sense of network data... and security researchers don't need open source code to spot suspicious data transfers.
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
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Whether or not it changes is one thing, but the point being: it's not a guaranteed aspect of proprietary software, and macOS doesn't do what Windows 10 does.

Also: yes, you can look. You can monitor software's network traffic; the data might be encrypted, but you'll know that something is going out when you perform certain tasks or leave the OS running. There's also the question of theory versus practice. Sure, open source software lets you inspect code, but how many people actually do that? When are Jane and John Typical User going to examine code with a fine-tooth comb to see if Apple is reading their contact lists? The answer, of course, is "never." It's completely unreasonable to expect an everyday user to learn code thoroughly enough that they can make sense of network data... and security researchers don't need open source code to spot suspicious data transfers.
Libre software provides herd immunity. Everyone doesn't have to code to benefit from having free code. There's no guarantees anywhere in life, but being able to review code will always be better than probing from the outside, and making guesses as to what the software's doing.
 

Commodus

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 2004
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Libre software provides herd immunity. Everyone doesn't have to code to benefit from having free code. There's no guarantees anywhere in life, but being able to review code will always be better than probing from the outside, and making guesses as to what the software's doing.

It will, I just don't think it's a life-or-death issue like it's made out to be. Ultimately, people are better off using the OS that runs the apps they want, and the thought that it might eventually, one day, maybe collect sensitive data without permission shouldn't be a major concern. Get reasonable evidence that it's not doing something right now; don't let speculative fear take over and limit what you can do.
 

Zaap

Diamond Member
Jun 12, 2008
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Doesn't surprise me in the least. Windows 10 offers virtuslly nothing compelling over previous versions (mainly 7) for businesses.

I personally wouldn't want a workstation PC running anything but Windows 7. (Use and prefer Macs, but PCs around the studio where I work are still rocking 7 for the most part). The market for workstations proves this is hardly unusual as most are still sold with Win7 either the default or an option.
 

Zaap

Diamond Member
Jun 12, 2008
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It will, I just don't think it's a life-or-death issue like it's made out to be.
And it isn't. I'm just sure Final Cut and Logic etc are phoning home every time I make an edit decision. Whoever is in charge of monitoring the transmissions sure has a boring job.
 

sweenish

Diamond Member
May 21, 2013
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It would be great if mods shut down the posters that refuse to actually know something before they open their mouths. First off, Win 10 enterprise doesn't phone home. I'm going to nip this one in the bud, but updates are also fully under the control of IT. And is it some kind of revelation that businesses are slow to migrate to new versions of Windows? The last company I worked for migrated to 7 from XP in 2013.

Less surprisingly, my current company (now in the tech industry) has already migrated to 10, but the anniversary update has [not surprisingly] yet to show up.
 

thewhat

Member
May 9, 2010
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Win 10 enterprise doesn't phone home.
Microsoft suggests that it does. Mind you, they updated the article a few times. It didn't have the optional MSRT/Defender reporting notes before.
It still contains this bit, though:
Connected User Experience and Telemetry component settings. If general telemetry data has been gathered and is queued, it is sent to Microsoft. Along with this telemetry, the Connected User Experience and Telemetry component may download a configuration settings file from Microsoft’s servers. This file is used to configure the Connected User Experience and Telemetry component itself. The data gathered by the client for this request includes OS information, device id (used to identify what specific device is requesting settings) and device class (for example, whether the device is server or desktop).
It's not clear if the configuration settings file can still be requested at Security level with MSRT/Defender reporting off. (And if not, why not, what is it configuring anyway.)

They certainly don't give you a "telemetry off" switch. I think many people were deceived into thinking that due to the 0 setting for Telemetry in registry/GP -- which doesn't mean disabled, but just "Security" level.
 

nemesismk2

Diamond Member
Sep 29, 2001
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where i work thay are still using windows xp because it works well and quickly. i keep saying that windows 7 would be faster than windows xp but they have a limited budget for upgrade. they will look into upgrading from windows xp when the microsoft security patches end in 2019. if they are going to be waiting that long then upgrading to windows 7 would not be much of an upgrade because windows 7 end of life is in 2020 so they should upgrade to windows 10 which will last until 2025.
 

Puffnstuff

Lifer
Mar 9, 2005
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Many companies don't have the IT support to address problems associated with a company wide upgrade such as moving up to 10 plus they might be running proprietary software packages that aren't compatible with it.
 

Red Squirrel

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May 24, 2003
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I can't imagine using windows 8 or 10 in a business environment, it's just not business oriented at all, it's too much "toyish". Not to mention the spy stuff that most IT dept will probably not want to have to deal with especially industries that have strict compliance requirements like hospitals or government. 7 is pretty much the defacto standard for businesses at this point if you want to upgrade from XP. We upgraded a few years ago.

Heck our hospital still has lot of NT4 stuff running. Servers with proprietary software that is very important and that has no upgrade path to a newer OS. I don't imagine most of the software they use on the standard image would work in 7 so they'll probably be on XP for quite a while.