A year or two ago I would have said I'd never buy a little a tablet or smartphone. My one year old daughter ended up at a childcare place where they use ipads, and she got an iPad. Very soon she was counting to ten with Elmo, saying "Caillou throw ball", and other things that most kids don't do until after they are two years old. Now, at 24 months old, she's about 6-9 months ahead on most of her skills. That's "only" 6-9 months, but it's also about 30% ahead.
Our kids have an iPad too, but it is locked down. Email, web browsing, the app store, are all turned off.
To even get apps to update I have to sign in and do it myself.
Nothing wrong with such a device, so long as you know how to control it.
I have a 10 year old son right now, he will be 11 in a few months.
He doesn't have a smart phone and isn't getting one until he is 16.
He also doesn't have unlimited access to the Internet at home and for the time being, I can control that. In a few years it will be harder to control, but it has to come off at some point.
Giving a 10 year old unlimited access to the Internet at 10 is beyond stupid, most kids can't handle it and it won't end well.
Yes, there are exceptions, but they are the exceptions that prove the rule. Just remember that you're the Dad, not society, so do what you think is right for your kids, everyone else be dammed.
Fair enough, then you'd be pretty stupid to try then, wouldn't you?
If people don't know how to use a computer, perhaps they should learn.
What you, and others, are saying is that ignorance is an excuse.
Now for home use, for casual use, perhaps it doesn't matter. If you grow tomatoes in your back yard and they die, will you starve? No, not likely. So that's ok that you tried and messed it up.
Now expand that to 500 acres of tomatoes, would you try that without knowing what you're doing? No, that would be stupid.
If someone is using a computer for business, to make money, and their store/shop/office depends on that computer, then you have an obligation to know how it works and what it takes to make sure it works.
The retail store using a Windows laptop for a point-of-sale terminal without knowing how to use it properly is at fault, not Microsoft. The tools exist to have prevented what happened, the store owner simply choose not to use them and paid the price.
Thankfully in this case, it wasn't a major price, but perhaps lesson learned.
The security clock is ticking down for Apple's OS X Mountain Lion, which will probably be retired from support this fall before the Cupertino, Calif. company releases El Capitan.
Mountain Lion, also known as OS X 10.8, debuted in July 2012, and was the last Mac operating system to come with a price tag: The now-unreasonable $19.99.
No. Windows 10 is significantly different to Windows 7 in all kinds of ways.
You think so, but that isn't what I said... What I said is that I suspect that a court of law might consider it reasonable.
One thing that Microsoft might do under such a new set of rules is to say "Windows is supported for 10 years on any computer it is pre-installed on, so long as you're running the then current version of Windows, which will be provided for free".
I suspect a whole lot of people will think that sounds quite reasonable and people like you would have little success in convincing the mass market that they are wrong.
I think Microsoft has an obligation to fix the defects in Windows 7 without imposing other changes, and if they don't want to do that because it's more expensive to maintain multiple products or whatever other excuse, I think the law should compel them to do so for a reasonable period in the interests of protecting consumers.
I understand, and it sounds wonderful to say... my point was that you can say that, but making it happen is another thing completely...
There are many shades of gray between "perfect" and "nothing". Feet put to the fire, MS may comply as much as they have to, and nothing more. Perhaps Windows will now only get 2 years of mainstream support and 10 years of "bug fixes", thus requiring you to upgrade far more often than today.
Windows 7 came out when Nehalem was current, yet it is fully supported all the way up to Haswell, with limited Skylake support. Would you be happier if they provide bug fixes for Windows free from the things you don't like, in return for it only working on Sandy Bridge or older, and Ivy Bridge would have required Windows 8? Or perhaps Windows 7.1 would have supported Ivy Bridge, for a $29 "upgrade fee".
Who is legally responsible if the software gets broken is a different question, but for sure it isn't the end customer who bought a computer and just wants to get what they paid for.
Consider that the customer DID get what they paid for...
