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HP Quietly Installs System-Slowing Spyware On Its PCs, Users Say (computerworld.com)
It hasn't been long since Lenovo settled a massive $3.5 million fine for preinstalling adware on laptops without users' consent, and it appears HP is on to the same route already. According to numerous reports gathered by news outlet Computer World, the brand is deploying a telemetry client on customer computers without asking permission. The software, called "HP Touchpoint Analytics Service", appears to replace the self-managed HP Touchpoint Manager solution. To make matter worse, the suite seems to be slowing down PCs, users say. From the report: Dubbed "HP Touchpoint Analytics Service," HP says it "harvests telemetry information that is used by HP Touchpoint's analytical services." Apparently, it's HP Touchpoint Analytics Client version 4.0.2.1435. There are dozens of reports of this new, ahem, service scattered all over the internet. According to Gunter Born, reports of the infection go all the way back to Nov. 15, when poster MML on BleepingComputer said: "After the latest batch of Windows updates, about a half hour after installing the last, I noticed that this had been installed on my computer because it showed up in the notes of my Kaspersky, and that it opened the Windows Dump File verifier and ran a disk check and battery test." According to Gartner, HP was the largest PC vendor in the quarter that ended in September this year.
It doesn't matter if its spying or not most 'value added' crap, computer manufacturers installs slows the computer. Rarely do they add to the performance of the PC. Hp printer installers are the worst for installing garbage you don't need.
Do these manufactures not realize just how much damage the crapware does to their brand?
They don't care because a big part of their business case for PC products which have razor thin margins and anything that brings in additional revenue is going to be implemented.
I've been using a MacBook Air for three years now as my primary business laptop and have been putting Mint on the few old Windows laptops I have hanging around and building my own systems to avoid the pre-installed malware of "Name" brands like HP. I can't say enough good things about my MacBook Air - I don't use it for code development but for email, presentations and /. posts, it's the best laptop I've ever owned. I just wish the Mac Pages, Numbers and Keynote (as well as Google Apps) worked as well as were completely compatible with the Office equivalents.
Unfortunately, at my daughter's college the faculty push Windows (10!) products with very significant discounts for the students. I've been trying to get her to do her programming work/assignments on a system that I have built and use a MacBook for classes.
With Windows 10 ISO download and electronic activation, there really is no excuse not to just wipe the pre-installed mess and put a clean Windows 10 image on. It should run much better, have no activation issues, and give you a nice known base installation from which you can make a reasonable restore image.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-g...
Lenovo settled a massive $3.5 million fine
This is why this sort of thing keeps happening. Massive? Not even close.
Last year, Lenovo's revenue averaged out to $4.9 Million USD PER HOUR. Congraulations, you fined Lenovo less that what they make in one hour.
Linux Mint. I used it on many computers without any problem. Running now on my Dell Precision m4800 (docking station connected to a LG 34" Ultrawide)) and Asus Zenbook 13". Everything is working fine.
I bought my Dell Precision in october 2014 (i7-4940MX, 32GB RAM, SSD, 1TB HDD, ...) and it's running like a brand new computer. It's fast, responsive, ... I'm a software engineer and I'm running a lot of stuff on it : VM, Dockers, Java development, ... I'll never get this performance with Windows installed on it. Not on a 3 years old laptop.
Will $CURRENT_YEAR be the year of the Linux Desktop?
Ubuntu would work just fine for what you are describing.