Your advice to seniors... stay with Windows 10 or try Windows 11

Hi,
I'm 71 years old and roll back to Dos 6.22 and Windows 3.1 and earlier the good old Speccy ZX; I have all versions of WIndows from Windows 95 through to Windows 10 and WIndows 11 Pro on my current computer.
I have installed all types of Windows on unsupported hardware, fresh installs from scratch, updates; the lot even back to the "pioneering" days when you had to write a bit of code to get anything started and no I'm not a techie at all, worked in the transport industry.
The computer I use now is the first relatively good spec one I have had and inherently supports Windows 11 which is a bit sad as no real tweaking to do !

Paul.

Device name DESKTOP-1ULGF16
Processor 11th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-1165G7 @ 2.80GHz 2.80 GHz
Installed RAM 8.00 GB (7.64 GB usable)
Device ID 0A7A2DB8-DF9E-4A47-A4CB-72E8D7CB3618
Product ID 00331-10000-00001-AA421
System type 64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
Pen and touch No pen or touch input is available for this display

Edition Windows 11 Pro
Version 21H2
Installed on ‎09/‎02/‎2022
OS build 22000.556
Experience Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.22000.556.0

cereberus said:

One problem with us oldies we cannot talk Emojish.

Click to expand...

I am seriously interested in an app (or easy method using a commonly available graphic app) to turn a nice headshot of mine into an emoji/gif

I am immune to the punishment at this point, so am staying with W11 against my better judgement.

Well, I suppose I am as ready as I ever will be for upgrade. I have just upgraded to latest MB (gigabyte) and latest CPU from AMD. Apparently my request for similar from Intel was met with hails of derisive laughter in the shop. MB and Intel £1200+ - MB and AMD £700. Needless to say Intel went back on the shelf. Also got a new monitor 27 inch 4K Samsung 144 mhz. It actually has less facilities than my other one but the image is exceptionally clear. Then had software problems with win 10. Desktop icons lost all links to their destination, even local onboard links. Spent hours trying to find out what was wrong, or as I originally typed 'wong'. By accident I found that the pc was not accepting anything from Steam. So I deleted everything I could find on board from steam and reinstalled it into a new specific folder steam/steamlibrary/games/ and reinstalled darkstar one which had totaly refused to work. Perfect, then ont the other big ones Fallout 4, black mesa and Age of Empire 2013 and then Banished. All went in, slowly, but went in and working. Then I put the rest of my steam library in today, and all seems solid, again.

If win 10 does not like my new setup, it'll have to go. But so far no word from MS ref 11.

elbmek said:

Well, I suppose I am as ready as I ever will be for upgrade. I have just upgraded to latest MB (gigabyte) and latest CPU from AMD. Apparently my request for similar from Intel was met with hails of derisive laughter in the shop. MB and Intel £1200+ - MB and AMD £700. Needless to say Intel went back on the shelf.

Click to expand...

(snip)

Just out of curiosity, what were you offered, AMD and Intel?

I checked Newegg.com. An AMD Ryzen 7 5800X is $350US, and a plausible X570 motherboard can be had for $126.

Intel I7-12700k, $400. Z690 DDR4 motherboard, $180. That's a significant price difference, but nothing like £700/1200.

I suppose that if you requested DDR5 RAM, that would have made the difference. The price and availability of that is improving compared to a few months ago, but it's still very expensive.

This is not Intel advocacy. My primary system at the moment is Intel, but I'd been with AMD for a couple of years. I'm pretty much brand agnostic.

Didn't mention memory. Prices elsewhere do not reflect on each other. EG: fuel: In Kenya 89p a litre. In UK £1.50+. Same fuel, same world market, same source. Same with computer parts. Prices are reflected by demand and region. Chips etc in USA will be a lot less expensive than UK because us Brits are apathetic in many ways. Nobody says anything so the suppliers charge what they like. Someone reported a fire on the top floor of a chip manufacturer in Japan and prices soared to take advantage. There is no shortage, but prices remain high until people STOP buying. They will soon fall.

elbmek said:

Didn't mention memory. Prices elsewhere do not reflect on each other. EG: fuel: In Kenya 89p a litre. In UK £1.50+. Same fuel, same world market, same source. Same with computer parts. Prices are reflected by demand and region. Chips etc in USA will be a lot less expensive than UK because us Brits are apathetic in many ways. Nobody says anything so the suppliers charge what they like. Someone reported a fire on the top floor of a chip manufacturer in Japan and prices soared to take advantage. There is no shortage, but prices remain high until people STOP buying. They will soon fall.

Click to expand...