Windows generally works just fine out of the box on the computer it was pre-installed on.
Putting aside defect cases where the computer is faulty (and that is a different area of law), future support and updates can never be guaranteed.
Part of the challenge is the Internet. How many patches and updates did DOS 5.0 get? Windows 3.0? Windows 95?
Yes, a few here and there, but not much... Sure, there was DOS 4.01 and DOS 6.2, and of course Windows 3.11... but those were minor, one off updates.
Today Windows is getting updated every week, it is a very different world than 20 years ago. The irony is that your new "requirement" would effectively lock Microsoft into place as the OS of choice forever, since it would become nearly impossible for anyone else to step in.
Also, what happens to Linux, since it clearly would never withstand that test. Yet there are companies that make a living supporting it. Put them to the same test and most of them would clearly fail.
I think what you haven't considered is that you're trying to hold Microsoft to a standard that you don't want to hold anyone else to, and that simply isn't right.
There was an IE security update recently that also included GWX crap, and IMHO that is unacceptable.
While I actually agree with you on that, I also don't think the government is remotely able to make that decision. The cure would be worse than the disease.
Even without that, for something like system software that is supplied with a laptop and essential to its use, clearly the expected useful lifetime must be at least as long as the laptop itself lasts.
A laptop might well last 20+ years, do you think MS should have to support it that long?
Consider cars... generally car companies must provide support and be liable for defects for 10 to 15 years, depending on the state. Beyond that point, it's all on you.
And in fairness, this is probably reasonable... after all, if you own a 1984 Cadillac Eldorado, do you REALLY expect GM in 2016 to be responsible for that car?
How about a 1971 Ford Pinto?
Taken to the extreme, how about a 1908 Ford Model T?
That example might sound absurd, but in computer terms, Windows 95 is a lot closer to a Model T than to a F-150 of today. Windows XP might be that 1971 Ford Pinto and Windows 7 is rapidly approaching 15 years old in computer years.
I think one very clear example is that software that communicates with the outside world but has a security vulnerability is defective. If that vulnerability isn't found before it ships, it's fair to expect the software developer to make commercially reasonable efforts to provide a fix within a reasonable timeframe for as long as the software is within a reasonably expected useful lifetime.
Ok, that sounds reasonable... but, doesn't MS already do this? What new action is expected?
What is the "expected useful lifetime" of Windows? 5 years? 10 years? Frankly I think MS provides updates longer than most companies do and for more past versions than most companies do.
What if MS came out tomorrow and said, "Windows 10 is now free forever to Windows 7 owners, but support for Windows 7 is ending, Windows 10 is your patch for security"?
I imagine if you wanted to get all legal about it, that would be a "reasonable solution" in the eyes of the law.
How far back does Apple provide support for OS X? Does MS do more?
All I'm suggesting is that the software industry should not be magically exempt from the same general legal standards as everyone else.
Are they? How much consumer stuff really works all that great?
Heck, a lot of clothes I buy no longer hold up the way the good old stuff used to. It is cheaper, which is nice, but it doesn't last as long either.
If you sell something and it doesn't work properly, you should be required to do something reasonable about that
Fair enough... like what?
Define "doesn't work properly" to a court of law. Then define who makes that decision and what shade of gray is used? What is the "reasonable thing about that"?
That is why it becomes heavy government regulation and you'd destroy the tech business, because of the above.
By some people's point of view, Windows has never worked properly. By others, it seems to work just fine. And what should MS do about that? For how long? Is MS required to fix bugs in Windows 3.1 in 2016?
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Again, while I understand your point of view, I'm not sure that it is a workable one. I'm open to hearing specifics on how you think it might work, because honestly I don't see a way. But that doesn't mean there isn't one.:)
It has been known for at least twenty years that people are people and will continue to be people, and that all the whining about how they should know what those of us in the field know is pointless.
The irony is that you're calling them stupid as well, but you're using the term "people will continue to be people" rather than say it outright...
