Bài viết bạn sắp đọc có hai purposes. Một, show bạn (và possibly entertain bạn với) trải nghiệm tôi quanh upgrade lên Windows 10 Build 1809, và all that it entails. Hai, review new version OS này và highlight changes và differences từ previous edition. Now, bạn may ask, why only now?
Vâng, first, bạn should never rush updating your system. Bạn should wait at least a month, let others play the ignoble role of the Charge of the Light Brigade. Sau đó, once issues are solved, bạn can then update without fearing problems. Tôi advocated this approach forever, và turns out, Build 1809 update proved me more than right. Nó released với so many issues — the modern software thingie, right — that Microsoft actually paused update for a while, trước khi restoring it. Still, three months down the road, tôi still didn't have it. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.
Playing around
Tôi not done much testing with Windows 10 recently, mostly vì tôi didn't feel there was value cho tôi để actually bother with whole endeavor. Updates would always take hours, one or two settings của tôi would get undone, và whole buzz doesn't bring any practical advantage to the table. Desktops should be quiet and calm, so you can focus on actual work và not waste life maintaining or fighting your system.
Với pending retirement của Windows Phone, which still remains best designed mobile UI of all time, whole experiment feels ever sadder than before. All this noise about apps và convergence, to no glorious end. Rồi Edge going Chromium engine thingie, even worse. We shall all pay dearly for this one day. Remember, you should always cheer the underdog, và that's Linux on the desktop, và that was Microsoft in the mobile space. In ten years, you will wish you've heeded my advice.
Nhưng tôi did decide to see what gives with Build 1809 after all, và check if there are any good changes. After all, one day, I might have to migrate to this operating system, so I need to be prepared in advance against any surprises that limit my freedom or insult my intelligence. Or both.
Anyway, tôi powered Windows 10 system, let it update, và meanwhile checked some of the settings và options. To my great surprise, update was relatively quick. Only about 15 minutes. Vâng, Microsoft did promise they were working on making their updates fast (again), so maybe this was that?
No. This proved to be just an ordinary set of patches. Tôi still wasn't being offered the 1809 release, và we're talking end of January, three months later. At this point, tôi decided to grab the Media Creator tool and run it in-vivo. Vâng, the tool complained it couldn't run under a standard account (even if you elevate privileges), so I had to log into the Administrator account và do everything fresh. Twenty minutes of life wasted — the time it takes to complete the entire update cycle in Windows 7/8. And here, we haven't even started.
Annoyances
Trước khi nói về process, cho tôi tell you a few brief things về pre-upgrade experience. Bạn should start with reading my Build 1804 review. Now, tôi typically remove most of the so-called modern apps từ Windows 10, vì tôi không dùng chúng, và với their touchy design, they are inferior to desktop tools in every way. There isn't a single mobile application in the entire universe, no matter who wrote it, that is somehow, in some way, superior to their classic desktop counterparts — on the desktop.
Nhưng even the monthly cumulative patch thingie was annoying enough that it restored these modern apps after I've deleted them. This is such a pesty behavior. Like having a rash, y' know. I mean, this is desperation first class. Then, as I mentioned earlier, my settings WERE CHANGED. Like Contacts. This is just sad.
Apps wise, Windows 10 cũng warned me about opening an executable that has not originated from the store. Vâng, bạn easily disable that in settings. Nhưng rồi, this wouldn't be a problem nếu the store actually had all the software I need. Or not needed using the online account to use it. Kind of a cyclic issue here.
Sau đó tôi tried to open a PDF file và got this:
What? Since when is a browser a PDF tool? And why would you retire your own tool? Ah well.
Hơn nữa, Windows Update Medic was on, và so was the WU service, so I disabled them nice and good again, nhưng this is another example where things are being done to the user's system against their explicit choice. If only there was a word, some sort of IT security industry phrase, to describe a piece of code that makes changes to the user's machine against their choice, hm. Oh, that's right, it's all in the EULA, so it's fine. All your kidney are belong to us.
