Be wary, traveller: There is no going back if you step over the Windows 10 20H1 threshold

Fast Ringers keen to extricate themselves from the Windows Insider programme have missed their chance for a quieter life as Microsoft booted them into the 2020s with build 18875. Before today, Microsoft's platoon of unpaid Fast Ring testers could have switched away without needing a reinstall, but no more. Like the vampire of …

[Steve Davies 3]

Isn't agreeing to the EULA a step over the edge

as in a 'step too far'?

As for no going back then a 3-finger salute followed by booting a recovery system and restoring your backup should do it for you

unless MS in their infinite wisdom has nuked this as well?

Close to the Edge

Down by the river (of no return)

Seasons pass you by

(but) I get back...

[doublelayer]

Re: Isn't agreeing to the EULA a step over the edge

That's exactly how you go back. They just can't press a button to convert their beta system into one running the main build. Which doesn't surprise me--if a system running untested beta operating systems breaks, I know I have a bunch of confidence that it will all start working again if I press the big reset button. If you're going to run an OS to find bugs in it, don't put it control of things you aren't prepared to lose.

[Updraft102]

Re: Isn't agreeing to the EULA a step over the edge

If you're going to run an OS to find bugs in it, don't put it control of things you aren't prepared to lose.

Always good advice. The problem is, if you're a consumer using Windows 10, you are going to run an OS to find bugs in it. That's what you're for in the new Microsoft, even though you've paid for what is supposed to be a commercial-quality product.

Running Windows 10 is a strange game. The only winning move is not to play.

[sad_loser]

Go POP

>> Running Windows 10 is a strange game. The only winning move is not to play.

My latest laptop came with W10 pro and I was keen to try Windows again as I had been on macs for the last 12 years, but am now in a MS corporate environment, and was encouraged by a friend who has used the preview builds.

What really shocked me was the bloatware (Candy Crush etc) and cruft that came with the product that I (someone who had been using Windows for 30 years) could not get rid of. That and the 'I want to be your friend' vomit-inducing sign-up process where Microsoft repeatedly try to data-ream my pristine data-butt. I very rapidly came to the conclusion that this was not a company I trusted to treat me as an adult or would respect my privacy. These are things that Apple have got right, but the thing that has driven me away from Apple is the failure to innovate since October 2011, and my organisations have gone for Office365, which has turned out to be a good response to Google's challenge (and the sort of thing that Apple could very easily have done if they had the vision).

While always using server versions of linux, I had tried many versions of linux on the desktop since RedHat 6.2 and all were crap or clunky, but have finally come across POP OS, a stripped back version of ubuntu set up with packages for analytics and machine learning, and everything Just Works. Even looks good.

So with Evolution to deal with my Office365, Libre Office and native packages for sci-kitlearn and tensorflow with GPU and Steam running smoothly - POP OS does everything I need both for day to day use and exploratory learning.

Would be nice to have a Reg review of POP OS please.

[DJV]

My insider test build (in a VM for safety!) tried to update to 18875 yesterday and then promptly failed with error 0xca00a000 and reverted back to 18362. So, probably SNAFU then - seems par for the course.

[Anonymous Coward]

I found this out the hard way...

[fidodogbreath]

Abandon all hope, ye who enter 20H1.

[BobChip]

Be wary? Don't do it then.

Sounds like a recipe for a permanently screwed up machine. Unless your principal pleasure in life is playing catch up and trying to sort out where M$ got it wrong. And of course, you don't actually need the machine to do any work.

As another comment on this article says, "I hear Linux is good." Yes. It is. Very good.

[Glen Turner 666]

Re: Be wary? Don't do it then.

Windows Insider Fast Track is essentially Microsoft's equivalent to Fedora Rawhide. There's a surprising number of generous people willing to run these slicing-edge operating systems. Neither should be run on a machine used for Real Work. The advantage of the Linux alternative is that those people can grow their skills into fixing the issue, rather than merely reporting it.

[thexfile]

I hear Linux is good.

[Notas Badoff]

Humpty-dumpty says...

"Now up to version 75.0.125.0, ..."

Oh dear, they aren't going for version number inflation in a small way, are they? 'at's a big jump from 44 to 75! Please tell me they aren't just going to adopt Chrome's versioning!

"it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less."

[katrinab]

Re: Humpty-dumpty says...

Firefox is on version 66, Chrome is on 73, so obviously Edge will need a bigger number than that.

Does anyone actually pay attention to their version numbers these days?

[macjules]

"There is no going back if you step over the Windows 10 20H1 threshold"

Shame. I was expecting something more akin to, "You can checkout any time you like, but you can never leave."

[Doctor Huh?]

Ugh. Sooooo very glad I'm running MacOS and Linux

I'm so glad that Windows 8 finally pushed me over the edge to abandon this crap.

[jelabarre59]

Re: Ugh. Sooooo very glad I'm running MacOS and Linux

My Win10 TP machine is a sacrificial machine anyway, so I can trash and reload any time I want.

I mean it *HAS* to be a sacrificial machine; my prior TP test machine (an HP lappy) eventually quit booting entirely rather than run MSWin10 TP). THIS one it's just the Hall Effect sensor that has quit, so I have to use an external monitor, although there *was* a month or so it wouldn't boot either.

But yes, any *REAL* work gets done on my Linux machines, and my MB Pro is a flea market find for practising OS-X on and for buying J-Pop from iTunes.

[N2]

Re: Ugh. Sooooo very glad I'm running MacOS and Linux

Yep, sacrificial machine thats it.

And any version < 8 for productivity.

[GingerOne]

So you just rebuild the computer then. This is the fast ring. For testing. If it borks your device then you start again. That's why we're testing. No biggie.

*As for whether we should be doing this level of testing is another matter!

[Anonymous Coward]

Ultimately both Microsoft and Google

for all their might are at the total mercy of the constellation of components (and their manufacturers) and the drivers they need in order to deliver a consistent "experience".

Just bulk buying <whatever enterprise brand> is painting over the problem.

[harmjschoonhoven]

I can always try it

Among half a dozen PCs I have one and only one with a Win10 HDD inside which

a) has the power plug pulled,

b) is not connected to the SATA bus,

c) has run once, but without internet connection.

[Tom -1]

No insider track Windows 10 for me!

I'm not on the windows 10 insider track. I'm on the windows 10 ordinary (non-insider) user track, with all currently released updates on that track - so it currently calls itself "Developer Edition (64-bit) on Windows 10 Home 10.0 <X64> (Build 17763:)". Normally I tell the system to lock and hibernate when I'm not going to use it for a while, only rebooting when there is at least one update that requires a reboot to apply it. Neing on that track, I generally regard Windows 10 (and its updates) as more reliable than winows 8.1, 8, or 7 and vastly more reliable than anything later than wndows 2,1 and earlier than windows 7 (despite Windows XP Pro and/or embedded versions of it having been for years my favourite client OS). When I replace my current machine I'll go to Windows 10 Pro, I think.

The only real problem I have with Windows 10 is the somewhat grotty Intel software and firmware (or maybe updates of it) that sometimes overwrites display and or screen parameters in such a way as to delete any configured size option greater that 1280X720 and forbid such large sizes to be declared as an available configuration, which is a real pain as I've told Windows and all utilities and apps (including browsers) to assume the screen is 1600 X 900. This happens about twice per year, and takes hours of running diagnostic software and rebooting to fix (because the "settings" app can't add the size until the problem is fixed).