In other words, people will continue to be stupid.:)
This is just MS helping people out who otherwise won't help themselves. The Internet needs better security, one way to get it is to drive forward Windows updates.
While we can disagree on their methods, the goal is a good one.
True enough... Honestly... I don't think there is any doubt there is room for them to grow, the question is... "is there room to grow and maintain their profit margins?"
Don't misunderstand me... I recently purchased a Macbook Pro off eBay.
Don't laugh, it was a good deal... It is a late 2013 model with quad core i7, SSD, and Retina display for under $1,200. If they sold at that price new, they would fly off the shelves (a similar new model is over $2,200!)
Even at $1,500 they would be worth a look, but at over $2K? Nuts...
That being said, I bought it to get some more current Apple experience, it has been a few years since I've used a Mac and it is always wise to keep current on the business. I own a computer company so being aware of the other side is smart. My OS X experience is about 5 versions out of date now, time to get current.:)
---
For what it is worth, I don't think Apple has to price as cheap as HP/Dell/Acer do... but they are so far out of the ballpark and offer so few good options, they are killing their chances.
The new Mac Mini is a good example. No RAM upgrades? Dual core only? In 2016? What are they thinking? The $700 Mac Mini (the only one worth a serious look) has about $350 worth of hardware in it. If it was $499 I wouldn't mind it and could even recommend it. At $699? You've got to be kidding...
Likewise, the iMac 27" is nice, but $1,800? Drop the requirement for the 5k display, frankly most people are fine with 1080p, but a 1440p wouldn't be that expensive.
Make an iMac for $999 with a 27" 1440p monitor and you'd sell tons of them.
Likewise, where the heck is a real desktop computer? The lack of gaming also prevents Mac from really taking off. A proper tower computer is needed for that.
I swear I had Win 3.1 running on machines with under 1 MB of memory, but that's going too far into the past for me to remember specifics.
I went back and looked... It was Windows for Workgroups that required 2MB min... I used it for so long, that burned into my brain...
Win 3.1 would run on 1MB of RAM, but it wasn't useful since it wouldn't run Virtual 386 mode on 640KB of RAM.
There is "running it" and then there is "having a useful computer. That is why I compared it to Windows 10 on 1GB of RAM. Yes it will run, but it isn't useful.
Apparently, though, this level of care is not sufficient for a computer.
For a Windows computer, no... and this has been known for 20 years, it isn't new...
Your car example would be closer to perhaps an iPad than a desktop computer running Windows.
There is reason Microsoft went with all automatic updates, people were not maintaining their computers and when they had a problem, they blamed Microsoft. This is simply Microsoft attempting to compensate for stupid computer users who do not wish to educate themselves.
You might be right, but is the answer honestly, "lets get the government involved?"
Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. If you really want to get Microsoft (or anyone else) to change, better to do it with market forces.
Get Apple to change how they sell Mac OS for example, or to offer reasonable Mac computers.
I frankly think in 2016 that if Apple offered better computer options they could easily own 30% of the overall PC market. But they don't, so they don't.
But perhaps they would actually not make any more money doing it, or even less, given lower margins.
For us, it seems absolutely clear that a system that is known to phone home under a wide range of circumstances and which is known to be able to introduce arbitrary changes via automatic updates cannot possibly be in compliance with our regulatory and contractual data protection obligations and be guaranteed to remain so. Even if it were somehow in compliance today, the forced updates mean we can't possibly know whether it would remain so tomorrow.
You may be a prime candidate for Windows Enterprise Edition and run on the LTSB (Long Term Servicing Branch). You would then have 100% control over any and all updates.
Such a thing does require competent sysadmins however since you're often running out of current patch systems and need a security plan to compensate for that.
It says it does, but it can be bypassed... It isn't something that most people should do, such machines are hardly usable on Windows 10 anyway, but there is a way around it.