Manual upgrade
Tôi signed into the Administrator account. And almost destroyed my laptop from anger. For the first ten or so minutes, the system was almost unusable. It had all sorts of "modern" stuff running, slowing things down và ruining the experience. As I slowly killed processes và services, things went back to semi-normal, nhưng it was still a slow and frustrating session. Tôi installed IrfanView as my image viewer, và Windows 10 reset the file associations back to Photos. Because. This crap behavior is still ongoing in 2019.
No problem. I just want to use a superior program.
No, I won't use Photos. EVER. EEEEEEEEVEEEEER. Once you make a light, fast app that equals IrfanView in its capabilities, I might. Or then again, I won't, because I will forever remember and resent this little game of permissions you did there, so I won't ever bother trying your modern apps on my desktop. Ever.
Tôi sorted this nonsense through the App defaults, deleted every single modern app I could — you have to do this separately for each user it seems, disabled even more unnecessary services, và started the upgrade. This will give me a chance to see how many of my choices are "respected" after the upgrade.
It took 27 minutes for Windows 10 from Media Creator launch to actual update. 27 minutes. Still, nothing has really happened. Just noise. This is progress, ladies and gentlemen, this is the future, not just of Microsoft but every single software company out there, và in twenty years, you will truly and deeply wish the computer was never invented.
Sau đó tôi left the machine be và went to write this thing. Glanced at the screen. 74% progress after 45 minutes. So ignoring the monthly updates và inability to run the Creator tool under the standard account, which cost me another 35-40 minutes, tôi was 1 hour and 15 minutes into the upgrade process, only three quarters done, và I'm guessing there will be a few reboots và post-upgrade configurations, too. So much wasted time.
The waiting game
Eventually, the full 100% mark happened 15 minutes later. After that, there were two reboots, with a total amount of 36 minutes spent performing the upgrade. So this is faster than Build 1804, but it's still an awful lot of time. Then, after logging in, I waited another five minutes for the user-specific setup to complete. All in all, this is more than two hours to get the upgrade done. Two hours.
What has changed?
Before I had a working session, I was asked to choose whether to enable the voice service, text and ink service, advertising ID, và a few other online-ish options. The kind of thing a new user would set up. Why am I being asked these questions on an upgraded system that uses a local account? Is this an attempt to get me somehow to "approve" of these different online-ad-happy things? Who came up with the idea that aggressive marketing will actually endear users or be effective in the long run?
Sau đó, a lot of services I had disabled were back on running, bao gồm Windows Defender, Telemetry, Xbox, và Windows Update itself. Without repeating myself, this is simply disrespectful to the end user. No other word.
You shall not pass!
App wise, seems like most of the items were back. Now, mind, not all of them — so this is an improvement, but again, tôi still find it puzzling why Microsoft keeps insisting on installing its touch-optimized software on the desktop, especially when people use the local account plus considering the fact they are retiring the phone. Moreover, these apps don't really offer the same value as many third-party software. Finally, some of the software cannot be removed through the settings menu, although you can Powershell them out of existence.
Using Build 1809
Now, tôi started actually testing the new build và what it offers. At first glance, there does not seem to be any difference, which is good, then again, I just spent two hours not being able to use my machine, so what's the point.
The logins are relatively slow. There's a whole bunch of stuff happening, như indexing và such, the disk is quite busy. Not sure why — nhưng this is still infinitely better than what I observed under the Admin account, which hasn't undergone as much rinsing as this one. Tôi cũng noticed the process named Cortana in the task manager, nhưng tôi have it disabled. This is sort of a spurious one, vì the search is coupled with the AI thingie, và even if you have the second part not running, you'll still see it.
New features
There's a lot of stuff, to be frank. But most of it does not make much sense to most people. Tôi don't mind the new features, nhưng not when they come at the expanse of stability và performance. All these colorful extras, như Game bar, VR, casting và such could all be offered as downloadable modules cho people who want to enhance their experience. Hell, even offer it through the store!
