Windows 10 1803 “Isn’t Ready for Prime Time”

Megalith

Megalith

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Computerworld continues their critical analysis of Windows 10: while Microsoft released a patch this week (KB 4284848) fixing two major bugs related to the SMBv1 protocol and Edge browser, they advise that Windows 10 1803 is still riddled with old problems. These include Intel NIC and VLAN issues, Chrome conflicts, and lack of home network connectivity.

There are many reports of munged Intel NICs and VLAN problems after installing 1803. Josh Mayfield (whom you may recall from GWX days) reports that you’re forced to set up a PIN during fresh installs. The ancient problem with restore partitions getting assigned drive letters on install remains. Chrome continues its indigestion with 1803, although Microsoft claims the latest patch cures all ills. None of this is acknowledged anywhere I can see.
 
Win10 1803 is the Anti-Gamer Edition. With it's Intel NIC issues it kills online and even offline gaming for many who don't know about the issue and how to ship around it. I am glad, tho I have the same affected NIC on my motherboard, as mine runs still smooth like silk.

I find it utmost annoying that MS forces you thru all the settings again if you dont opt-in with all they have to offer. I have done this on numerous machines and it's just sick and dirty. Instead of taking the user's decision NOT to participate in all those options..no..MS wants to hear your NO again...as lazy people may just click "Yes" and MS has won another battle the dirty way.

Yet 1803 is the worst they ever released imho
 
The PIN thing is no big deal, my PIN is the same as my password. Chrome seems fine to me, maybe I'm just not using whatever Chrome feature causes a problem. No one cares about the Edge browser.
 
The home networking problem is universal and the reason is silly but easy to fix. http://maximumpcguides.com/windows-...covery-resource-publication-fdrespub-service/. When Microsoft removed HomeGroups they disabled these two services that enable peer networking. Almost sure that this isn't an oversight because it's so obvious but then I have no idea why they did this.

One plus that's noted in the CW article and something I've noticed as well. The mouse and pen would predictably stutter at times on my Surface Book 2 such as when closing an app. That seems to have been fixed in the latest update.
 
Windows should never have been made into a rolling-release OS, that was the biggest single mistake Microsoft has ever made with their desktop operating system and it will do nothing but cause shit for them till the day they finally realize "Oh, that was a mistake, we need to address that."

Until that happens, fuck Windows 10, and fuck Microsoft too.
 
Tiberian said:
Windows should never have been made into a rolling-release OS, that was the biggest single mistake Microsoft has ever made with their desktop operating system and it will do nothing but cause shit for them till the day they finally realize "Oh, that was a mistake, we need to address that."
Click to expand...

But three year big bang releases isn't the answer anymore either.
 
heatlesssun said:
But three year big bang releases isn't the answer anymore either.
Click to expand...

As an "I.T. Professional" since the 1970s, I'd rather fix shit once every 3 years than having my phone never stop ringing every time they push out some intermediary update that breaks more shit than I care to fix regardless of the fees I'd be charging.

/me walks away from this one fast 'cause it'll go downhill in record time...
 
heatlesssun said:
But three year big bang releases isn't the answer anymore either.
Click to expand...

Why not? For me, and I expect for lots of people, it's precisely the answer. The bi-annual updates do nothing for me, and that's why I'll be installing Windows 10 LTSB on my next build. And 3 years between releases is still too rapid. People didn't replace XP after 3 years, and neither did they replace Windows 7 after 3 years.

The OS platform has generally reached its maturity to fulfill its purpose, and so there's no need for frequent large updates. And frequent large updates, mostly of features in search of a need rather than the other way around, are doing a lot of harm.

I suspect that Microsoft's move to a bi-annual release schedule is mostly about Microsoft's want to collect as much personal data as possible (adding additional data-harvesting points, resetting settings, adding new MS services that MS monetizes), and not about what works best for or wanted by Microsoft's customers.
 
Tiberian said:
/me walks away from this one fast 'cause it'll go downhill in record time...
Click to expand...

Not at all. Continuous development and delivery, agile. I've been in the business for close to 30 years myself and I've seen how many development processes come and go?

Agile kick the living shit out of all them. Maybe two a year releases for Windows 10 should be one but the three year big bang release schedule is done. That's just way to long to deliver today.
 
heatlesssun said:
Name one major software project, commercial or open source, that delivers major functional changes only once every three years today.
Click to expand...

