back to article Windows 10 1809 looks unlikely to overtake prior build before 19H1 lands

Windows 10 1809 continued its sinister seep from beneath the basement door last month as usage crested the 20 per cent mark. This is according to ad slingers AdDuplex, though the figures have to be taken with a pinch of salt since, as the outfit cheerfully admits, the data hailed from around 5,000 Windows Store apps running …

  1. big_D Silver badge

    Apps...

    that's your problem right there. We've rolled out over a dozen 1809 PCs last month and upgraded some others. But they are all corporate PCs with no Store apps installed and the Store disabled...

    1. DailyLlama
      FAIL

      Re: Apps...

      Same here. We've done around 150 PCs since 1809 was properly released, and the Store is disabled by GPO. None of that Candy Crush nonsense on work computers please!

      1. Mark 78

        Re: Apps...

        You can avoid Candy Crush etc but still allow useful apps by setting up the Store for Business assuming you have an Enterprise Agreement.

        1. big_D Silver badge

          Re: Apps...

          You can, but if all of the software that is required comes in a pre-installed image, there is no need for the Store.

          We use the Windows Deployment Tool to install new PCs with Windows 10 and all the corporate applications the user needs / has been authorized to use. None of those are available in the Store anyway.

        2. Ilsa Loving

          Re: Apps...

          So... pay 200% markup just for the privilege of not getting malware shoved down our throats, or we disable the "functionality" outright for free.

          Hmm... decisions decisions.

          You know a product is a failure when the only real selling point to their super expensive version is, "You get control back."

          I'd rather use Apple. At least that way, only my wallet is getting f__ked over instead of my wallet, my time, my energy, and my sanity.

    2. Diogenes

      Re: Apps...

      Ditto the several thousand computers used in public schools in our state.

      Even my home machine uses no app store apps that haven't come from MS (eg whiteboard, onenote and sway)

  2. djstardust

    No thanks ....

    Both my Windows 10 machines are running their factory builds with updates permanently disabled and they work perfectly.

    If someone can sell me the benefits of updating then I'm all ears ........

    1. big_D Silver badge
      Facepalm

      Re: No thanks ....

      You mean apart from protection to all of the critical remote exploitation flaws that have been patched in the last months and years?

      I hope your machines don't have an internet connection!

      1. ReverandDave

        Re: No thanks ....

        Windows updates are a fucking nightmare, but not updating your system is like not vaccinating your kids, it's irresponsible and makes you and everyone around you, less safe.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Is it just me..

    .. why does 1809 and 19H1 make me think of H1N1?

    *cough*

    :)

  4. rmason

    Can't see it

    I can't see it.

    As things stand now there's no automatic method to "skip" a feature update., You have to apply one then the other, if using either windows update or WSUS.

    I believe you can do it manually.

    So, nope, I can't see these users being able to do much apart from two giant updates/reboots in the correct sequence. That's what machines do now if some sort of issue prevents them from getting the feature updates, you just have 2 to do,

  5. Andytug

    Wonder if....

    they'll have put back the vital accessibility option for changing font sizes in toolbars etc that they inexplicably removed in the last update, thus rendering all the toolbars etc too small to read unless your close up vision is perfect?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    A couple of my home machines have suddenly decided that today is the day for 1809 ... As a cynic I'm assuming that this is because it's 1903 in 2 days time!

    1. DJV Silver badge
  7. Ian Johnston Silver badge

    Is there a good reason why a 500MB (say) update to Windows can take several hours to complete after download but a similar-sized update to Linux applies in a couple of minutes?

    1. DJV Silver badge

      Could it be that it's because Windows is (shock horror!) crap?

    2. Barry Rueger

      And why the Linux update "just works", while Win 10 breaks stuff.

  8. mark l 2 Silver badge

    The problem with these 'feature updates' for Windows OS every 6 months is they are essentially a reinstall of the whole OS. This can put your computer out of action for the best part of half a day, especially on older PCs with hard drives rather than SSDs.