I'm afraid you're also misreading the Apple figures somewhere. Mac sales are much lower than Windows PC sales, of course, but perhaps you confused quarterly figures with annual ones somewhere along the line?
Yep, you might be right...
The 4.8 million Mac sales was a quarterly figure...
Still, even at 20 million a year, it is less than 10% of PC sales. Not bad, given the price of the things, but it is never going to grow unless they change their business model. The damm things are stupid expensive.
My point was that you thought people would leave Windows for Mac. No, they won't, there is zero chance of that happening. A decent Macbook is over $1,000, you can buy a nice Windows laptop for $400. It just isn't even close. Lets not even get into the absurd situation of desktops with the Mac.
The whole damm thing is a Greek tragedy, because I DO think that Mac could be a real contender, if only they would let go of their existing nonsense. But they are making money while the PC companies aren't, so they probably shouldn't change.:)
Market share is vanity while profits are sanity!:)
Do you honestly think that Microsoft Windows is bug ridden and security flawed because Microsoft doesn't care or isn't willing to spend another hundred million to make it right?
I don't believe a program that complex written by humans and designed to run on a hundred million different configurations supporting a million different software programs going back 20 years can be made bug free.
Slashdot Mirror
A year or two ago I would have said I'd never buy a little a tablet or smartphone. My one year old daughter ended up at a childcare place where they use ipads, and she got an iPad. Very soon she was counting to ten with Elmo, saying "Caillou throw ball", and other things that most kids don't do until after they are two years old. Now, at 24 months old, she's about 6-9 months ahead on most of her skills. That's "only" 6-9 months, but it's also about 30% ahead.
Our kids have an iPad too, but it is locked down. Email, web browsing, the app store, are all turned off.
To even get apps to update I have to sign in and do it myself.
Nothing wrong with such a device, so long as you know how to control it.
Ignore the stupid ACs, who are probably trolling anyway...
You're doing the right thing...
I have a 10 year old son right now, he will be 11 in a few months.
He doesn't have a smart phone and isn't getting one until he is 16.
He also doesn't have unlimited access to the Internet at home and for the time being, I can control that. In a few years it will be harder to control, but it has to come off at some point.
Giving a 10 year old unlimited access to the Internet at 10 is beyond stupid, most kids can't handle it and it won't end well.
Yes, there are exceptions, but they are the exceptions that prove the rule. Just remember that you're the Dad, not society, so do what you think is right for your kids, everyone else be dammed.
I have no clue how to run a farm, for example.
Fair enough, then you'd be pretty stupid to try then, wouldn't you?
If people don't know how to use a computer, perhaps they should learn.
What you, and others, are saying is that ignorance is an excuse.
Now for home use, for casual use, perhaps it doesn't matter. If you grow tomatoes in your back yard and they die, will you starve? No, not likely. So that's ok that you tried and messed it up.
Now expand that to 500 acres of tomatoes, would you try that without knowing what you're doing? No, that would be stupid.
If someone is using a computer for business, to make money, and their store/shop/office depends on that computer, then you have an obligation to know how it works and what it takes to make sure it works.
The retail store using a Windows laptop for a point-of-sale terminal without knowing how to use it properly is at fault, not Microsoft. The tools exist to have prevented what happened, the store owner simply choose not to use them and paid the price.
Thankfully in this case, it wasn't a major price, but perhaps lesson learned.
I'm not calling them stupid.
Yes, you are... you just don't want to admit it...
(or perhaps you aren't aware of it, but you are)
I don't know the details for Apple
Let me help you out... :)
On average, you get between 3 and 4 years of support for each version of OS X.
http://www.computerworld.com/a...
The security clock is ticking down for Apple's OS X Mountain Lion, which will probably be retired from support this fall before the Cupertino, Calif. company releases El Capitan.
Mountain Lion, also known as OS X 10.8, debuted in July 2012, and was the last Mac operating system to come with a price tag: The now-unreasonable $19.99.