This is beside the point. Windows hasn't undergone a major change since Windows Vista released. Windows 7 was a minor update of Vista, and 8 of 7 and Vista, and 10 of 8, 7, and Vista. Updates just for the sake of having updates is entirely pointless. But Microsoft seemingly wanted to capitalize on the mobile phone trend (which I think is over, now) of being excited for every vapid update that basically changes nothing big, to push out Windows 10, an ultra-monetized version of the Windows OS. And I think the inconvenient and disruptive large update schedule is also done to serve Microsoft's monetization interests, and not because there's enough quality content being made by Microsoft to warrant them. There clearly isn't.


As for a major software project that has delivered major changes about every few years give or take: Apache HTTP Server, and Windows before Windows 10.

If a software is doing its job, then it's purpose is fulfilled. Updates for the sake of updating is meaningless, disruptive, and can be (and in the case of Windows 10 has been) harmful.

Also, software that sees major releases frequently isn't normally addressing something as big as the Windows OS, and usually doesn't force the newest version to be installed over existing versions.
 
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heatlesssun said:
But three year big bang releases isn't the answer anymore either.
Click to expand...

There's that false choice fallacy again. A happy medium used to exist, and anyone being honest remembers the Service Pack days as being relatively smooth - certainly more than perpetual-beta, constant state of flux Windows 10 where you never know if you're waking up to a bricked PC or wiped desktop and missing programs because you got zapped by the forced update hammer middle of the night. Back in the service pack days, real engineers ran the fucking show, not a selfie obsessed millennial; a real QA division with professional testers vetted the patches, not customers.

Pre-Windows 10 you didn't really have to second guess Microsoft's patches. In business and enterprise you might've delayed a bit or tested in a sandbox first, but you generally could trust Windows Update not to contain any weird shit. But now you have to be on guard for them, you have to wonder what new trojans MS has tried to sneak in behind vaguely worded KB description text. And every time there's a big featureless seasonal update that reinstalls the OS, it's dread, because it causes lots of headaches for usually no meaningful improvements or gain, not to mention undoes OS tweaks, removes shipping features, and resets things back to MS defaults.
 
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heatlesssun said:
The home networking problem is universal and the reason is silly but easy to fix. http://maximumpcguides.com/windows-...covery-resource-publication-fdrespub-service/. When Microsoft removed HomeGroups they disabled these two services that enable peer networking. Almost sure that this isn't an oversight because it's so obvious but then I have no idea why they did this.

One plus that's noted in the CW article and something I've noticed as well. The mouse and pen would predictably stutter at times on my Surface Book 2 such as when closing an app. That seems to have been fixed in the latest update.
Click to expand...
I've had that "hang" thing with a regular mouse. I thought it was caused by my video drivers.
 
I downgraded to 1709 quite a while ago (maybe 2 weeks or so after the update launch) and despite not having disabled win update or even postponed feature updates for some reason it hasn't even attempted to install 1803 again, seems like MS did tweaks to this and respects the people who chose to downgrade, I mean it must have been couple of months since I downgraded.

Also the downgrade process was very quick this time, we're talking about seconds, for previous update it took matters of 15 min probably so at least that's an improvement.
 
heatlesssun said:
Not at all. Continuous development and delivery, agile. I've been in the business for close to 30 years myself and I've seen how many development processes come and go?

Agile kick the living shit out of all them. Maybe two a year releases for Windows 10 should be one but the three year big bang release schedule is done. That's just way to long to deliver today.
Click to expand...

The fact that Agile development is trendy and a big buzzword in software development circles does not create in Windows users an obligation to care WHEN IT DOES NOT IMPROVE THE SOFTWARE. And with Windows 10's awful record of botched patches, there's not much evidence that Agile is really doing anything but making the product suffer because of the "we'll just patch the patch, fix it later" attitude.

Customers don't care how the sausage is made. They don't care if it's following industry trends. They don't care if the latest Visual Studio added social media buttons or Cortana and Bing integration. Customers simply want a better product, ideally that improves upon its predecessor meaningfully. How Microsoft achieves that is Microsoft's problem.

If an auto manufacturer was pumping out defective cars that required being serviced or recalled far more frequently than prior years, nobody would care when the manufacturer was insisting "But we're using the latest, most trendy manufacturing technology!". WGAF.
 
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heatlesssun said:
Not at all. Continuous development and delivery, agile. I've been in the business for close to 30 years myself and I've seen how many development processes come and go?

Agile kick the living shit out of all them. Maybe two a year releases for Windows 10 should be one but the three year big bang release schedule is done. That's just way to long to deliver today.
Click to expand...

There is a reasonable in between and you know it.

Seeing as chrome is one of the issues here it seems fitting to hold it up as an example;
https://www.chromium.org/getting-involved/dev-channel

Stable, Beta, Dev.

