Windows 10 finally rendered my laptop unusable, except maybe as a doorstop.
Just switching from Windows 7 to 10 was a big mistake. At the time, Microsoft kept pushing me to switch to Win10 (“All your Hardware and Software is compatible! Go on, do it while it’s free!”) to the point where I basically did it just to stop the incessant messages.
As it turned out after the fact, not all my hardware and software was compatible. The touch pad stopped working, but that was a minor thing because I don’t use it much. And a new driver did come along after a while, and it started working again. The big thing was the DVD drive, which disappeared from the device list and never came back; it’s an older unit and it turned out that Sony has no intention of ever releasing a Win10 driver for it, so that’s that.
On the software front, my video editing software doesn’t run any more; neither does PaintShop Pro. I fiddled with compatibility settings, did a little googling for solutions, but nothing worked. I ended up downloading Paint.net for image editing, so at least I can do my picture work, but video editing is a lost cause.
Compatible? Really, Microsoft?
The latest (“Creators”) update was the last straw. The machine just couldn’t cope with it any more. Chrome has stopped working; it fires up and opens tabs but after a few seconds it freezes and stops responding to clicks. Reinstalling makes no difference.
Now the machine won’t shut down or restart cleanly – it sits at the spinner and eventually the only thing to do is hold the power button until it switches off. I hate to think what that does to the file system. I left it overnight one time, to see if it ever finished, but it was still sitting at the “Shutting Down” spinner eight hours later.
The thing is, the machine is my workhorse. It’s what I use for most of my writing and all of my editing, because it’s where I have Word installed. I need Chrome because I use Google Drive to back up my files and share work with my editor. Without Chrome, I can’t do much. And since the machine is now so compromised, I can’t trust it not to corrupt my Word documents – so I haven’t done any writing work since the “update”.
In the end I decided I had no other option but to buy a new machine and retire the old one. It took a while to install all the software I use on a regular basis, and several hours to move all my documents and stuff from the old machine, but it’s all done now.
But here’s the point: I wouldn’t have had to spend all the time and money if it hadn’t been for Windows 10, and Microsoft’s “alternative facts” about compatibility.
So, Microsoft, I’m out of pocket and it’s all because of you. Thanks for that. Where do I send the bill?
Pete Ford 