Site admins doing email validation tend to blacklist those sites for such reasons.
OTOH they’re great for bugmenot passwords for sites that like to send validation emails before you can log in to read otherwise free content.
Otherwise I’d never use them for anything persistent and of value to me.
[quote=“idleprocess, post:6, topic:223930”]Win10
pro does the ~27hr nagging to set up an account so I fully expect 11 pro to also demand one give MSFT remote root access.
[/quote] I’ve done many installs and reinstalls of Win10 pro and never had it in nag me to set up a Microsoft account.
Same with Win home.
I think sharklasers in particular belong to guerrillamail and I remember successfully reusing an inbox there using the ‘unscrambled’ address…
I just tested this with the Pro version of Win11, using the latest 23H2 v2 iso. When it asks if you want to set it up for personal use or work/school, select Work/School, then select “sign-in options” instead of entering your microsoft account, then “domain join instead”.
It will then proceed to the local account creation setup. You will not be forced to join a domain.
Im about to erase this virtual machine and test with the home version to see what it does.
The home version doesnt have this option and seems to force the use of a microsoft account.
When i used windows in the past, i never used the home version, always the Pro version without a license. If you want to use a local account, i would suggest using the pro version with or without a license.
Using windows without a license is fine, it just disables certain features like personalization. You wont be able to change you wallpaper or anything like that using the PC settings. If you are comfortable with the registry though, all those settings can still be changed in the registry. It also adds a watermark to the bottom right of screen reminding you that its unlicensed which personally never really bothered me.
I highly recommend using this software. It is essentially a GUI that brings all of Windows’ most annoying and invasive settings together into one place so you can easily shut them off.
Among other things, it makes it easy to disable Bing search results in the Start Menu. (a “feature” that is pure cancer imo)
I’d be a little leary of a company that claims to be a Microsoft partner (im unable to find O&O labs/software/group in Microsoft’s Partner list) on their homepage, especially since they are providing software that can be used to disable windows features that would cut into microsofts data collection.
Pretty sure it is legit, it’s been around and recommended by power users for a while. It certainly works, and it doesn’t require you to keep any services running, or have the software installed.
Their “partnership” with Microsoft is discussed here three years ago:
Interesting. I personally wouldnt use it, but i also dont use windows, so theres that. You (not specifically you) are free to install whatever you want on your computer.
Do you just avoid all freeware? Some of the best software I’ve used is freeware.
avoid freeware? no, i run linux. 90% of of what i run is free and open.
Open being the key word. With open source software, i can review the source and make sure the software isnt doing stuff i dont want it to do.
With closed source freeware, theres no way to verify what the software is doing. for all i know, the software could be stopping my data from being sent to microsoft, and instead sending it to their own servers. in which case, id rather my data be sent to microsoft.
I dont like companies gathering my data, but if they do, id rather limit the number of campanies that have it.
Microsoft has been giving away OS updates for free. Just from that alone we could reason that they are collecting and selling data at a prodigious rate.
I get why it is nice to be able to peek inside software and verify it does what it says and nothing more. I do not agree with the implication that Microsoft deserves more trust simply because it is a known evil. Shutup10 is not an unknown either, it’s been around for years and used by many (probably ocd and paranoid) people who would have noticed by now if anything were amiss with it.
I’m not trying to convince you–your preference is clearly open-source and that’s fine. It just bothers me that your comments might scare some people away from using Shutup10 when it is one of the best tools for limiting the data-collection and nagging of Microsoft.
This is one of the main reasons i stopped using windows and switched to linux. I dont want my data collected without my consent. The other reason is every time Windows installed updates, it removed software and drivers, i explicitly installed, without any reason. Mainly my nvidia GPU drivers being replaced with generic microsoft vga drivers. Updates shouldnt break my system and require me to re-install software i explicitly installed.
Microsoft is already collecting my data from other stuff ive used in the past (Windows and xbox). Might as well keep it all under one roof.
I never said not to use it. I said I’d be leary (suspicious) of it.
Let me spell it out for anyone that reads this. Don’t install random software from the internet just because some recommends it to you. Do your own research and make sure you understand what it’s doing and where its coming from. Then make your own decision about whether or not to install it.
Sorry. I work in IT. I do desktop support for a University and have to deal with people installing stuff that they shouldnt, causing issues that never should’ve been an issue to begin with. Just be care about what you download from the internet.
I just downloaded and ran O&O ShutUp10++.
The program looks powerful, and if you don’t know what you’re doing, it is possible to screw things up.
That said, it looks like a very useful program for experts.
Thanks for the recommendation!
EDIT:
By the way, O&O makes a defragging program called O&O Defrag.
It’s my defragger of choice, though it’s not freeware.
I really, really want to do this, but I love games and Linux is still worse in that area for compatibility. I could have a separate gaming-only Windows machine. A Linux machine could be used for all other daily computing. What has stopped me so far is the thought of my best PC hardware collecting dust on the Windows machine 80% of the time.