MS should be doing much the same. The default installation of windows 10 for everyone should be stable.
Enough people would opt into the beta and dev channels to more then give them the feedback they need to push complete stable versions to Stable on a regular basis.

The issue isn't constant updates.
The issue is constant broken updates.
 
DPI said:
There's that false choice fallacy again. A happy medium did once exist, and anyone being honest remembers the Service Pack days as being relatively smooth - certainly more han this perpetual-beta, constant state of flux that Windows 10 is in, where you never know if you're waking up to a bricked PC or wiped desktop with missing programs because you got zapped by the forced update hammer middle of the night. Back in the service pack days, real engineers ran the fucking show, not a selfie obsessed millennial; a real QA division with professional testers vetted the patches, not customers.
Click to expand...

Service Packs were never a delivery vehicle for major functional changes save one, Windows XP Service Pack 2. Windows XP was on its way to super security disaster before this service pack. That service pack which really wasn't saved XP and made it viable for enterprise use.

No major commercial or open source project today delivers major functional changes in three year cycles. Not one.
 
DPI said:
The fact that Agile development is trendy and a big buzzword in software development circles does not create in Windows users an obligation to care WHEN IT DOES NOT IMPROVE THE SOFTWARE.
Click to expand...

Again, all major software projects, commercial and open source, adhere to the principle of continuous development and delivery. Every single one. Even the biggest anti-Microsoft folks are doing agile. So I just don't get where you are anyone else is going with this. Agile is well beyond a buzzword. It's how software across the board is development AND deployed these days.

DPI said:
Customers don't give a shit how the sausage is made. They don't care that it's following industry trends. They don't care if the latest Visual Studio added social media buttons or Cortana and Bing integration. Customers simply want a better product, ideally that improves upon its predecessor meaningfully. How the developer achieves that is the developer's problem.
Click to expand...

But customers are impatient. The recognition of this and setting time based delivery is part of the brilliance of Agile.
 
Cuing all of the Windows 10 haters in three... two... one... although their gripes have merit.

Megalith said:
Computerworld continues their critical analysis of Windows 10: while Microsoft released a patch this week (KB 4284848) fixing two major bugs related to the SMBv1 protocol and Edge browser, they advise that Windows 10 1803 is still riddled with old problems. These include Intel NIC and VLAN issues, Chrome conflicts, and lack of home network connectivity.
Click to expand...

I want to know more about the Intel NICS. Doesn't most motherboards with a Intel chipset also come with a Intel NIC on the board? I know my Gigabyte GA-Z97X-UD5H motherboard has both a Intel NIC and a Killer NIC, but I'm only using the Intel NIC. (I thought it was a cool feature at the time, but never used it). I don't use VLANs on my home network though.

Tiberian said:
Windows should never have been made into a rolling-release OS, that was the biggest single mistake Microsoft has ever made with their desktop operating system and it will do nothing but cause shit for them till the day they finally realize "Oh, that was a mistake, we need to address that."

Until that happens, fuck Windows 10, and fuck Microsoft too.
Click to expand...

Windows 10 was released in July, 2015. At the time of that release, the MacOS was on 10.10: "Yosemite", and since then, has released 10.11: "El Capitan", 10.12: "Sierra", and 10.13: "High Sierra", with 10.14: "Mojave" slated for later on this year. Ubuntu Linux was on 15.04 (Vivid Vervet) on April, 2015, and had 15.10 (Wily Werewolf), 16.04 LTS (Xenial Xerus), 16.10 (Yakkety Yak), 17.04 (Zesty Zapus), and 17.10 (Artful Aardvark), with 18.04 LTS (Bionic Beaver) being the current release.

And, while I prefer the wide-open ecosystem of the Windows platform (especially with the walled-off Mac ecosystem), I do recognize the challenges of that also. How many different places can a game publisher place a save file, for instance? Not only is my Documents folder filled with them, but also the different AppData folders as well as ProgramData.
 
My Windows 10 system is running 1803, because it was either that or have it not run at all: That Windows 10 installation randomly borked itself a long time ago while it was on version 1703, and because I'm fed up with having to reinstall Windows 10 every time it breaks itself (1 - 2 times a year) I'd just let the OS remain broken and used Windows 7 ever since (which hasn't had a single issue).

I recently decided to try updating the Windows 10 1703 installation to see if it would fix the broken explorer (which is what I suspect broke), and it actually did. I guess the installation re-installed or reconfigured explorer. So, that Windows 10 installation is now usable again, for now.
 
heatlesssun said:
Again, all major software projects, commercial and open source, adhere to the principle of continuous development and delivery. Every single one. Even the biggest anti-Microsoft folks are doing agile. So I just don't get where you are anyone else is going with this. Agile is well beyond a buzzword. It's how software across the board is development AND deployed these days.
Click to expand...