Instead, one-size-fits-all simply creates unnecessary noise. Nếu tôi look at Windows 7 hoặc 8, they don't really lack anything for modern-day computing — except hardware drivers, which is fine. Tôi don't mind the improvements on that front at all. My reasoning for the switch from XP to 7 was indeed that, much better 64-bit support. But there wasn't and isn't really anything on the application side of things.
Security
A revamped security center. Tôi find the naming convention change confusing, although the new overview layout is easier to understand than in the past. However, there are too many Windows Defender components, most of which aren't related to one another. Exploit protection sits under Apps control, và it's a bit harder to locate than before. But that's the killer feature you want to focus on nếu bạn really keen on security. The rest creates a sense of urgency và activity, nhưng doesn't cardinally contribute to anything. Even so, all that said, tôi think Microsoft's approach to security is better than what you typically get from third-party software.
Search & regedit
The menu search looks nicer, more functional than before. You get more details, you can fine-tune your search, và nếu bạn dùng online recommendations, bạn get ever more information, provided you're comfortable with this mode of use. But even the offline side has been refined quite nicely. Regedit also comes with hive path auto-complete, so this helps navigate the registry faster.
Clipboard
Tôi đã praised Plasma for having a smart và sophisticated clipboard. Windows 10 finally gotten one, nhưng you do need to explicitly allow it. This one also comes with online integration. Now here's something that might actually be useful. Tôi do appreciate the fact this one isn't running by default, và you need to turn it on. Why this isn't the case with three dozen other apps, beats me.
Some options are missing for me
Not sure if this is a Home/Pro thing hoặc nếu không có online account limits hoặc changes things, nhưng tôi didn't see some of the options mentioned in the release notes. For instance, tôi had no option to start a Linux shell anywhere, even though I'm running WSL, và tôi didn't see all the different security settings that ought to be available (like Application Guard). Tôi don't mind, I just wonder what factor leads to the divergence in the final product for different users.
Other things
Kiosk, biometrics, dark theme — some people may find this quite useful. Personalmente, tôi không thích dark themes, trừ trên phone (Windows Phone was perfect like that), so this might be a nod toward developers và alike. Tôi cũng tried the Storage Sense cleanup — manually — và it was fast và did a good job.
Beyond that, this remains the same operating system. It took a lot of effort taming it back to the baseline I expect, và once it's in that state, it behaves reliably và predictably, với solid performance, good battery life, và solid-ish ergonomics. Shame about all that wasted energy trying to make me into a low-IQ person for no good reason. It's not hard. Check if the user is running an online account, for instance. Or maybe ask the user if they are interested in changes. Now that would be revolutionary.
Kết luận
Build 1803 was the first Windows update ever where I had big glitches và errors. Then, Build 1809 came, went, came back, và I never actually got it. A sign of clear deterioration in quality. Microsoft's software used to be the stuff of legends. Rock solid. I guess another old truth got eroded, another scar to my soul added.
The aggressive push to use the online stuff is just sad. And it doesn't even make sense anymore. While Windows Phone still existed, bless my Lumia, the cross-platform connectivity was actually something worth exploring. It didn't quite work out, but it had its place. There was logic to it. Now, this is practically desktop-only stuff, và there's really no value in any of these things. The only real outcome is an outcry of resentment. Techies are feeling deeply antagonized by these changes, và the perception of intrusive wrongness is starting to resonate even with the ordinary users. Tôi know that Microsoft's future is entirely in the cloud, services và office, nhưng eroding the thirty years of desktop is wrong.
Once again, after you're done stripping away the low-IQ noise, under all that unnecessary glamor, Windows 10 isn't bad after all. It doesn't have any cardinal advantages over Windows 7/8, but it works reasonably well. The big problem is the knowledge that if you do update your system, you will have to waste time re-fixing things. That's an exercise of despair and futility. And it would seem that is our future. All in all, Build 1809 ain't bad, but it ain't special either. Just ... average. Take care.
Cheers.