Re fuel - the reason UK prices are so high is due to the money grabbing government(s) ripping us Brits with high taxation! It is not a reflection of supply and demand.

elbmek said:

Didn't mention memory. Prices elsewhere do not reflect on each other. EG: fuel: In Kenya 89p a litre. In UK £1.50+. Same fuel, same world market, same source. Same with computer parts. Prices are reflected by demand and region. Chips etc in USA will be a lot less expensive than UK because us Brits are apathetic in many ways. Nobody says anything so the suppliers charge what they like. Someone reported a fire on the top floor of a chip manufacturer in Japan and prices soared to take advantage. There is no shortage, but prices remain high until people STOP buying. They will soon fall.

Click to expand...

I know that PC components are expensive in the UK, compared to the US. I expect a US price in dollars to appear as the roughly same number of UK pounds, exclusive of VAT.

I hadn't checked UK sources. The Ryzen 7 5800X is about £300 at Amazon UK, with a decent X570 motherboard at £130. £430 for the pair.

An I7-12700K is £360. Z690 DDR4 motherboard, maybe £200. (A B660 board could be rather less.) £560.

That's a 30% premium for Intel, not the 70% the shop gave you.

I wonder what was up with the shop? It's as if they didn't want to sell you an Intel based system.

cereberus said:

Re fuel - the reason UK prices are so high is due to the money grabbing government(s) ripping us Brits with high taxation! It is not a reflection of supply and demand.

Click to expand...

I don't know how much of its oil the UK gets for its North Sea resources, but, according to Wikipedia, that didn't become much of a thing until at least the mid sixties. I think that the UK taxed oil imports heavily before that. Possibly justifiable in the context of limiting imports. (The taxes stayed in the UK.)

IMHO, once a government has a significant revenue source, they are reluctant to give it up.

bobkn said:

I don't know how much of its oil the UK gets for its North Sea resources, but, according to Wikipedia, that didn't become much of a thing until at least the mid sixties. I think that the UK taxed oil imports heavily before that. Possibly justifiable in the context of limiting imports. (The taxes stayed in the UK.)

IMHO, once a government has a significant revenue source, they are reluctant to give it up.

Click to expand...

The UK has been a net importer of crude oil since 2005. The total net crude oil imports (imports minus exports) in 2018 was 3.3 million tonnes. Sources of UK imports The principal source of the UK's imports has consistently been Norway, historically accounting for around 65% of all imports.

Oil demand (for petrol) in 60s is nothing like nowadays - unlike US, there were not that many cars in 60's - 5 million - roughly 1 car per 10 persons.

Now there are 32 million - more or less 1 car per two persons. Although cars are more efficient, people drive a lot more as well.

Interestingly, on average, EV owners will pay just 4p for the electricity to travel a mile, while a new diesel car costs three times that, at 12p per mile, and new petrol car owners can expect to pay 13p per mile.

However as petrol demand declines, you can bet your shirt that goverment will start taxing electricity heavily (definitely government Elec-Trickery for those old enough to remember Catweazle).

In the US, there were supposed to be about 290 million cars in 2020, for a population of 330 million. 0.88 cars per person.

Conus (the contiguous US) has an area of about 8 million square km. Great Britain, about 209 thousand sq km, and 60.8 million population (2011).

Not sure what the numbers integrate to, but we Americans love our cars. (Largely SUVs and pickup trucks, lately).

The US appears to be subsidizing the rest of the world's pharmaceuticals, but I doubt that those numbers are readily available. We have a state medical plan (Medicare), but our beloved Congress has forbidden any possibility of Medicare negotiating drug prices. Our brand of socialism can be pretty expensive for those who nominally benefit from it.

My apologies for getting far, far off topic.

cereberus said:

Re fuel - the reason UK prices are so high is due to the money grabbing government(s) ripping us Brits with high taxation! It is not a reflection of supply and demand.

Click to expand...

Hi there

what you guys in the UK need to do is ask why the VAT is added on to the price AFTER excise duty is added on so a tax on a tax. I can understand VAT and Excise duty but surely the excise duty should be added after VAT on base price. Amazing how many Brits seem not to understand they are being taxed on a tax. !!! Almost unbelievable in todays Internet age. OK UK like other govts needs tax but do it fairly.

I don't think high price at UK fuel pumps is due to Russian troops crossing the Mersey or the Humber Bridge or even Russian Rockets landing on major refineries like Stanlow in Cheshire especially as the UK actually exports N.Sea Oil now.

Tax in the UK is getting bonkers -- I'm sure some of my Lincolnshire friends might well ask why is it the potatoes imported from Lincolnshire into Iceland in spite of Brexit / EEA tariffs are still cheaper here than the 20% or so price rise that is happenning across the UK making their "Fish'n Chips" almost unaffordable. !!!!

Cheers
jimbo