No. Windows 10 is significantly different to Windows 7 in all kinds of ways.
You think so, but that isn't what I said... What I said is that I suspect that a court of law might consider it reasonable.
One thing that Microsoft might do under such a new set of rules is to say "Windows is supported for 10 years on any computer it is pre-installed on, so long as you're running the then current version of Windows, which will be provided for free".
I suspect a whole lot of people will think that sounds quite reasonable and people like you would have little success in convincing the mass market that they are wrong.
I think Microsoft has an obligation to fix the defects in Windows 7 without imposing other changes, and if they don't want to do that because it's more expensive to maintain multiple products or whatever other excuse, I think the law should compel them to do so for a reasonable period in the interests of protecting consumers.
I understand, and it sounds wonderful to say... my point was that you can say that, but making it happen is another thing completely...
There are many shades of gray between "perfect" and "nothing". Feet put to the fire, MS may comply as much as they have to, and nothing more. Perhaps Windows will now only get 2 years of mainstream support and 10 years of "bug fixes", thus requiring you to upgrade far more often than today.
Windows 7 came out when Nehalem was current, yet it is fully supported all the way up to Haswell, with limited Skylake support. Would you be happier if they provide bug fixes for Windows free from the things you don't like, in return for it only working on Sandy Bridge or older, and Ivy Bridge would have required Windows 8? Or perhaps Windows 7.1 would have supported Ivy Bridge, for a $29 "upgrade fee".
That is the cure being worse than the disease. :)
Who is legally responsible if the software gets broken is a different question, but for sure it isn't the end customer who bought a computer and just wants to get what they paid for.
Consider that the customer DID get what they paid for...
Windows generally works just fine out of the box on the computer it was pre-installed on.
Putting aside defect cases where the computer is faulty (and that is a different area of law), future support and updates can never be guaranteed.
Part of the challenge is the Internet. How many patches and updates did DOS 5.0 get? Windows 3.0? Windows 95?
Yes, a few here and there, but not much... Sure, there was DOS 4.01 and DOS 6.2, and of course Windows 3.11... but those were minor, one off updates.
Today Windows is getting updated every week, it is a very different world than 20 years ago. The irony is that your new "requirement" would effectively lock Microsoft into place as the OS of choice forever, since it would become nearly impossible for anyone else to step in.
Also, what happens to Linux, since it clearly would never withstand that test. Yet there are companies that make a living supporting it. Put them to the same test and most of them would clearly fail.
I think what you haven't considered is that you're trying to hold Microsoft to a standard that you don't want to hold anyone else to, and that simply isn't right.
There was an IE security update recently that also included GWX crap, and IMHO that is unacceptable.
While I actually agree with you on that, I also don't think the government is remotely able to make that decision. The cure would be worse than the disease.
Even without that, for something like system software that is supplied with a laptop and essential to its use, clearly the expected useful lifetime must be at least as long as the laptop itself lasts.
A laptop might well last 20+ years, do you think MS should have to support it that long?
Consider cars... generally car companies must provide support and be liable for defects for 10 to 15 years, depending on the state. Beyond that point, it's all on you.
http://www.clarkfountain.com/b...
And in fairness, this is probably reasonable... after all, if you own a 1984 Cadillac Eldorado, do you REALLY expect GM in 2016 to be responsible for that car?
How about a 1971 Ford Pinto?
Taken to the extreme, how about a 1908 Ford Model T?
That example might sound absurd, but in computer terms, Windows 95 is a lot closer to a Model T than to a F-150 of today. Windows XP might be that 1971 Ford Pinto and Windows 7 is rapidly approaching 15 years old in computer years.
http://www.kensblog.com/
That is what he is up to these days...
1979 to 1996, I miss those days... Adventure games really took a hit when they got out of the business...
