Re: "customer service call and chat volumes – has steadily dropped"
Too right, the quality of their updates has become so bad that it's hardly news worthy when they go wrong, and everyone just resigns themselves to dealing with the aftermath, or doing everything possible to delay updates and hoping the glitches are fixed by the time your PC forces them to install. IMHO the main selling point of Pro vs Home edition on a home setup is the extra time you can delay updates! I'll pay the extra just to avoid my PC being used as a test lab for their updates.
I didn't even realise there was a worthwhile call/chat option available! Always found the best option was to head to the forums, see if anyone else has the same thing, and if not post. Then wait and hope for an MVP or similar to answer, cos if it's a MSFT response you just know it'll be useless... lots of "I understand", while clearly not reading the information you've provided, and suggesting reinstalling Windows or something equally useless.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
