This is how you make paying customers hate you.
That problem sits at the top of the command chain in MS. Ballmer had his known list of problems, but at least "he loves this company yeah!"...
Microsoft makes Windows settings backup the default in 26H2
Windows 11 26H2 is out, and Microsoft has enabled Windows settings backup by default, a move that could send administrators scrambling to opt out where they once had to opt in. The latest release hasn't made a lot of shockwaves in the community featurewise. Users with up-to-date versions of 25H2 will unlikely notice much …
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Thursday 1st October 2026 16:45 GMT williamyf
In a home license setting, this would be a welcome change. For microsoft is a simpler (and therefore cheaper) support call from someone who blew their storage, or changed device. And for the user, a quicker and faster resolution. That's why you were offered the ESU carrot for free on Win10 if you enabled this setting.
But in a Pro or Enterprise setting, as the article clearly said, going from opt-in to opt out, without a clear warning in big bold red letters is a big no-no.
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Thursday 1st October 2026 16:55 GMT Elongated Muskrat
So a "backup" for some "settings" and apps installed from the MS app store
To quote Mr Panucci, "I saw it on the cover of Big Whoop Magazine".
Every new "improvement" from Microsoft sees me looking for ths settings to turn it off (looking at you, CoPilot), and there's no way I'd be dumb enough to want to install anything from their crappy app store.
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Monday 5th October 2026 07:46 GMT hoola
Re: So a "backup" for some "settings" and apps installed from the MS app store
Whilst not defending Microsoft this is has been the case on mobile devices and tablets for years. I don't see people ranting about that but continue to use the devices anyway.
On a corporate device I don't understand why the setting has been reversed however with so much now being joined to EntraID this is also becoming a dumping ground for all sorts of stuff that in reality does not need to be "stored safely in The Cloud". I see lot of it down to the gradual move away from traditional Active Directory as so much is pushed into Cloud applications and services. Those at the top of many companies just don't care, "The Cloud" is seen as the way forward and anything else is marketed as "Legacy".
As soon as the team "Legacy" is is attached to something C-Suite idiots lap up the marketing and tell IT Teams to jump. Those at the top care very little about the reality of cloud services (or anything else) unless it comes to bite them on the arse. At the point the excuses "it was a sophisticated attack" or "a rogue nation" are spewed out. If they hit like JLR then it might affect their bonus for a year or two. They have no worries, just "Increase efficiency" by reducing staff levels. elsewhere in the business.
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Thursday 1st October 2026 20:10 GMT ecofeco
Jokes on them
I don't have a One Drive account.
That said, GODDAMNIT! There is no option to back up to anywhere else. When I try to choose one, it says I need an app from the M$lop store to make that choice.
Why?!
As for using another backup program, they all suck. I've tried them. How does a simple task like back-up, suck so bad on Windows? (rhetorical question of course)
Linux? Easy peasy. Apple, was easy peasy. May still be but I haven't used it it years.
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Friday 2nd October 2026 07:17 GMT Jay 2
Re: Jokes on them
Yep easy enough on Apple. You can select where you want TimeMachine to store stuff, which I guess is the most user-friendly option. You could use something like SuperDuper or Carbon Copy Cloner or similar to create clones of your disk(s), bootable if OS. You could even create a tarball and copy it off somewhere if you want to get down and dirty. I'm a sys admin, so I use all three approaches for various bits of data!
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Wednesday 7th October 2026 14:44 GMT Jou (Mxyzptlk)
Re: Jokes on them
Rsync is blocked on work machine (obviously). For that reason I wrote a PS-Sync, powershell sync, which does something similar for the purpose of syncing unidirectional.
Guess I could feed github with a few things, but I don't want my code to be stolen by machines. Don't care if humans do, but machines - no.
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Wednesday 7th October 2026 13:11 GMT CrazyOldCatMan
Re: Jokes on them
There is no option to back up to anywhere else
Like Microsoft Authenticator.
Supposedly a corporate-level MFA tool. I have multiple auth setup in MS-Auth on my work phone so I though that, maybe, I ought to back it up just in case of a phone/pavement incident.
Backup of your MFA settings *requires* an MS Account. No, you can't use your corporate account/Onedrive. No, you can't even save them to the phone storage. You have you expose one of your major security comfort blankets to an MS home-user account.
Corporate my aged and spreading backside!
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Thursday 1st October 2026 20:38 GMT Taliesinawen
Windows backup and restore ..
“The service, which was previously off by default, backs up a device's settings and a list of installed Microsoft Store apps.”
But not any third party apps in $APPDATA :(
“The idea is that when a user moves to a new device, a restore can happen during setup.”
The idea being to prevent cloning, make the migration process a jolting experience :(
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Friday 2nd October 2026 19:49 GMT Gavsky
Re: It's a big update.
Well, they do know best! [\SARC]. It's incredible that ANYONE at Microsoft thought that users were clamouring for a fixed, centred Taskbar - as user choice is a dangerous thing. Ignore anyone who really might need a resizable, movable Taskbar - because of disability/assistive technology.
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Monday 5th October 2026 07:53 GMT hoola
Re: It's a big update.
It is ALL developers. How many applications do we use that do everything you need them to. You know where the menus are, what to look for then some UI plonker decides to change everything. What winds me up most is this obsession where you now have to start typing what you want to find because the menus are now so shite. If I want a text driven interface that is my choice. A "Graphical User Interface" is just that. It uses a convenient pointing devices that lets you select what you want. You may also be able to use text but that latter is not because the GUI is so crap you cannot find anything. Usability testing has been thrown out (along with a lot of other testing) as stuff is outsourced and younger developers with no concept of how to code economically come in.
Building applications on giant >30" ultra wide monitors is all well and good just test the f***ing stuff on a real monitor with normal aspect ratio!!!!!
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Thursday 1st October 2026 23:02 GMT Number6
I would way prefer the option to export that data to a local file and present it to a new install via a USB drive if I wanted continuity. But then they wouldn't have an official copy of all my data to sift through and sell to third parties when they change their terms and conditions once they've accumulated enough data.
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Friday 2nd October 2026 07:25 GMT Fruit and Nutcase
That rogue programmer
"since this only backs up settings and a list of Windows apps"
Once he did the Google Streetview unauthorized capture of data transmitted over unsecured networks (2008–2010), he's been popping up all over the place "doing his thing", a bit like Banksy.
I'd be worried AI has been trained on his codebase, given the use of AI coding at Microsoft. And AI has a habit of doing unauthorized actions even when there are guardrails
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Friday 2nd October 2026 08:39 GMT Anonymous Coward
Backup locations
All our stuff is backed up to a local raid server. Being a small organisation working in a secure environment we don't back anything up to the cloud. We don't have a onedrive account and any new PCs are set up using a "gold disc" which loads everything the user needs. This is just another buggeration that the admin will have to turn off.