Kings Quest and Space Quest were SO AWESOME! :)
I think one very clear example is that software that communicates with the outside world but has a security vulnerability is defective. If that vulnerability isn't found before it ships, it's fair to expect the software developer to make commercially reasonable efforts to provide a fix within a reasonable timeframe for as long as the software is within a reasonably expected useful lifetime.
Ok, that sounds reasonable... but, doesn't MS already do this? What new action is expected?
What is the "expected useful lifetime" of Windows? 5 years? 10 years? Frankly I think MS provides updates longer than most companies do and for more past versions than most companies do.
What if MS came out tomorrow and said, "Windows 10 is now free forever to Windows 7 owners, but support for Windows 7 is ending, Windows 10 is your patch for security"?
I imagine if you wanted to get all legal about it, that would be a "reasonable solution" in the eyes of the law.
How far back does Apple provide support for OS X? Does MS do more?
5 computers is a "large business"?
If you have 5 or more computers and they already come with Windows, you can upgrade them to Enterprise for a reasonable fee.
Sadly, MS doesn't make this easy, you have to pickup the phone and call them. :)
All I'm suggesting is that the software industry should not be magically exempt from the same general legal standards as everyone else.
Are they? How much consumer stuff really works all that great?
Heck, a lot of clothes I buy no longer hold up the way the good old stuff used to. It is cheaper, which is nice, but it doesn't last as long either.
If you sell something and it doesn't work properly, you should be required to do something reasonable about that
Fair enough... like what?
Define "doesn't work properly" to a court of law. Then define who makes that decision and what shade of gray is used? What is the "reasonable thing about that"?
That is why it becomes heavy government regulation and you'd destroy the tech business, because of the above.
By some people's point of view, Windows has never worked properly. By others, it seems to work just fine. And what should MS do about that? For how long? Is MS required to fix bugs in Windows 3.1 in 2016?
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Again, while I understand your point of view, I'm not sure that it is a workable one. I'm open to hearing specifics on how you think it might work, because honestly I don't see a way. But that doesn't mean there isn't one. :)
It has been known for at least twenty years that people are people and will continue to be people, and that all the whining about how they should know what those of us in the field know is pointless.
The irony is that you're calling them stupid as well, but you're using the term "people will continue to be people" rather than say it outright...
In other words, people will continue to be stupid. :)
This is just MS helping people out who otherwise won't help themselves. The Internet needs better security, one way to get it is to drive forward Windows updates.
While we can disagree on their methods, the goal is a good one.
True enough... Honestly... I don't think there is any doubt there is room for them to grow, the question is... "is there room to grow and maintain their profit margins?"
Don't misunderstand me... I recently purchased a Macbook Pro off eBay.
Don't laugh, it was a good deal... It is a late 2013 model with quad core i7, SSD, and Retina display for under $1,200. If they sold at that price new, they would fly off the shelves (a similar new model is over $2,200!)
Even at $1,500 they would be worth a look, but at over $2K? Nuts...
That being said, I bought it to get some more current Apple experience, it has been a few years since I've used a Mac and it is always wise to keep current on the business. I own a computer company so being aware of the other side is smart. My OS X experience is about 5 versions out of date now, time to get current. :)
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For what it is worth, I don't think Apple has to price as cheap as HP/Dell/Acer do... but they are so far out of the ballpark and offer so few good options, they are killing their chances.
The new Mac Mini is a good example. No RAM upgrades? Dual core only? In 2016? What are they thinking? The $700 Mac Mini (the only one worth a serious look) has about $350 worth of hardware in it. If it was $499 I wouldn't mind it and could even recommend it. At $699? You've got to be kidding...
Likewise, the iMac 27" is nice, but $1,800? Drop the requirement for the 5k display, frankly most people are fine with 1080p, but a 1440p wouldn't be that expensive.
Make an iMac for $999 with a 27" 1440p monitor and you'd sell tons of them.
Likewise, where the heck is a real desktop computer? The lack of gaming also prevents Mac from really taking off. A proper tower computer is needed for that.
