Bruninho wrote on 2020-05-12, 01:03:Welcome to the club!!! Where do I sign up? […]
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ShovelKnight wrote on 2020-05-11, 23:07:One of my good friends who was a Mac developer at the time grimly predicted 5 years ago that Apple would slowly turn macOS into […]
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One of my good friends who was a Mac developer at the time grimly predicted 5 years ago that Apple would slowly turn macOS into a mostly locked-down operating system with heavy sandboxing for all apps, draconian privacy/security restrictions and no way to distribute applications outside of Mac App Store.
I would say he was almost spot on, Catalina is not only a steaming pile of garbage, it's also a total nightmare when it comes to app entitlements (the system is not only cumbersome, it's also broken in many places and some things that used to work now don't), and given the notarisation requirements, I feel the move to Mac App Store only is basically just around the corner. If they switch to ARM, this would be a good excuse to enforce the MAS-only policy.
I used to worry about the state of Mac hardware, these days I'm much more concerned about software. I'm not running Catalina on my main Mac, but the latest Boot ROM update managed to completely break display detection both on my Mac mini and my MacBook Pro. It's now a total gamble whether the displays would wake when I wake up the computer, half of the time I need to unplug them and plug them in again. Thanks, Apple.
In the last 3 years, they went from "It just works" to "It mostly works" to "It sometimes works". What's next, "It just doesn't work"?
Welcome to the club!!! Where do I sign up?
EDIT: About Windows 7, I was recently undecided about doing another VM for a few games I have, they are somewhat resource hungry. A few tests showed I can run them on Win 7 and Win 10. I can't choose which I should go for. But after reading these posts, I'm fu***ng sure as h*ll that I will go for Win 7 this time. Can't waste another night fighting to put down the Windows 10 privacy settings, data collection stuff, their mixture of new and old UI, settings, file explorer mess, and finally... the cream of the top that made me decide... the fu***g start menu. Oh, boy, the tiles, the disarray of programs and groups... my OCD just collapses.
At first I went for Windows XP + Inexperience patcher, because I wanted the Windows 2000 appearance and the classic logon. But even Win XP does not get any love anymore from VMware (its running SVGA II driver instead of the much loved SVGA 3D driver).
I 🤣'd at your list, pretty much same as mine and everyone I know who ever touched Win10. And between the cruddy Start Menu abortion and the "new" File Explorer I basically took 3 months off work and wrote my own freaking UI, start menu, taskbar, file explorer, the whole works. Figured if I was going back to Win7 I sure wasn't going to be happy with the standard stuff. By the way if you ever want a "classic" start menu on ANY version of WIndows, check out ClassicShell (or OpenShell I think it became). Very nice Start Menu replacement.
The bloated Win10 consumes so much in system resources and MOSTLY to do stuff the user 1: isn't aware of and 2: didn't ask for and 3: doesn't need - EVER. For example, I showed my friends once that Win10 put the MS app "Photo" on their machine and it had control of their camera AND WAS RUNNING! Without having been executed! 🤣 Then I showed them my former MS Live Account and it had literal MAPS of places I had been recently. So, privacy? Data collection? Yeah I don't anything to be private about really, but I don't like them wanting to watch me that closely. It's the same reason I use a "non-Google" build of the Chrome web-browser (Chromium actually). It has zero Google hooks in it. I sound paranoid, I actually hate the idea - the balls of those companies, it's far more wide reaching than most people know.
The only difficult part of using Win7 is to find drivers for the hardware you want to use. MS mandated that most hw mfgrs stop releasing Win7 drivers and utils. However, since they're all lazy farks, their Win10 drivers can usually be used on Win7 as long as the proper modifications are made to certain files (.inf for example). And often a manual install is required since they rig their installers to spew snark at you for having the wrong OS. But I found all sorts of solutions and have my main workstation as a 1yr old HP Envy Laptop, so rather new, and have 100% driver coverage for it all including multiple monitors, VirtualBox VMs, sound drivers, you name it. So far, there has not been one single piece of software or hardware that I wanted to use that wouldn't work. It won't be that way forever of course, but since I'm in my twilight and inching towards retiring my keyboard and just using computers for what they're best at (p0rn of course 🤣 I mean arcade games). Having to make my living on these damn things has taken a huge toll.
In any case - if you or anyone wants information or assistance, just let me know. I'm happy to help always. Especially if it involves helping people take control of their computers and be able to do whatever the fark they want.
PS: Just remembered you mentioned Win2k at some point, just remember that compatibility over the various incarnations of Windows from NT through 98, XP, Vista, 8, 2k - all the way to Win10 - each one has a different degree of compatibility. And also, differing degrees of driver availability. Win2k would be, along with Vista & 8, my last choices if I wanted to run any games or do anything more than MS-Word (joking, sorta).