I was thinking as a work around to this how about just overnighting your electronics to the house? Mostly just as an FU.

I switched to Kubuntu in April on my main laptop. I am running 16.04 and it works great. I have not found anything I cannot do. I switched after I realized that Microsoft had renamed and re-enabled the telemetry service with a forced automatic update. You can put up with that kind of control from Redmond if you like but I will have none of it.

I keep a VMWare Player VM of Windows 7 around just in case but have not fired it up in a good while.

I am also a gamer and I have about 140 games in my steam account that work on Linux and for those that don't I stream them from my Windows 7 media center PC. I have not gotten rid of MS entirely but at least finally there are real transition solutions available.

The thing I would like to see is the tech class to wake up and throw off the yoke of Redmond and go ahead and switch at this point. A truly open OS with real competition between distros is the only solution to corporations trying to take over your computing experience for their benefit. I think if my fellow techies realized that we could start a real step change on the desktop. That would result in better support for Linux overall (drivers and apps) . The Linux Desktop OS is ready as near as I can tell. Just the people who aren't.

You don't have to put up with Microsoft anymore. Switch to Linux I did in April and it's a perfectly viable alternative to Windows at this point. It's come a hell of a long way. And Steam on Linux is really a game changer (no pun intended).

If you don't know what Microsoft Xenix is get off my lawn.

If this is a game once we get to Alpha Centauri is it game over?

Look Microsoft is not giving Windows 10 away for free and foisting it on everyone for no good reason. You are the product in Windows 10. They are going to collect your data and use it to serve you ads and possibly sell it to third parties. If you try and disable some of the services that do this they will rename the service and re-enable it with a non optional automatic update see here if you think I am joking http://bgr.com/2015/12/01/windows-10-privacy-preferences/ It's not your computer anymore and you exist at Microsoft's whim. Go ahead and update. Their main goal is to be able to tell advertisers they have a billion devices on which they can serve ads. By the way live tiles ar ads in case you have not figured that out.

I recently switched full time to Kubuntu because Windows 10 shows Microsoft going down a very worrying path. I.E. Basic Telemetry is not optional in consumer versions. And even more worrying any attempts to disable Windows 10 spying will be reversed by a automatic update see here http://bgr.com/2015/12/01/windows-10-privacy-preferences/

So it seems you are the product in WIndows 10. People like to point out that this is similar to how Google and Facebook operate their web services. Ignoring the fact that those are web services that you can easily choose not to use. Whilst Windows 10 is the dominate desktop operating system that runs your software that you may have spent thousand of dollars on. Not so easy to switch away from that.

They are also doing advertising in Windows 10 as that's what live tiles in the start menu really are. Currently most of them are just cross promoting things like Microsoft's other web services and offerings I.E. Get Office app Get Skype App and Xbox and of course Windows store. But there are also straight up ads right now. Right now if I open the Windows 10 start menu I see an ad for Flip Board, Minecraft, and I heart radio. I assume Flip Board and Clear Channel media paid for those ads.

So here's the deal, Microsoft's monopoly on the Desktop has been historically very bad for users. It's allowed them to produce shoddy software with little real impact on their bottom line. It's now allowing them to go in a direction that will result in a constant barrage of ads driven by data they have collected about you being built right in to the OS. If this keeps going the way it is soon your desktop will look like the TV screen from Idiocracy just a bunch of ads with a little view port in the middle. Microsoft is not trustworthy nor a good steward of this defacto monopoly. It is really up to us tech types to start the revolution by moving to an open platform like Linux where there can be real competition on the desktop between competing distributions. After all we are the ones that have the technical chops to easily move. Once adoption is up better driver and software support will follow. All though personally in my recent switch on a MSI gaming laptop I had 0 issues.

My move has gone without a hitch I am writing this from Kubuntu 15.10 all my daily work is fine. I have VMWare player setup for the Windows apps I need. And when I logged on to Steam thanks to Steam OS there were 107 games already in my steam Library I could install and play. So I have not missed Microsoft's Advertising System Windows 10 at all. It's time to switch.

Just ditch Skype fuck em if they can't take a joke. Hangouts seems to be a decent replacement and does not require a client at all.

If you fall for Windows Store and Microsoft's desire for a total walled garden approach in Windows 10 your a full on chump. Microsoft has taken to renaming and re-enabling there spying telemetry service after users turned it off.

http://bgr.com/2015/12/01/windows-10-privacy-preferences/

It's no longer your computer this is a complete outrage where the hell is the DOJ on this? I have been a Linux admin since the 90s and I have used it on the desktop on and off never really being able to stick with it because my games were on Windows. Well, this tears it for me I am out. I will take what I can get on SteamOS there is enough there to keep me entertained.

The whole idea behind live tiles and the full screen interface that was in Windows 8 was that it was an ad. It was just cross promoting other Microsoft stuff. Bing Maps, Bing Finance, MSN, MS Store, Windows Mobile, Xbox etc... It was always about promoting Microsoft's other stuff in a full screen animated Ad. They alienated their users with a poorly thought out and designed UI including mystery meat navigation in the form of charms bars for the soul purpose of serving their cross promotional interests. Which is why in my opinion they didn't get nearly enough grief for the shenanigans.

Looks like someones check didn't clear

Is all about cross promoting Microsoft's other stuff Bing Everything, Xbox One, MS Store, IE (renamed). At least they had the decency to not charge you to upgrade to full screen live tile based advertisements for their other offerings like they did with Windows 8. There is not much in either version that truly benefits the user it's all about improving their flat revenue by getting suckers to buy or use their other crap. And of course Cortana is just about getting people to use Bing.

Hey Steve, Guess you have a lot more time on your hands to look at Slashdot since you retired from throwing chairs.

A faculty research associate wanted to play with 3D printers and drones on the federal dime.

If you keep making Chicken Little the sky is falling predictions with computer models as your proof to bring about some desired political change. Then eventually you will lose all credibility and no one will listen to you anymore. You damage the reputation of the sciences and certainly of computer models when you do this. Knock it off.