Stitched up by Globalgig - beware this roaming internet service trap.

[santelmo]

I used to be able to get almost a month out of my 5 gb allocation from wind Greece but the mystery disappearance of my paid for gigs became a real problem during the summer. Its not a problem when back in the UK in the winter but next summer I will be going with a Linux OS. Will I be able to keep win 10 on my hard drive (disabled) and revert to it during the winter, (I may not want to)? Is there any one of the distros better than the others or are they all as good as each other. Ubuntu seems poplar.

 

[charles_reed]

I used to be able to get almost a month out of my 5 gb allocation from wind Greece but the mystery disappearance of my paid for gigs became a real problem during the summer. Its not a problem when back in the UK in the winter but next summer I will be going with a Linux OS. Will I be able to keep win 10 on my hard drive (disabled) and revert to it during the winter, (I may not want to)? Is there any one of the distros better than the others or are they all as good as each other. Ubuntu seems poplar.

I have, for the last 11 years, dual booted all my boxes into the then current Windows OS and the then current Suse Linux.
The gap in performance has gradually narrowed - Linux still gives me about 20% longer on each laptop charge and Win10 has at last caught up with Suse in speed of start-up. I did leave out some of the real dog versions of Microsoft - 2000, Vista and 8.
Ubuntu is popular because it most closely parallels Microsoft offerings, but Red Hat is the backbone of internet servers and Suse (now Leap 42.2) probably for those with some software knowledge.
Replacing any Windows OS on an old machine, with Linux, transforms it giving it a new lease of life. The desktop I'm using is now 11 years old - one of the 1st 64-bit WinXP machines. On Suse 13.2 it flies, on XP it works at about 20% of the speed of Linux.
There is no need to "disable" Win10, you just boot into Linux, in preference - you do need to remember to use th on/off switch on the computer though.
Since 8.0 Microsoft have "protected" their machines with UEFI.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-GB/library/hh825112.aspx

This could be seen as a crude attempt to prevent users from mounting in any other OS - but there are ways around it, varying according to the computer BIOS fitted, I've only experience of the AMI ones.
One has to face, the fact that Microsoft have the better peripheral programmes - the Adobe stable springs to mind - but one can do anything with the open source offerings that can be done with Microsoft based and there are certain Mac programmes that are, possibly historically, indisputably best-in-class.
You pays your money and takes your pick...

To go back to my experiences - part of the lost Gbs were down to 4g coverage around much of Greece (the 1st time I'd had 4G), much was due to "updating" not just Win10, but Kaspersky and other programmes. The illusion that you can obviate Win10's updating is just that, whatever the words on the tin say.
My answer will be to double my monthly allowance to 10Gb - only another €5/month on the Cosmote data-pack I have.

 

[Tony Cross]

Since 8.0 Microsoft have "protected" their machines with UEFI.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-GB/library/hh825112.aspx

This could be seen as a crude attempt to prevent users from mounting in any other OS - but there are ways around it, varying according to the computer BIOS fitted, I've only experience of the AMI ones.

UEFI is not a Microsoft 'product', it's an industry wide standard that even Apple support. UEFI has been supported in most Linux distros for some time too. UEFI is a much more modular, extensible and potentially leaner interface than legacy BIOS which is why it's been embraced by almost the entire industry. Not only is it not owned nor managed by Microsoft it is actually a community effort managed aned controlled by the UEFI forum (http://www.uefi.org/. It provides for a faster and much more secure boot, not just for Windows but for all operating systems that take the trouble to support it. UEFI also introduces GPT partitioning which brings some major improvements removing the limit on 4 primary partitions and allowing boot drives to be larger than 2GB, important features in modern large computer systems.

I get that you don't like Windows or Microsoft Charles, and that's fine - but your tendency to assume that everything Microsoft does is designed to frustrate or annoy you sound more like paranoia on your part.

 

[DaveRo]

Ubuntu is popular and there is more online advice available to newbies. Many of the online advisors seem somewhat inexperienced to me, but at least the help is there. I would look for second opinions before acting on it until you find a forum you trust.

32 bit distributions are becoming scarcer if yours is an old computer. SUSE & Fedora only do 64 bit now. . After using SuSE for a 15 years I've switched to Debian on my 10 year old 32 bit laptop. Using SUSE Leap 42.2 on my 64 bit boxes - all with xfce desktop.

 

[santelmo]

Thanks for the info on Linux I think that I have found what looks like a good tutorial/forum here

http://www.everydaylinuxuser.com/2015/11/how-to-install-ubuntu-linux-alongside.html#

 

[charles_reed]

UEFI is not a Microsoft 'product', it's an industry wide standard that even Apple support. UEFI has been supported in most Linux distros for some time too. UEFI is a much more modular, extensible and potentially leaner interface than legacy BIOS which is why it's been embraced by almost the entire industry. Not only is it not owned nor managed by Microsoft it is actually a community effort managed aned controlled by the UEFI forum (http://www.uefi.org/. It provides for a faster and much more secure boot, not just for Windows but for all operating systems that take the trouble to support it. UEFI also introduces GPT partitioning which brings some major improvements removing the limit on 4 primary partitions and allowing boot drives to be larger than 2GB, important features in modern large computer systems.

I get that you don't like Windows or Microsoft Charles, and that's fine - but your tendency to assume that everything Microsoft does is designed to frustrate or annoy you sound more like paranoia on your part.

I think, Tony, you're reading things I didn't write - at no time have I claimed UEFI is a Microsoft product - as to Microsoft, I have ambiguous feelings about their products, but more is dissatisfaction with their past-monopoly of software for PCs - but especially with the bloated nature of their software which artificially limits the life and endurance of computers.

 

[Tony Cross]

I think, Tony, you're reading things I didn't write - at no time have I claimed UEFI is a Microsoft product - as to Microsoft, I have ambiguous feelings about their products, but more is dissatisfaction with their past-monopoly of software for PCs - but especially with the bloated nature of their software which artificially limits the life and endurance of computers.

You did accuse Microsoft of 'protecting' their machines with UEFI so that other OSs could not be installed.

It's not Windows that's bloated it's the crap most high street vendors install with it that's the problem. And as for Windows 'limiting the life and endurance of computers' that just sound like more nonsense. Hard evidence would be useful...

 

[JumbleDuck]

Simple answer. Use one of the Linux distros as your OS of choice - or Win7 as downgrade rights in a new PC.
Yours is the tip of the Win 10 outrage as they busily, on each successive update, wipe your settings and any non-MS programmes you may value.

My crew's laptop has just done a jumbo-size W10 upgrade. Firefox, LibreOffice and Google Earth were all completely unaffected. No sign of any changed settings except that Cortana and Edge reappeared on the taskbar.

 

[BrianH]

My crew's laptop has just done a jumbo-size W10 upgrade. Firefox, LibreOffice and Google Earth were all completely unaffected. No sign of any changed settings except that Cortana and Edge reappeared on the taskbar.

In May, living on-board in Italy, my entire month's 4G subscribed balance was sacrificed for a MS Win 10 download despite a 'metered connection' - no doubt with a so-called 'critical update', which metered connections do not protect against. I had to subscribe to an entire extra month's subscription to continue connection.

My wife, exasperated last month by constant configurations delaying her work when turning on her computer, went out and bought a Macbook Pro just because of it.