    1. Andytug

      And also why on 32GB tablets..

      you have to provide extra memory (USB stick) before you can do the upgrade as Win10 takes around 20GB for itself, so there's no room for the updates to happen!

  9. Bearshark

    Operating Systems

    Operating Systems present users access to the hardware on which the OS resides. That's all it should be, nothing more. Then the user then has the freedom to run / install applications that interact with the hardware. (i.e. spreadsheet on the monitor, spread sheet using floating point calculations on a CPU).

    Windows has grown to a bloated piece of crap and this update model just doesn't work well.

    It's like the United States Federal Government. At it's constitutional core, I am to be protected from foreign aggression and have the freedom to prosper. In its current iteration, The United States Federal Government is there just to impede my pursuit of liberty and happiness.

    So I can draw parallels with Windows :-)

  10. Uncle Ron

    My Own Voyage of the Damned

    I have 9 laptops and desktops in a little home network. Hobby stuff. Movie servers, backup servers, email, etc.--sandboxes. They are all Windows 7 and all humming along. Due to the impending 2020 abandonment/betrayal/departure of Win 7, I decided to bite the bullet and do an in-place upgrade to two machines. The two least valuable--from a content standpoint. It was not pretty. Lots of stuff didn't work. (I use VNC to pop around to all the machines from one place. Worked like a charm on Win 7 but with WIn 10, I got blank screens, freezes, and more. Days of research to fix that.) One of the machines repeatedly froze very early in the boot and only multiple power button restarts would bring it back. Looked at the critical errors in the logs and fixed something that didn't fixed anything. More research, and I'm still not sure if it's fixed and what fixed it. I use a screen recorder to record live stream sessions and it doesn't work with the laptop cover closed. (I know the settings are all correct...) More days of research and I finally bought VGA emulator dongles to fool the machines into thinking there was a 2nd display attached. The USB wireless dongle needed to be uninstalled and SW and drivers reinstalled to stop it from messing up. There's more. The point is, I now feel I could have done a clean install of almost ANY Linux distro, learned Linux, and solved all the problems in about the same time. I swear to god I don't know what a "civilian" does when they want to do this. Oh wait, yes, they just buy a new PC. I feel that Microsoft really really sucks. Oh and BTW, IMHO, there is NOTHING better about Windows 10. Nothing better. Some things were needlessly changed, and some things are absolutely worse.

    1. Adrian 4

      Re: My Own Voyage of the Damned

      So .. er. why do you bother ?

      I guess Linux would just be too easy.

    2. btrower

      Re: My Own Voyage of the Damned

      I feel your pain.

      I am obliged to update notebooks and workstations here for myself and family members and the last rounds were nightmares that took days of my time. Windows 8, 8.1 (nein?) and 10 have been disasters.

      The last system we bought here was an Apple Macbook and likely the next system will also be an Apple. Microsoft has been downright hostile for years, but lately is has been making our machines unusable.

      Machines that are not used on a daily basis spend most of their time running Microsoft updates of one kind or another. Microsoft literally uses most of the capacity of those machines, sometimes rendering them unusable for many hours.

      Civilians have no hope of doing this stuff on their own and market rates for professional help can quickly exceed the cost of simply replacing the device.

      I have a feeling that the reason Microsoft is not seeing much more vigorous push-back is because people are switching to their phones for many tasks.

    3. N2

      Re: My Own Voyage of the Damned

      Windows went downhill rapidly after 7, they dont give a fuck and just turn out any old shite now as the great unwashed test it for them.

    4. DailyLlama

      Re: My Own Voyage of the Damned

      Nothing better?

      There speaks someone who has clearly never used Windows 8...

  11. jelabarre59

    but yet

    But yet 1809 managed to install itself on my brother's computer on a crap DSL connection in the Catskills, on a machine that had the Windows Update service outright *DISABLED* in the control panel. Fortunately it actually *WORKED* (one of the rare occurrences) since it's a 90 minute drive for me to get to the machine if MSW10 barfed.

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