Let's try to make this even simpler because you're still not getting it. Agile is not a substitute for innovation. Print this out on a banner and hang it in the hallways at Microsoft.
 
These updates have been a mess for me. The last Fall creators update broke the Window's Store version of Quantum Break and also broke printscreen for me and neither have been fixed with newer updates. And the last update actually deleted the Nvidia driver completely and put my 60hz monitor at 62hz. And EVERY one of these large updates changes some of my settings and also changes my audio to 5.1 even though I have a 2.1 setup. Most issues I can fix no problem but many everyday people like my parents would have no idea how to fix their audio or video if it gets screwed up.
 
DPI said:
Let's try to make this even simpler because you're still not getting it. Agile is not a substitute for innovation. Print this out on a banner and hang it in the hallways at Microsoft.
Click to expand...

So how many major software projects aren't doing continuous development and delivery today? All of this nonsense and no one can name ONE that rejects the core principle of Agile?
 
What is all this crap about forced PIN number setups? Am I missing something? (I didn't read the linked article yet if it is mentioned there) I've done a crapload of fresh 1803 installs, Home and Pro, not seeing any forced PIN number stuff. I don't normally password fresh installs for customers though. Is it happening on fresh 1803 installs if you do setup a password or something?

EDIT: Ah, yes, it's mentioned in the article, guess I have not run into it yet. If true, that's a bit annoying.
 
heatlesssun said:
So how many major software projects aren't doing continuous development and delivery today? All of this nonsense and no one can name ONE that rejects the core principle of Agile?
Click to expand...

Operating systems....

MacOS. One major update a year for What 12 or 13 years now.

The issue isn't even that MS is messing up trying to be agile. Its that they have implemented a very open source style release format basically turning average consumers windows boxes into Dev Channel devices.

If I'm running the latest greatest Linux kernel and run into issues... I'm not hoping mad. I have choose to run beta software. If I install Linux for my parents they are getting a LTS kernel that doesn't change until the next LTS kernel is released a year+ later at min. They will not be calling me on a weekend complaining that an update killed their network or any other such sillyness.

MS having issues with their beta updates is to be expected... what shouldn't be expected is forced beta level updates of peoples consumer devices.

MS needs a Win 10 Stable branch.... cause what they are doing currently isn't working. It seems clear their updates have minimal testing done on them.
 
heatlesssun said:
So how many major software projects aren't doing continuous development and delivery today? All of this nonsense and no one can name ONE that rejects the core principle of Agile?
Click to expand...

ChadD said:
Operating systems....

MacOS. One major update a year for What 12 or 13 years now.

The issue isn't even that MS is messing up trying to be agile. Its that they have implemented a very open source style release format basically turning average consumers windows boxes into Dev Channel devices.

If I'm running the latest greatest Linux kernel and run into issues... I'm not hoping mad. I have choose to run beta software. If I install Linux for my parents they are getting a LTS kernel that doesn't change until the next LTS kernel is released a year+ later at min. They will not be calling me on a weekend complaining that an update killed their network or any other such sillyness.

MS having issues with their beta updates is to be expected... what shouldn't be expected is forced beta level updates of peoples consumer devices.

MS needs a Win 10 Stable branch.... cause what they are doing currently isn't working. It seems clear their updates have minimal testing done on them.
Click to expand...
I think you're both right. The solution is for Microsoft to implement a way to stay on a specific branch for all versions of Windows. If they are going to patch security for previous OS branches, why not let people stay on them? Otherwise there's no reason to patch them if you are forcing upgrades.
 
ChadD said:
MS needs a Win 10 Stable branch.... cause what they are doing currently isn't working. It seems clear their updates have minimal testing done on them.
Click to expand...

It's because Satya Nadella (the worst thing to happen to Microsoft and their Windows OS customers) fired off many thousands of Microsoft's testing engineers, and shifted the company to rely on data-harvesting information to test the OS - and he did this without any verification that it would be a suitable and effective tact. He did it, like psychopathic short-term thinking CEO's do, to increase Microsoft's profitability, make Microsoft's share-holders short-term profits, and to increase his CEO compensation package.

As a result of his lack of understanding of what he was doing, Microsoft has nose-dived in design and quality control. Also, he has set the stage for Microsoft to be crippled in the long-term:

GDPR recently came into effect, and California has just mandated that Microsoft and all other tech and data companies must offer the option for people to not have their data collected or sold - and it can be expected that other states and other countries are going to follow suit with California, as that is the logical, rational, and only rights-respecting way to move forward and address the manifesting unfettered data-exploitation crisis.

