Solved Is it OK to use the Release Preview Channel on your only device?


quack101

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Since it's a very stable Insider channel it should be fine, but I would still like to ask.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11 Home 21H2
    Computer type
    Laptop
    Manufacturer/Model
    ASUS VivoBook 15, model K513E
    CPU
    Intel Core i5 11th Generation (1135G7) at 2.4GHz
    Motherboard
    Unknown
    Memory
    16GB DDR4
    Graphics Card(s)
    Intel Iris Xe (intergrated), NVIDIA GeForce MX350 (dedicated, 2GB VRAM)
    Sound Card
    Unknown
    Monitor(s) Displays
    1080p ASUS OLED display, 15.6 inches, pixel shift enabled via MyASUS app
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1080
    Hard Drives
    512GB NVMe SSD (encrypted with TPM 2.0)
    PSU
    Unknown
    Case
    Laptop body - aluminium + plastic
    Cooling
    Unknown
    Keyboard
    Non-backlit, with numpad
    Mouse
    Microsoft Wireless Mobile Mouse 1000, built-in trackpad
    Internet Speed
    (From speedtest.net, recommended server, WiFi 6) 383.36 Mbps download, 35.80 Mbps upload
    Browser
    Microsoft Edge (Chromium)
    Antivirus
    Windows Security/Defender
    Other Info
    Win11 compatible, although update not yet offered through Windows Update (Win11 install assistant was used).
Been using the beta release (now same as RP as of today) as my daily for a month, yeah it's stable
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11 Pro Beta, 11 Dev, W11 Canary
    Computer type
    Laptop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Alienware M15 Ryzen Edition R6
    CPU
    AMD Ryzen™ 9 5900HX
    Memory
    32GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 3070 8GB GDDR6
    Hard Drives
    1 x Samsung 980 Pro 1TB
    1 x Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1TB
Pretty much yes but bear in mind you have to send optional data as well to MS if on an Insider version. Only you can decide if this is an issue to you personally.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 10 Pro + others in VHDs
    Computer type
    Laptop
    Manufacturer/Model
    ASUS Vivobook 14
    CPU
    I7
    Motherboard
    Yep, Laptop has one.
    Memory
    16 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    Integrated Intel Iris XE
    Sound Card
    Realtek built in
    Monitor(s) Displays
    N/A
    Screen Resolution
    1920x1080
    Hard Drives
    1 TB Optane NVME SSD, 1 TB NVME SSD
    PSU
    Yep, got one
    Case
    Yep, got one
    Cooling
    Stella Artois
    Keyboard
    Built in
    Mouse
    Bluetooth , wired
    Internet Speed
    72 Mb/s :-(
    Browser
    Edge mostly
    Antivirus
    Defender
    Other Info
    TPM 2.0
Pretty much yes but bear in mind you have to send optional data as well to MS if on an Insider version. Only you can decide if this is an issue to you personally.
@cereberus If I'm honest given the amount of data collecting other companies do (e.g Google) I really don't care anymore if MS does so. So I will probably switch.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11 Home 21H2
    Computer type
    Laptop
    Manufacturer/Model
    ASUS VivoBook 15, model K513E
    CPU
    Intel Core i5 11th Generation (1135G7) at 2.4GHz
    Motherboard
    Unknown
    Memory
    16GB DDR4
    Graphics Card(s)
    Intel Iris Xe (intergrated), NVIDIA GeForce MX350 (dedicated, 2GB VRAM)
    Sound Card
    Unknown
    Monitor(s) Displays
    1080p ASUS OLED display, 15.6 inches, pixel shift enabled via MyASUS app
    Screen Resolution
    1920 x 1080
    Hard Drives
    512GB NVMe SSD (encrypted with TPM 2.0)
    PSU
    Unknown
    Case
    Laptop body - aluminium + plastic
    Cooling
    Unknown
    Keyboard
    Non-backlit, with numpad
    Mouse
    Microsoft Wireless Mobile Mouse 1000, built-in trackpad
    Internet Speed
    (From speedtest.net, recommended server, WiFi 6) 383.36 Mbps download, 35.80 Mbps upload
    Browser
    Microsoft Edge (Chromium)
    Antivirus
    Windows Security/Defender
    Other Info
    Win11 compatible, although update not yet offered through Windows Update (Win11 install assistant was used).
When I joined the Insider Preview [when it was called Technical Preview] some time ago [about 2014] everything in print at that time warned not to use the test version on the only computer or a production computer due to instability, incompatible software or devices, etc. It was plain to the average user there would be changes and probably failures, some catastrophic.
 

