Quasi-OT: How to double your CPU power. for free

They are not looking. I can *assure* you that this problem is present.

When you don't believe it, just install a Windows 7 system from DVD and try to run Windows Update on it! Report us how long it takes.

In my experience, takes about 5 hours. And that is what many others write as well.

Some people whinge about their problems, others search for solutions...

Hey, tell me that's not fair...

Scolding aside, I've been having a similar problem with WU. The overall problem was my mistake, stuffing Win7 on a mere 30GB partition. Well, between updates, drivers, extraneous features I'm never going to use, and winSxS assemblies, Windows is choking itself (with under a gig to spare, depending on when you ask). The single most volatile file seems to be DataStore.edb, regularly pegging a gig.

There are several procedures to treat these problems, and many people have had them. Easy to find and try.

Cheers,

Tim

--
Seven Transistor Labs, LLC 
Electrical Engineering Consultation and Contract Design 
Website: http://seventransistorlabs.com 


 wrote in message  
news:8933df4a-e59e-45c7-98c5-c345b4508538@googlegroups.com... 
> Windows was using 50% of my Win7 CPU, idling, plus 1G of RAM.  So I ran 
> services.msc, and stopped Windows Update.  Shazaam. 
> 
> I really need to switch to Linux. 
> 
> Cheers, 
> James Arthur

Nope, it's a known Windows Update bug, 'fixed' by gigabytes of further updates.

That's the June 2016 fix. There are patches to that fix, starting in July.

But I have updates disabled--I don't feel like giving the people who wrote that sort of software open access to my computer, for them to download onto it at their pleasure.

I credit Microsoft for ruining the world. Seriously. They've taught a generation of programmers that bugs, discipline, and reliability don't matter. And they've taught an entire world to accept that.

Cheers, James Arthur

I'm down to 1% CPU idling now, and I got that gigabyte of RAM back. It's awfully nice of Bill Gates to lend me their system (while they're not busy using it).

12GB? Firefox sure is a pig! Bloatware, bloatware everywhere, nor any drop to drink.

Cheers, James Arthur

Thanks for the pointers. I was all set to switch to Linux circa '97, IIRC, but I had some critical Windows programs I used and needed, that Linux wouldn't run. Wine was in early stages.

I don't upgrade often--my preferred machine is a (laughable) 2.5GHz Celeron from 2002, running XP. But it has been a faithful & trusted tool all these years. Once I get a computer loaded and doing what I need, I'm loathe to change it--I use these things for work, not amusement.

But the old machine has developed a weird habit of hiccuping 'on' for a second or two when it's supposed to be off, a habit that survives a change of motherboards and power supply! So I'm using a dual-core Win7 machine for the moment, irritated that monkeysoft has moved and monkeyed with everything. Grrrr.

Yes, the Linux tips are much-appreciated. It's hard to dive into that open-source info maelstrom when overloaded, just trying to get some work done, and not trying to build an IT temple.

Cheers, James Arthur

I had mine set to 'check for updates, but ask me before downloading or installing.'

The last actual 'update' was a year ago, and the log says it 'failed.' Most impressive. Which, IIRC, is when I told it to stop that.

I've switched settings to 'never update, and never check.' We'll see if that helps. Until then, I'm just manually deleting the Windows Update process every time I boot.

WinXP did the same thing for me a coupla years or so ago, bogging down, & begging for updates. I ultimately had to cave and let it download a gigabyte of fixes or two, & then it was happy. Microsoft finally fixed the problem...MS' discontinuing XP 'support' solved the problem.

Cheers, James Arthur

I'm careful not to send MS money. I get used machines & use non-MS applications, generally.

I've been annoyed with MS since they FUD'd OS2 to death. Or maybe before. Then they 'upgraded' Word, morphing the .doc format to evade copycats, but rendering years of my work done with an earlier version of Word unreadable & inaccessible (until Open Office came along).

When people won't let me read my own work, made with a program I paid them serious money for, that's annoying.

Cheers, James Arthur

Understood. I dropped the last vestiges of Windows off my work machines because Microsoft's new EULA conflicts with many of my consulting contracts and even court protective orders for my expert witness cases--MS has explicitly said that they're allowed to upload anything on my computer, so that using Windows doesn't qualify as a high level of care for confidential info.

The Eastern District of Texas has the most ferocious protective orders I've ever seen--for source code, there can be no more than three copies, on coloured paper, kept locked in a steel cabinet, on pain of jail or large fines. No soft copies at all.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

--
Dr Philip C D Hobbs 
Principal Consultant 
ElectroOptical Innovations LLC 
Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics 

160 North State Road #203 
Briarcliff Manor NY 10510 

hobbs at electrooptical dot net 
http://electrooptical.net

Gates actually turned bugs into a profit center. Windows' entire early business model was to ship buggy software that you had to buy an 'upgrade' to fix, then ship upgrades with new bugs.

