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A comment on I help seniors with technology issues. A regular came in with a Lenovo laptop. Parent comment

Re:I help seniors with technology issues. A regular came in ... by bootsmann on Monday October 24, 2022 @07:03AM (#33315114)
The process is available (though you also need to click away a few nudges to get you onto cloud) using the normal setup if you use Pro instead of Home, with Home they basically force it on you, allegedly so they get to backup your BitLocker recovery keys.

I think in general Microsoft is suffering from an incentive problem. Unlike Apple they don't really have any revenue stream from users except for the up-front cost of the installation but still incur costs for patching etc. so they do all this trickery to at least get access to data and metrics to improve their paid line of products (Office etc.)

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Re:I help seniors with technology issues. A regular came in ... by vbezhenar on Monday October 24, 2022 @07:16AM (#33315228)
Thanks, was not aware about edition difference. I'm surprised that MS put that bat-file in their install files, because it definitely looks like it was specially created for that purpose (it sets one key in registry and then reboots computer which starts installation again, but now this registry key enables UI option to use local account).
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Re:I help seniors with technology issues. A regular came in ... by capableweb on Monday October 24, 2022 @07:06AM (#33315139)
> allegedly so they get to backup your BitLocker recovery keys

AKA so you can't really encrypt your own computer without someone else also be able to unlock said encryption "if they really have to".

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Re:I help seniors with technology issues. A regular came in ... by bootsmann on Monday October 24, 2022 @07:17AM (#33315238)
Idk what happens on the backend, so I wont engage in conjecture on how safe it is, but keep in mind that BitLocker is not available for Home users at all in Win10 and enabling it by default in Win11 does increase the data safety of the average user quite a bit because a petty thief will not be able to get any data from the device.
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Re:I help seniors with technology issues. A regular came in ... by zeusk on Monday October 24, 2022 @01:55PM (#33320021)
Telemetry/metrics and device-account relation is not just for revenue or improving the paid products; it helps immensely in tracking down and debugging Windows and external device drivers as well.
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Re:I help seniors with technology issues. A regular came in ... by CatWChainsaw on Wednesday October 26, 2022 @02:56PM (#33347833)
I believe this is about to change in 22H2 Pro. You will need internet and microsoft account to set up. And a Pro license is a $1000 markup on consumer laptops, from what I've seen.
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