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That groan you hear is users’ reaction to Recall going back into Windows
(arstechnica.com)
Even if Copilot was suspended, the idea was put into the heads of managers and executives. My work laptop current has three applications constantly locking files as they track everything I do and every file that gets touched and upload it all to the servers. Git now takes a ridiculous amount of time to check in and push files since it creates tons of small changes to the cached files that a the tracking applications block further changes or uploads until they can record the information. It takes about 30 seconds to a minute to check in a single small file. Something that used to take a second or two at most. Worst part is if I'm in a WebEx meeting, the fighting over caches in it and git and any other processes,often causes deadlocks that crash the machine. I'm constantly apologizing for being late for meetings because the laptop crashed and had to reboot. It's gotten to the point that they finally gave me a much faster laptop rather than just excluding cache and git folders and such from the tracking because the people who want literally everything tracked don't know what cache or git is, much less how much useless data they're gathering or how the AI that analyzes it all is going yo get distracted by the garbage and not find any useful data anyway. Microsoft needs to get in the game to push the others back out.
No bro! I promise bro! It's just because Michaelsoft isnt tracking and indexing that info. I promise this next micromanaging software won't be as bad! The next one will be as good as teams bro! I promise!
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Is this legal in EU? I mean not the tool itself but just enabling it by default.
GDPR regulation mandates that there is at least informed consent. So MS has to ask users if they want all their data to be uploaded. This includes of course a disable option. But knowing big tech companies, they'll find a way to make users press that Okay button.
From the comments it seems like you have to opt in to the screenshots. But I'm sure they do it at the bottom of a three thousand page EULA or something so most users will wind up opting in by default
Probably in the same dark pattern bullshit they do to get you to turn the rest of their crap on.
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I literally only use Windows for video games these days and Steam OS is looking better and better for that.
I installed Bazzite on my ROG Ally to get rid of Windows. I have a gaming laptop with Windows installed for 3 games that aren't compatible with Linux and that's all it's used for.
I use Debian for video games. Haven't had a problem yet.
Doing the same on Ubuntu myself after trying Bazzite for a couple weeks. Bazzite kept messing up SSSD and would prevent me from authenticating with my home domain.
Will definitely try SteamOS once it is fully released.
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SteamOS will not be your best option for desktop. Stop waiting for it. It's made for the Deck and console like experiences, not desktop. It's immutable too, which is great for a console experience, but probably not ideal for a desktop user.
Just go download Linux now. There's nothing special in SteamOS that you need. I use Garuda, which is Arch based (which SteamOS is also, if that matters), and has a version specifically designed for gaming. It comes with most of what you could need set up, and a tool to quickly install any packages you may want for additional things like controllers or whatever.
It's immutable too, which is great for a console experience, but probably not ideal for a desktop user.
I've been enjoying Fedora Atomic, personally.
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Look into bazzite. LTT and Game Foundry have made videos about it too, and they were pleasantly surprised
Pretty much any Linux distro will work for gaming. Some just do more work for you at the beginning. Linux mint, Pop OS, Endeavor, manjaro, etc, you can game on basically any of them. After familiarizing myself I eventually swapped to Arch, but if any of the other distros I mentioned work, and you feel satisfied with it, then stick with it. Its about finding a distro you enjoy and can work around despite it's flaws.
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Disable Recall with these instructions:
https://oracle-base.com/blog/2024/11/10/windows-recall-how-to-disable-spy-mode/
Just stop using Windows and you will not have to deal with it, for now.
Fuuucking hell. I have to keep a laptop on win for work purposes and i just finished decrapifying 11 last night
Microsoft has shown over the years they will undo your preferences if they aren't what they prefer. They are the worst
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I just want to tip my fellow colleagues that need to use windows for their job (and also maybe have invested thousands in pc games).
This is my favorite tool for debloating and uncrappifying and more. If you have others please reply with yours. 😊
Or install an OS without most of the crap? https://massgrave.dev/windows_ltsc_links
I use linux so idk how that is but I heard is lightweight in bs
Hey, thanks for the laptop IT guy! Yeah everyone around the office has been very welcoming, I’m happy to be here. I’m pretty handy with computers so hopefully I won’t be bothering you too much haha…. Yeah anyway, I know you just imaged this laptop, but the thing is, I really don’t like all the fluff in the Windows updates, can I instead provide my own Windows image? It’s straight from Microsoft but you get it through a site called MASS GRAVE. And then you can apply the group policies and enable the drive mapping scripts and reinstall the secure company network client infrastructure —
I think when most people mean work they mean corporate where you have zero control. I’m just happy they let me use PowerTools. At home, manually amputating pieces of Windows has been a bit fiddly but no less fiddly than what people think configuring is still like.
It’s annoying, but for most people, even among the technically inclined, it’s fine. For now. I’m more likely to pivot to Linux than to OSX eventually.
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For the memory of a lifetime. Recall, Recall, Recall.
this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2025
523 points (98.2% liked)
Privacy
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