My Computers

System One System Two

  • OS
    Win11 Pro RTM
    Computer type
    Laptop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Vostro 3400
    CPU
    Intel Core i5 11th Gen. 2.40GHz
    Memory
    12GB
    Hard Drives
    256GB SSD NVMe
  • Operating System
    Windows 11 Pro RTM x64
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Dell Vostro 5890
    CPU
    Intel Core i5 10th Gen. 2.90GHz
    Memory
    16GB
    Graphics card(s)
    Onboard, no VGA, using a DisplayPort-to-VGA adapter
    Monitor(s) Displays
    24" Dell
    Hard Drives
    512GB SSD NVMe, 2TB WDC HDD
    Browser
    Firefox, Edge
    Antivirus
    Windows Defender/Microsoft Security
When I joined the Insider Preview [when it was called Technical Preview] some time ago [about 2014] everything in print at that time warned not to use the test version on the only computer or a production computer due to instability, incompatible software or devices, etc. It was plain to the average user there would be changes and probably failures, some catastrophic.
Certainly 100% true back in the day, but MS changed the policy and made new builds more frequent, and generally reliabilty was much improved.

This was reflected a few Dev builds ago when MS gave a whole load of feature updates in one build and a few problems arose all in one go.

People forget that in early days there was not an RP Ring (now Channel).

The RP Channel is of limited use, as it only contains updates intended to be added to RTM via cumulative updates a few weeks later anyway.

As we get close to RTM, RP is quite stable but maybe slightly unpolished but very unlikely to have major issues.

Of course, one should should understand the risks and make an image backup first
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 10 Pro + others in VHDs
    Computer type
    Laptop
    Manufacturer/Model
    ASUS Vivobook 14
    CPU
    I7
    Motherboard
    Yep, Laptop has one.
    Memory
    16 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    Integrated Intel Iris XE
    Sound Card
    Realtek built in
    Monitor(s) Displays
    N/A
    Screen Resolution
    1920x1080
    Hard Drives
    1 TB Optane NVME SSD, 1 TB NVME SSD
    PSU
    Yep, got one
    Case
    Yep, got one
    Cooling
    Stella Artois
    Keyboard
    Built in
    Mouse
    Bluetooth , wired
    Internet Speed
    72 Mb/s :-(
    Browser
    Edge mostly
    Antivirus
    Defender
    Other Info
    TPM 2.0
Whatever data Ms have collected - at least from me - hasn't resulted in my getting any spam from Ms or other annoying stuff whatsoever -- If you join the Windows insider you might get an email once in a while when a new build appears or some podcast advertising new windows features but that's minimal compared with the amount of junk you get whenever you buy anything on the Net.

There's often so much paranoia with this stuff -- I'll bet some people get really bored if they hear even 3 people using mobile phones on public transport -- just imagine monitoring the Pb (Petabytes) of data to access just a small amount of data being generated on the internet daily -- unless you become a "Person of Interest" there's 100% no reason to worry over this stuff.

Cheers
jimbo
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows XP,7,10,11 Linux Arch Linux
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    CPU
    2 X Intel i7
Yes, it is absolutely safe. The preview builds are in fact supported by Microsoft, and recommended not just for home, but also for commercial deployment, meaning they must be really close to the retail builds.

On the other hand, I would not recommend the other "flavors" aka the beta or dev builds. The beta ones used to be reliable, but recently they merged it with the dev build timeline (to allow a "time window" to switch between them as you can only upgrade and not downgrade) and this essentially resulted beta ring users getting dev ring builds, wrecking havoc in terms of stability.

This trick should not threaten the preview builds, hence why I can recommend that, but not the other two on your only machine. However, in a virtual machine all of them should be great to try.
 

My Computers

System One System Two

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