Can’t say I agree with this. I’ve been using Windows as my daily driver for the last decade since switching back from Mac+Linux for work reasons.

Honestly there’s lots to like in Windows 10 even if there’s a bit of bloat around the edges. I cannot imagine wanting to go back to the bad old days of ME. Modern Windows is stable, secure, fast and has plenty in there for power users.

Driver support and sleep mode is seamless and just works. Even video drivers are sandboxes in their own process. Windows can and I have seen it recover from video and other driver crashes. My laptop can switch between embedded and nVidia graphics seamlessly. This is a lot better than the situation on Linux.

Integrated firewall, AV (Windows Defender), drive encryption (bit defender) and application signing is great for end users. The update process is pushy but nags less than I’ve seen on Macs and honestly you should update regularly.

PowerShell, WSL and inbuilt virtualisation (Hyper-V) are great for power users. Revamped Explorer is also nice with options like open in PowerShell.

Integration with Azure AD and SSO means that for all internal applications for work I don’t need to sign on.

My main complaints are that start menu search is still broken with unnecessary integration with Bing and file search corrupting search results with the slightest typo, file copy is still slow for many small files (although directory merging is nice) and Microsoft is a way too aggressive in their product placements on the start menu and trying to force people to create Microsoft accounts.

See, all of these things would be great reasons to use Windows, and I agree that these are nice (though I'd hardly call "seamless GPU switching" unique to Windows; my Linux laptops can do that perfectly fine with FOSS drivers).

The problem is that the Microsoft-sanctioned Windows desktop experience seems to be actively hostile to user experience due to all the extra shit that Microsoft has tacked onto the "goodness" that's Windows 10:

- Cortana not only enabled by default and difficult to remove, but shouting at me at max volume as my very first experience with a new Windows installation

- Random apps being preinstalled, even on so-called "professional" versions (hell, even on enterprise versions by default - and yeah, it's trivial to disable these things with GPOs, but I shouldn't have to)

- Literally no option to create a user account in the "home" edition that doesn't entail connecting to an online account, which is dumb as hell

- Ads. On a product that I paid money for. What the fuck, Microsoft?

Each of these things in isolation is itself entirely unacceptable for any product that even remotely respects its users. In combination, these things make Windows 10 Home and Professional the two absolute worst versions of Windows money has ever been able to buy, and fundamentally undermine any trust I might have in Microsoft.

I would, however, change my tune in a heartbeat if LTSC was at least an option, if not the default, for desktops. Windows 10 LTSC is what Windows 10 should be, and probably would be if the Windows team didn't seem driven to make the default Windows UX as janky as possible. I still think Windows 2000 was peak Windows, but LTSC is almost there - all the neat things you mention, and none of the bullshit.

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EDIT: there are also a bunch of little papercuts that bug me every time I use Windows, like never knowing which tool is the "right" one to use for various things (screenshots come to mind; what was wrong with the Snipping Tool?), or the fact that "ClearType" is anything but. Not that Windows 2000 didn't have its own share of little papercuts, but when an OS has accumulated 20 more years of those papercuts, they start to really add up.

Also, maybe I'm just butthurt that Microsoft dropped Space Cadet Pinball ;)

Didn't realise Linux did seamless GPU switching these days. It's good to know. Personally I wish they'd move to proper driver isolation though.

Agreed about the BS. Honestly I'd pay more money to get rid of it and have thought about switching back to Linux a few times but the day-to-day Windows 10 experience is smooth enough that I always end up staying (maybe I just have Stockholm syndrome from the downright abuse Apple and Google throw at their mobile users though..)

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PS: Snipping Tool is still around btw and works fine. Sometimes you might want to hit print screen to capture mouse over state though.

Also as long as you don't connect to the internet you can skip creating an MS account on setup and Cortana won't bother you either afterwards either.

I've had Windows installs (in a VM) go sideways because Cortana started listening DURING THE INSTALL and I was on a conference call.

Everything is wrong with that.

Microsoft has disabled Cortana during the Windows 10 install process for recent versions -- albeit not for this reason. Rather, it was due to IT personnel doing multiple installs for corporate deployments only to be faced with a room full of chattering Cortanas.

EDIT: It's more likely due to Microsoft decoupling Cortana from the OS and making it available as an app download. Since Cortana is not a selling point of Windows 10 itself it makes no sense to have it during the install.

having 4 different sound control panels is a sickening joke. there's so many disjointed laters on layers on layers everywhere. nothing is ever cleaned up, just new glossy over layers that don't quite work as well created atop the old. tragi-comic experience.

tragi-comic, hilariously terrible.

You can now set a static IP either in the new network configuration panel or from the old adapter properties. If you set a static IP in one, it won't show up in the other. Either being set to a static IP overrides a DHCP setting. Who knows what happens if they are both set to different static IPs.