If you turned off the update spigot, WinXP eventually behaved similarly.

Cheers, James Arthur

Windows is certainly OK for some things (and better than Linux for a few things). But it does not usually come "all set up" - when you buy a new PC with Windows "pre-installed" it can take /hours/ before it has actually set itself up from its "recovery partition". Then you spend another few hours deleting the crapware that comes with the machine... Installing Windows from a DVD is far quicker than using a "pre-installed" system.

(Maybe Dell really installs Windows if you pay them enough - it's been a while since I have had a Dell machine with Windows.)

And while you usually have to pay for Windows whether you want it or not, so that it is "cheap" in that you have bought it already, the same does not apply to Word and friends. You have to pay for these if you want them.

Some of the more helpful PC builders do install stuff for you if it is purchased at the same time as the hardware.

Set it running and walk away to do something else.

Not always - sometimes there are deals where Office 20nn are included in the price. I bought my ASUS T100 to get such a deal. It turned out that the machine was really rather good and a keeper but at the time all I wanted was a sacrificial laptop for Win8.x and Office 2013.

--
Regards, 
Martin Brown

I already trouble-shot, researched, solved the problem, and posted the solution where it might possibly benefit others. YMMV.

Cheers, James Arthur

I've had a suspicion that the new Microsoft EULA policies might end up having just that effect. Yours is the first public statement I've seen, that this is actually occurring - thanks for confirming that I'm not entirely crazy (on this one point at least).

I wonder how long it will be before corporate land-sharks start writing an explicit prohibition against using Microsoft Windows (by name) for any work done under certain contracts?

Of course, Chromebooks and similar "applications as Web services" architectures would probably also be barred from use.

It is not really suitable when it counts. A few weeks ago I attended a meeting and someone wanted to use his laptop running Windows 10 to show a presentation he had prepared using powerpoint. Unfortunately the laptop decided that it was more important to work on updating the system than to show the user desktop. We watched a circle with spinning dots for well over 15 minutes while he held his lecture without visual support.

I would call this "not ready for prime time". The next lecturer had Debian Linux on his laptop and fared much better.

I'm not sure windows has ever been ready for general use. I'm just grateful there are now good alternatives. My days of running unstable bug ridden OSes are mostly over.

NT

Yes indeed. They usually charge for the service (but in a business setting, it is usually worth paying for).

That works for many of them, as long as you are happy to wait. That can be fine at home, but perhaps less fine in a small business.

And I have seen some that need hand-holding along the way. Half an hour installing itself, then the computer wants your name. Another half hour, then it stops to ask for your time-zone. And so on.

"Included in the price" means "you pay for it, whether you want it or not", even if you pay slightly less for it than you might otherwise have done. MS Office does not come free, no matter how you look at it.

Be fair MickeySoft didn't FUD OS2 to death. IBM shot themselves in both feet with both barrels, reloaded and then did it again. Insisting that OS/2 must work on legacy 286 boxes and conflating OS/2 and IBM PS/2 MCA lockin hardware united all the other rival PC makers and EISA was born.

Early Win3 was so flaky IBM should still have been able make OS/2 fly if their sales force had not been protecting S-3X mini market share.

M$ Word is the creation of the devil - no doubt about that. But even so it can be made to do useful stuff - although I will admit that I have to get my wife to fix things for me in mangled format Word documents.

My favourite bug is with Word drag and drop images in corporate environments where the document has lived through several versions of Word. It is not uncommon to find hundreds of MB of orphanned metadata from ancient images tagging along for the ride. Some places now print them to PDF to strip out the junk before archiving (and ensure readability). My pet hate with Word is WYSINQWYG depending on the printer used.

Excel by comparison is very useful and capable if a little slow on large datasets. PowerPoint is OK but a bit quirky at times. And Access is a fairly capable database if a bit inaccessible

They do distribute a free reader and an addin load/save for legacy programs. It isn't their fault if you don't RTFM.

--
Regards, 
Martin Brown

It may be different in each region, but here there is no charge to pre-install Windows and all kinds of "trial mode" applications, it is often more expensive to go through the ordeal of getting the system without Windows and then trying to get a deduction from the price.

Lots of Linux users simply get the system with Windows then format it.

Heck, at work where we use Windows we even get the boxes with Windows pre-installed then immediately boot them from the network to overwrite that install with our own (that does not include the crapware) without ever booting the Dell-provided image. And I think lots of medium- and large size businesses do that.