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First off, before anything else, I really don't want to hear about security concerns. In this specific case, I really don't fucking care. Unless you're a business or running a public-facing website, you do NOT have to have Windows updates. And even IF you are, the chances of Windows updates actually mattering in terms of deterring an attack are (very usually) low. Furthermore, Microsoft has demonstrated multiple times that if a found exploit is truly bad enough, they will go back and patch versions of Windows even though they might even be a solid decade out of support. Ok, we all got that? Good. Awesome. Let's move on.
I don't think I really need to elaborate any more on why I despise Windows 11. It has all of Windows 10's problems and then some more of its own for good measure. But what if we had just Windows 10 and we removed one of the absolute worst """features""" about it, the forced updates... ? Is it worth at least a look? Or is this OS still a complete waste of time?
For this talk, let's assume we've already ran Windows 10 through a debloating program or script or whatever you decide to do that with. What are the advantages? What are the disadvantages? Well, for the advantages, by switching to 10, you gain full hardware and software support for just about everything, excluding some legacy software and games. (That is significant on its own, but more on that later.) Hardware support MAY start to dip once Microsoft updates end, but I'm guessing since everyone so vehemently hates Windows 11 now, software makers and hardware manufacturers are going to play it safe and continue to ship with Windows 10 compatibility for a long while yet.
The second advantage is pretty obvious as well. Windows updates, ever since the very release of Windows 10, have become an absolute thorn in everyone's side as Microsoft has warred for years to wrestle control of the OS more and more away from the user, even going so far as to ignore its own group policy settings. With Windows 10 no longer updating, that war finally stops, and the community can now finally shift their attention away from wrestling with Microsoft and more towards actually making the OS better to use. This also means that you no longer are forced to update to some new major version of Windows 10 that tacks on more unwanted """features""" just so you can maintain compatibility with some of your desired programs.
The third advantage is more of a long-term thing, but if we can get some of those developers who, for example wrote KernelEx and the Unofficial Windows 98SE Service Pack, we could see Windows 10 getting much more stable over time. Now that the OS itself has stopped being a moving target, it can now be patched by the community. Though this may take a long time. Developers will have to become VERY familiar with Windows 10's systems in order to actually pull off these patches successfully.
Alright. So, what are the disadvantages? I think straight off the bat, the biggest one is probably going to be... Just how buggy the OS has already become, and debloating scripts, and even running enterprise versions of Windows 10 are not going to help this. You may have escaped update hell, but now you get to deal with the wasteland that Microsoft has left in its wake...
Okay, okay, it won't be THAT bad, but I can almost guarantee you, it won't be great, especially compared to Windows NT versions 8.1 and below and Debian Stable based Linux distros.
The second disadvantage is that Windows 10 has not only accumulated bugs over time, it's also accumulated incompatibilities with legacy software and hardware. PCGamingWiki has hundreds, maybe thousands of games, that need special installation instructions just to get them to run correctly on Windows 10. And for hardware, basically anything that is old enough is not going to have Windows 10 drivers. It was generally Windows XP or Windows 7 drivers at that time. And there's a VAST swath of hardware that has drivers for those OSes but not for 10. And THEN there's the fact that Windows 10, since around launch, magically stopped working even halfway decently when the install drive was a spinning HDD. And going even further, owing to the bloating up of Windows 10, your hardware may generally just be too damn old to run it in a passable state, even if the machine might run older Windows OSes and software just fine or even beautifully.
All in all... I'd say it's definitely something to consider. MX Linux or even older Windows OSes may still be the way to go depending on your use case, but regardless, Microsoft stopping updates for Windows 10 may ironically be the best thing that ever happened to the OS.
I don't think I really need to elaborate any more on why I despise Windows 11. It has all of Windows 10's problems and then some more of its own for good measure. But what if we had just Windows 10 and we removed one of the absolute worst """features""" about it, the forced updates... ? Is it worth at least a look? Or is this OS still a complete waste of time?
For this talk, let's assume we've already ran Windows 10 through a debloating program or script or whatever you decide to do that with. What are the advantages? What are the disadvantages? Well, for the advantages, by switching to 10, you gain full hardware and software support for just about everything, excluding some legacy software and games. (That is significant on its own, but more on that later.) Hardware support MAY start to dip once Microsoft updates end, but I'm guessing since everyone so vehemently hates Windows 11 now, software makers and hardware manufacturers are going to play it safe and continue to ship with Windows 10 compatibility for a long while yet.
The second advantage is pretty obvious as well. Windows updates, ever since the very release of Windows 10, have become an absolute thorn in everyone's side as Microsoft has warred for years to wrestle control of the OS more and more away from the user, even going so far as to ignore its own group policy settings. With Windows 10 no longer updating, that war finally stops, and the community can now finally shift their attention away from wrestling with Microsoft and more towards actually making the OS better to use. This also means that you no longer are forced to update to some new major version of Windows 10 that tacks on more unwanted """features""" just so you can maintain compatibility with some of your desired programs.
The third advantage is more of a long-term thing, but if we can get some of those developers who, for example wrote KernelEx and the Unofficial Windows 98SE Service Pack, we could see Windows 10 getting much more stable over time. Now that the OS itself has stopped being a moving target, it can now be patched by the community. Though this may take a long time. Developers will have to become VERY familiar with Windows 10's systems in order to actually pull off these patches successfully.
Alright. So, what are the disadvantages? I think straight off the bat, the biggest one is probably going to be... Just how buggy the OS has already become, and debloating scripts, and even running enterprise versions of Windows 10 are not going to help this. You may have escaped update hell, but now you get to deal with the wasteland that Microsoft has left in its wake...
Okay, okay, it won't be THAT bad, but I can almost guarantee you, it won't be great, especially compared to Windows NT versions 8.1 and below and Debian Stable based Linux distros.
The second disadvantage is that Windows 10 has not only accumulated bugs over time, it's also accumulated incompatibilities with legacy software and hardware. PCGamingWiki has hundreds, maybe thousands of games, that need special installation instructions just to get them to run correctly on Windows 10. And for hardware, basically anything that is old enough is not going to have Windows 10 drivers. It was generally Windows XP or Windows 7 drivers at that time. And there's a VAST swath of hardware that has drivers for those OSes but not for 10. And THEN there's the fact that Windows 10, since around launch, magically stopped working even halfway decently when the install drive was a spinning HDD. And going even further, owing to the bloating up of Windows 10, your hardware may generally just be too damn old to run it in a passable state, even if the machine might run older Windows OSes and software just fine or even beautifully.
All in all... I'd say it's definitely something to consider. MX Linux or even older Windows OSes may still be the way to go depending on your use case, but regardless, Microsoft stopping updates for Windows 10 may ironically be the best thing that ever happened to the OS.