It doesn't matter what you use, if you want to see the whole page, it will take short of forever to render...
Now if you're using something that strips stuff from the site, maybe... but in Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge, it is largely unusable...
Mobile web sites have been created to solve two problems.
1. Limited space on phones
2. Limited processing power on phones
Try browsing Yahoo's Sports page on a Pentium 4 and tell me how well that works.
I swear I had Win 3.1 running on machines with under 1 MB of memory, but that's going too far into the past for me to remember specifics.
I went back and looked... It was Windows for Workgroups that required 2MB min... I used it for so long, that burned into my brain...
Win 3.1 would run on 1MB of RAM, but it wasn't useful since it wouldn't run Virtual 386 mode on 640KB of RAM.
There is "running it" and then there is "having a useful computer. That is why I compared it to Windows 10 on 1GB of RAM. Yes it will run, but it isn't useful.
Apparently, though, this level of care is not sufficient for a computer.
For a Windows computer, no... and this has been known for 20 years, it isn't new...
Your car example would be closer to perhaps an iPad than a desktop computer running Windows.
There is reason Microsoft went with all automatic updates, people were not maintaining their computers and when they had a problem, they blamed Microsoft. This is simply Microsoft attempting to compensate for stupid computer users who do not wish to educate themselves.
You might be right, but is the answer honestly, "lets get the government involved?"
Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. If you really want to get Microsoft (or anyone else) to change, better to do it with market forces.
Get Apple to change how they sell Mac OS for example, or to offer reasonable Mac computers.
I frankly think in 2016 that if Apple offered better computer options they could easily own 30% of the overall PC market. But they don't, so they don't.
But perhaps they would actually not make any more money doing it, or even less, given lower margins.
For us, it seems absolutely clear that a system that is known to phone home under a wide range of circumstances and which is known to be able to introduce arbitrary changes via automatic updates cannot possibly be in compliance with our regulatory and contractual data protection obligations and be guaranteed to remain so. Even if it were somehow in compliance today, the forced updates mean we can't possibly know whether it would remain so tomorrow.
You may be a prime candidate for Windows Enterprise Edition and run on the LTSB (Long Term Servicing Branch). You would then have 100% control over any and all updates.
Such a thing does require competent sysadmins however since you're often running out of current patch systems and need a security plan to compensate for that.
Two points:
1. Microsoft doesn't remotely care about your tax forms. Mine are already in the cloud thanks to OneDrive, so they already have a copy.
2. The government already has them, so you aren't keeping some big secrets from them.
Windows 10 requires the NX bit
It says it does, but it can be bypassed... It isn't something that most people should do, such machines are hardly usable on Windows 10 anyway, but there is a way around it.
I'm afraid you're also misreading the Apple figures somewhere. Mac sales are much lower than Windows PC sales, of course, but perhaps you confused quarterly figures with annual ones somewhere along the line?
Yep, you might be right...
The 4.8 million Mac sales was a quarterly figure...
Still, even at 20 million a year, it is less than 10% of PC sales. Not bad, given the price of the things, but it is never going to grow unless they change their business model. The damm things are stupid expensive.
My point was that you thought people would leave Windows for Mac. No, they won't, there is zero chance of that happening. A decent Macbook is over $1,000, you can buy a nice Windows laptop for $400. It just isn't even close. Lets not even get into the absurd situation of desktops with the Mac.
The whole damm thing is a Greek tragedy, because I DO think that Mac could be a real contender, if only they would let go of their existing nonsense. But they are making money while the PC companies aren't, so they probably shouldn't change. :)
Market share is vanity while profits are sanity! :)
Do you honestly think that Microsoft Windows is bug ridden and security flawed because Microsoft doesn't care or isn't willing to spend another hundred million to make it right?
I don't believe a program that complex written by humans and designed to run on a hundred million different configurations supporting a million different software programs going back 20 years can be made bug free.
It is beyond human ability to do that.