Still, Microsoft getting excited to add LLMs to Windows is pretty creepy to me.
I’m guessing the data all goes to the same markets regardless.
My education was focused on software development and I don’t make a habit of installing random programs either. I’m the kind of person who hunts through their active background processes to see if anything can be trimmed out.
I think word-of-mouth online can be valuable depending on the source. Like with anything, you should always verify for yourself as much as possible. In the case of O&O Software, I like the fact that they list a physical address which is visible on Google Maps, that they have a clear source of income, and that their software products have been reviewed on tech sites in the past. IRL, I know a bank network admin who uses Shutup10 and recommends it too.
The different settings are actually color-coded based on system impact. The green items are highly recommended to be disabled and will have no side affects. The yellow are recommended if you understand what they do and know what you want. Red items are not recommended but they are available just for the hardcore.
Personally, I disabled all of the green, and just one or two yellow. I believe Bing Search integration in the Start Menu was a yellow item.
Some items require the PC to restart in order to take effect. This tracks, since the same is true for some registry hacks.
Oh, I understand.
(I disabled all of the green items and some of the yellow.)
I consider myself an expert when it comes to Windows, though there are plenty of others that know Windows better than me. 
As an avid linux gamer, i can say gaming on linux has gotten much better/easier in the last 10 years. There have been a ton of improvements in just the last few years since valve released the steamdeck.
Just make sure you are using a distro that runs the latest kernel and latest mesa. Distros like debian/ubuntu arent the best because they run older kernels. Yes you can install a newer kernel, but id rather just run a distro on the bleeding edge. I personally run arch. Also, AMD gpus have a better chance of working than nvidia.
Check out protondb.com to see user submitted reports of game compatibility.
I used to check protondb before buying a game to make sure it would work on linux. A lot of times there were tweaks i would have to do to get games working. Its gotten to the point now though that I just buy games and they work without any tweaks.
Over the last couple years ive downloaded and played several AAA games on launch day without issue.
The biggest issue with gaming on linux is anti-cheat. EAC and Battleye pretty much work, but some of the other anti-cheats dont. I cant think of the name, but the anti-cheat used on valorant doesnt work. Same with pubg.
Edit:
You dont necessarily need to setup a separate computer for gaming. I dual booted my desktop for a few years for specific games that wouldnt run on linux. Eventually, those games either started working on linux, or i decided i didnt care enough to play them anymore and fully switch to linux.
I’ve been loosely monitoring it, I’ve heard about the positive momentum caused in part by the Steam Deck. I know it’s a lot better but I don’t know if I can let go of Windows for gaming just yet. Some of the best games seem to be made with small teams lately and I’d think they would have the most problems with Linux compatibility. Seems like some devs just say “good luck” to linux users sometimes. Idk, I might experiment with Linux gaming this year though, not like it’d cost me anything but time.
I’ve dabbled with dual-boot systems but I don’t love the experience of dual-booting. Seems like a cleaner solution to just have two systems. Unless you encrypt everything, wouldn’t having Windows be a potential privacy concern for the Linux partition?
Bad news about the GPU compatibility. I got a NVIDIA RTX 4080 Super recently. It was similar in price to the 7900xtx but has lower power consumption overall and better performance in some games I play. Also, seems like AMD has more annoying driver bugs from what I’ve seen, at least with Windows.
Sorry for the wall of text. Ill stop after this. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.
Thats the great thing about Proton. Its a compatibility layer, built on WINE. It translates Windows system calls to Linux system calls. The games themselves dont need to support linux because Proton will do the translation for a Windows game to run on linux. Of course games will run better if they have a native linux version, but most games running in proton have near native performance. In some cases games run better in proton than they do on windows.
I do encrypt everything so it wasnt really a concern for me. On top of that, Windows cant read/write to most linux filesystems without additional software so thats another layer of obfuscation.
About the GPU, Nvidia gpus work, theyre just more likely to cause issues due to nvidias unwillingness to open source their drivers. I havent used a nvidia gpu on linux in several years , so this may not be true anymore. Nvidia seems to have gotten better about linux support in the last few years.
AMD drivers, at least on the linux side of things, are open source and maintained by the community + AMD. In fact, i dont even have amd specific drivers on my computer, i just use mesa which is the open source graphics driver for linux.
As an example, when i originally switched to linux I had a Nvidia GTX980. Some games just refused to work. I always thought it was a linux thing. When i finally built a new computer in 2021, I went with a RX 6900XT, and all those games that refused to work, magically started working.
A couple years ago, a friend of mine built a new computer and i helped him install linux. There were a few growing pains since he was new to desktop linux (he had been running linux on servers for a couple years). Once he got his system configured, its been solid ever since, and after a year or so he even told me “I hate to say this, but it just works. I didnt think it would be this smooth and i figured i wouldve switched back to windows by now”.
Like you said, you have nothing to lose but time, and if you have the time, i would definitely suggest you try it out. You might be surprised.