Some people aren't comfortable with the amount of data Microsoft is collecting about them. There are a lot of privacy issues, and their terms of service are really quite jarring if you read them. Even turning all the the tracking and telemetry off, you cannot be sure they are not collecting your personal data.

But they were already collecting that data. They're still collecting it on 7 and 8. You almost certainly use several other services that collect the same data, or more. The only reason you think Windows 10 is unique in this is because Microsoft did THE RIGHT FUCKING THING and made their privacy policies understandable to regular people. And they're being criticized and villainized for this. It's childish and indefensible.

Do you have a source for the data collecting for Win 7? Windows 8 is a slightly different story since they incorporated signing into your machine with a Microsoft account, so they have more personal identification linked to your machine (email etc).

Yes other services and companies use your data, including Google and Apple. But these are usually (as far as I know) more annonimized. Microsoft is taking personal data collecting to a new level. From their TOS:

“Microsoft collects information about you, your devices, applications and networks, and your use of those devices, applications and networks. Examples of data we collect include your name, email address, preferences and interests; browsing, search and file history; phone call and SMS data; device configuration and sensor data; and application usage.”

And also:

“If you open a file, we may collect information about the file, the application used to open the file, and how long it takes any use [of]it for purposes such as improving performance, or [if you]enter text, we may collect typed characters, we may collect typed characters and use them for purposes such as improving autocomplete and spell check features.”

There are also reports they are taking sound recordings and webcam captures. This operating system is like an NSA wet dream. If this doesn't make you feel uncomfortable, go ahead and support the new normal. I don't want any part in it.

And not to mention that Microsoft took it upon themselves to use user bandwidth as a way to alleviate stress from their servers.

http://lifehacker.com/windows-10-uses-your-bandwidth-to-dist...

Google collects just as much as Microsoft if not more. If you're using an Android phone with a Google Account then they pretty much know everything about you.

Tu quoque is not an argument.

I guess it's a good thing I didn't use Tu quoque then, now if you'd said I made a Fallacy Fallacy you might be closer to the truth.

I wasn't disputing the op's conclusion, just pointed out the invalid assumption in his argument. Though I could have just dismissed him entirely by saying he made three separate Fallacies of Alleged Certainty. But then I'd be dismissing his statement the way you dismissed mine.

Yet, the fact that Google collects data with Play framework, is not an excuse for Microsoft doing the same, where they historically didn't do it.

That excuse appeared in discussions at HN several times already and compares apples to oranges.

No one is excusing Microsoft, everyone is freaking out and fear mongering about Windows 10 but no one seems to care that the computers we carry around in our pockets daily tracking even more information. People are using their phones more than their PCs these days for internet activities, their phones carry all of their contact information (not just email addresses), they know where we are, where we've been, how active we are, and dozens of other things that PCs don't even begin to track. But no one seems to be outraged about that, they laugh at things like Blackphone and say it's for paranoid alarmists. If we're going to get outraged, lets spread it around and not just hate on Microsoft who happens to be very late to the party.

With phones, it's easy - do not sign in with Google Account. There's no need to flash custom firmware, getting custom hardware, etc. Just do not use your Google Account and be picky about the apps you are going to install.

Yes, it is possible to use Android phone like this. I used it for several years this way - my contacts, calendar and email came from Exchange clone (Kerio) using ActiveSync.

The freaking out regarding Windows is, that you cannot opt out. You don't sign in with Microsoft Account? Does not matter, it will send data anyway. You turn off everything, that is possible to turn off? Does not matter, it will send data anyway. And that's all for something, that was not necessary in older versions - the impression is, that something was taken from you.

See the difference?

Actually it's not that easy because Google Services will transmit data back to Google even if you're not logged in. At a minimum it transmits back statistical information but it's not entirely clear what is sent. Which is just like with Windows 10, we don't know exactly what's being transmitted.

So from what I can tell there is no difference.

If they did THE RIGHT FUCKING THING there would be one giant checkbox that says:

[ ] Do not send any data to Microsoft. Ever.

Alas, they didn't.

A clarification: Windows 7 always collected limited telemetry data, but it wasn't until Windows 8 was released that most aspects of your daily computing experience were collected by default. I believe that some of the more aggressive data collection methods in Windows 8+ have started trickling down to 7 via recent updates though, mostly due to the GWX Windows 10 compatibility checks.

You can block the sites microsoft reports to in your host file, problem solved.

I did it because of issues with W10 disconnecting from my Bluetooth mouse and WIFI issues. I tried many things such as reinstalling drivers and applying fixes suggested by others that were experiencing the same problems. Also, my computer got slower: slower booting up, and slower shutting down. I'm not blaming Microsoft because it could very well be my laptop that has the problem; the fact is, however, that ever since I downgraded to W8.1 my laptop is working fine -- all over again.

I'm strongly considering downgrading to Windows 7. After the upgrade I can't put my PC to sleep - it wakes up all by itself after a couple hours,for no reason whatsoever. I tried doing "powercfg - lastwake" and it just doesn't show anything. I've disabled every single wake timer in the task scheduler, and also completely disabled wake on lan in device manager and in my BIOS. It annoys me enough that I actually want to downgrade.

Also try disabling hybrid sleep in power settings, that's usually the cause.

My Windows machine is for gaming only and I have no interest in Windows 10 cloud integration and data collection, much of which cannot be disabled or blocked.

I made the switch from Windows 7 a few days after release and I'm learning more and more about what is going on under the hood of Windows 10 that is making me seriously consider going back to Windows 7.

Windows 7 had reporting and telemetry, but not even in the same league as what is happening in Windows 10.

Seems like the title should be "upgrading to Windows 7".

I basically went to Windows 10 for DirectX 12.

Now I'm beginning to regret doing so.

Would it be possible to 'hackport' DirectX 12 to Windows 7?

I don't think there is any technical reason why DX12 would not run on Windows 7.

It's just Microsoft being Microsoft and locking it to their new operating system the same way they did with DX10 and Windows Vista.

You can't disable it unless you have enterprise edition, but you can select between levels of telemetry in Win10 I think.

I'm aware. I've gone to some extreme lengths to disable these things.

Group Policy editor, registry edits, hosts file additions and added entries to Comodo Firewall to block any suspicious Microsoft processes from making outbound connections.

It's embarrassing how ignorant you are. Congrats on falling prey to fear mongering.

Different reasons for different machines; my wife's laptop was simply unstable under Windows 10 so it went back to 7. My gaming desktop ran great, but I purposely planned to test Windows 10 and go back to 7 after about a week, just to make sure it would run well. Given some of the privacy revelations the past few days though, as well as some incompatibility with older games, I may just keep Windows 7 on that machine indefinitely. My wife's desktop is running great with 8.1 and she has no complaints, so it will probably be a while before we upgrade it as well.

My main workstation runs Slackware Linux so Windows 10 doesn't enter into the picture there, and my laptop is so old (Dell D400 from 2003 also running Slackware) that it wouldn't run 10 due to no DirectX 9 hardware, and even if it did I'd have to buy a copy anyway since that machine came with XP originally.

>Why would you ever do this?

The complaints I'm hearing from folks running Windows 10 is that it is broken enough to interrupt their work. (E.g., crashing while using an IDE to code.) That's all the reason needed, really. If you can't quickly find a solution, you'd have to spend the time to revert.