Technology Ramblings

MS released Windows 10 Build 10532 to Fast Ring folks this week and I applied to two desktops, a laptop and a tablet. In all cases the update downloaded and installed okay with only 1 issue and that was with one of my desktops.   In this case I don't blame MS - but rather AMD and their support for older Radeon video cards.   One of my machines has a Radeon 4850 video card.   AMD had decided not to support anything earlier than Radeon 6000 series on Windows 10.   So starting with Build 10525 - AMD has provided an updated video driver which does not install properly and therefore leaves my video resolution settings at either 1024 x 768 or 1280 x 1024 - neither of which is close to the 1920 x 1080 that I normally have been running. I had been running an older Windows 8 version of Catalyst for the 4850 which was working fine and providing proper resolution - but AMD made it almost impossible to go backwards.  I did decide to order a new Radeon R7 card - but AMD and NVidia in my opi

Back on August 12 - MS released Windows 10 Mobile build 10512 to Fast Ring folks..   I installed it on a Nokia 735 over build 10166. First off a comment on the build number.   For many years you used to be able to determine the overall age of Windows NT based OS by the build number.   MS had a great video called a day in the life of Windows - when it showed how the build was assembled and tested every day... But now that seems to have changed.  A little over a month ago MS released Windows 10 Mobile build 10166 - and now all of a sudden here is 10512.  So that means that MS was performing some 10 builds per day and while that is certainly possible utilizing modern development techniques - there is probably some other driver now... So let's cover the basics.   First 10512 showed up on Windows Update with no problem and also installed error free.  Versus previous builds it did retain start screen settings, etc., so you didn't end up with a swiss cheese effect and have

So today by surprise - MS released a new Windows 10 build to Fast Ring folks - 10525... The question to me is why ?   In it's 3 weeks since official release MS has provided 3 cumulative updates to repair bugs.  And then today we get a whole new build.  Obviously the old rules about a build a day have been broken because this build number is in theory 285 builds newer than 10240 which was released back in July.   Or let's say at least the build count rule is broken... So what has changed ?   And why did MS feel it necessary to release an entire new build ?   I installed on my Dell Venue 8 Pro tablet to start.... First - a quick note on the install process.  10525 did show up fine in Windows Update and downloaded and installed with no issues over 10240.   What did seem odd was yet another cumulative update that seemed to be included in the download.  I didn't write down the KB number and this build actually clears out update history.  It actually followed the 10525

So I've been running build 10240 - or effectively RTM code since July 16.   In that time there have been three "cumulative" updates released to address a number of bugs. But in reality - a lot of things in Windows 10 don't work as well as they do in Windows 8.1.  And many of the items I complained about initially in 10240 have still not been corrected. The biggest for me is location.   On all 5 of my PCs and 1 phone I have running Windows 10 none of them accurately reflect location.  It is often miles off which is inexcusable since the same app on Windows 8.1 works perfectly. Even though MS updated the Maps app today - it still doesn't work.   The community is flooded with complaints regarding this..   But this also effects Weather and other location aware apps. Next is other simple things that should be working correctly in a working release.  The Bing picture of the day background does not update consistently. On some devices it does on others it doesn'

In the last year or so of Steve Balmer's reign at Microsoft - the direction of the company was a "Device and Services" company and the introduction of the Surface tablet and the acquisition of Nokia's devices business were reflective of that strategy.   But Surface lost money for the first 2 years and it wasn't until Surface 3 Pro that it began to gain traction.  The Nokia acquisition has been a nightmare with MS recently having to take a $8.6B write down - actually more than they paid for Nokia and jettison some 8,000 employees and re-position their mobile strategy. Shortly after the Nokia purchase Steve Ballmer announced his transition out of MS and the role of CEO would transition to Satya Nadella.    In Satya's term to date some 26,000 employees have been let go from MS and while it still has several billion dollar franchises - some of them - Windows included have been on a reduced trajectory and in fact have been shrinking. Satya realigned MS to a

On July 29th - Windows 10 officially released.  I've been a part of the Fast Ring Insiders since the beginning of the program back last October and have been documenting my experience with Desktops, Laptops, AIOs, Tablets and Phones across the various builds that have been released. It appears as though build 10240 is the official release build as none of my machines upgraded to a new build this week.   The good news is that MS has released an ISO of the build along with a tool to help upgrade existing machines. Throughout that time I've been pretty critical of MS with their approach to Windows 10 and the associated native apps that provide a portion of the overall experience and while the last rounds of builds starting with 10160 showed some promise - even 10240 - the "RTM" build still had issues... When I look at Windows 10 - here is what I see.... A good core that is efficient and fast.   Good overall driver support that covers a large spectrum of devices.