So, where will Microsoft be, having fired maybe most of their testing engineers, after Microsoft is no longer able to surrogate actual testers with data-collection? Microsoft will have to hire new testing engineers to replace the ones they previously fired. But I'm sure Microsoft's QA departments were refined and skilled-up over many years, and Microsoft will now have to spend many years to rebuild something of similar quality and experience.

Psychopathic CEO's tend to create short-term gain but long-term damage to the companies they work for. And I think that is what we're witnessing Satya Nadella doing to Microsoft.
 
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heatlesssun said:
The home networking problem is universal and the reason is silly but easy to fix. http://maximumpcguides.com/windows-...covery-resource-publication-fdrespub-service/. When Microsoft removed HomeGroups they disabled these two services that enable peer networking. Almost sure that this isn't an oversight because it's so obvious but then I have no idea why they did this.
Click to expand...

Thanks for this, I thought I was having a "just me" problem from turning off some sort of sync setting. THANKS AGAIN!
 
heatlesssun said:
Microsoft's market cap has nearly quadrupled under Nadella and stands at all time highs at over $750 billion USD. I get that you hate Microsoft but no one fires a CEO under those conditions for performance reasons.

That would be psychopathic.
Click to expand...

I think his point would be that in order to make something good you have to actually spend time on it.

MS has greatly increased their stock market value sure... I think bigdogchris is saying its at the expense of long term viability. Every single upgrade cycle the news stories of MS broke X Y and Z are numerous. It is going to cost them in the end. MS is offering less and less value to software developers, if their updates are constantly forcing them to provide active support which isn't cheap. Its not always MS getting the call if X windows update kills some third party device or software.

MS can still turn it around without hiring back 100s or 1000s of support personal. All they need to do is implement a proper channel system. Default to a stable branch which only gets updates after the Beta channel has had them for 5-6 months. Give windows 10 users a simple On/Off button in their update settings, beta updates on or off. If laws change and harvesting data becomes a no no. They can easily add a beta assistant that runs in the windows tray, that offers a easy search of known issues... and allows beta update users to report issues providing additional data when they experience issues. (a lot of online games do exactly that... Cryptic for example the makers of Star Trek Online and Neverwinter pop up a tray Icon if their games crash it offers to scan your files, and offers an easy ticket creation option. No reason MS couldn't add a simple tool to do the same)

Again their is a middle path between Zero testing and pushing everything out the door... and testing everything to the point of only being able to do big updates every few years.
 
heatlesssun said:
Microsoft's market cap has nearly quadrupled under Nadella and stands at all time highs at over $750 billion USD. I get that you hate Microsoft but no one fires a CEO under those conditions for performance reasons.

That would be psychopathic.
Click to expand...

Quality control has nose-dived and profitability has sky-rocketed - yes, that was what I said in my previous post which you quoted. Short-term benefit, long-term damage is a common trend for companies helmed by a psychopathic CEO.


A part of Microsoft's new profitability gain is from firing many thousands of testing engineers, and from the selling of personal data that Microsoft collects from people.

After California's new data privacy rights kick in, and after more states and countries implement similar or the same legislation, Microsoft will lose a lot of that gained profitability, and their ability to test and refine the OS will be greatly impaired. It will cost Microsoft a lot of money to hire new testing engineers, and their reputation will suffer while the OS is in a state of brokenness as it will take time for Microsoft to rebuild up its QA capabilities.


I don't hate Microsoft. I detest practices that screw the general populace over, and which involve stealing from your customers and selling what you stole from them for profit.

Microsoft is profiting off of criminal activity.
 
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heatlesssun said:
Microsoft's market cap has nearly quadrupled under Nadella and stands at all time highs at over $750 billion USD. I get that you hate Microsoft but no one fires a CEO under those conditions for performance reasons.

That would be psychopathic.
Click to expand...
You might want to check to see who you quoted, I never said that on post 35, it was someone else.
 
I know this is a pain in the fucking ass at the enterprise level.

And what the hell is with this sites forms lately? Constantly java errors. Links to forum posts going to the front page instead of the article. The page responding slow as ever loving hell.
 
Delicieuxz said:
I don't hate Microsoft. I detest practices that screw the general populace over, and which involve stealing from your customers and selling what you stole from them for profit.

Microsoft is profiting off of criminal activity.
Click to expand...

I get that you think whatever of me. But you've this claim repeatedly with no proof. Just a fact, don't spazz over that.
 
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