Users Can Now Retake Control and Block Windows 10 Sneaky and Silent Installations in Windows 7 and 8
SysStreaming has released a free solution to prevent computers running Windows 7 and Windows 8 from upgrading to Windows 10 without the user's consent and to avoid nagging and inciting users to upgrade several times per day. Now is the time for Windows 10 when it is actually desired.
Paris, France, October 21, 2015 (Newswire.com) - What is the problem?
Since the release of Windows 10, there have been several attempts to push Windows 10 as a free upgrade to Windows 7 and Windows 8 computers. Users who did not want the upgrade have been left with no easy way to prevent it from producing nag screens or being actively pushed to their machines. To begin with, users were seeing a new icon in the notification area along with several popups inciting them to upgrade to Windows 10. SysStreaming has decided to help such users to retake control of the way Windows 10 is deployed to their computers. After some intensive study of the mechanisms in use and the ways to circumvent them, SysStreaming has released the free Win10wiwi tool.
What users say (well just 2 of them, otherwise it would take pages and pages) June Londion: "I have been driven mad by Microsoft trying to download win 10. I have just downloaded your small utility. It took all of that had been put on and freed up about 5gb of space on my ssd so thanks for that" (link: http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/how-to/windows/how-remove-windows-10-nag-messages-not-madatory-3614204/#comment-2315495971) Kurt: "I downloaded the solution from the above mentioned site (as previously displayed in a response to Ghacks- Thanks a lot). It works - it kills downloads from Microsoft that lead you to a Win 10 upgrade and "fakes" that they still exist (because otherwise MS would again download them to your PC) through the automatic update. The site appears very trustworthy - this statement is from someone working since about 1981 with MS (then DOS 1.1 on a IBM PC with two Floppy drives) .I am leaving MS in the next future (maybe 2-3 years) to a LINUX. Good-bye Bill Gates. It has been enough." (link: http://www.ghacks.net/2015/10/15/windows-users-report-windows-10-upgrades-are-enforced-on-their-systems/#comment-3664167 )
Yves Gattegno, CEO
How does it work?
SysStreaming’s studies revealed that several Windows updates have been deployed, which installed components responsible for the various icons, applications and tasks that can, in the best cases, be disturbing and in the worst cases, upgrade a working Windows 7 or 8 system to Windows 10, without any kind of user approval. At first these Windows Update components have been deployed as “optional updates”, meaning that it was only when users decided they wanted them that they would get installed.
More recently, some updates have been deployed as “Recommended”: systems that kept Windows default and recommended settings (download and install updates that are marked Recommended and Important) installed these updates automatically.
These more recent updates are now deployed as “Important”, which means that even more systems will silently install these updates. And there’s more: “Upgrade to Windows 10” has recently been deployed as “Important” causing the upgrade program to run automatically, without user consent.
Tech savvy users can find various resources on the Internet to prevent these updates from being installed or from being active: step-by-step manual procedures, often requiring using command line tools run from a command prompt, as administrator, tampering with registry settings etc. Less-tech savvy users have are probably already lost just by hearing those terms.
What does Microsoft do?
Microsoft, on its end, has not being very helpful to non-tech savvy users who do not want to upgrade Windows 7 and 8 to Windows 10. There are procedures that have been documented but they are quite complex and do not work all the time. For instance, users have been advised to disable the notification icon display. This worked in the past, but now with the upgrade being deployed as an important update, such users could still be upgraded to Windows 10 anyway. Microsoft has stated that it believes that it is acting in the best interest of the customer, but it has not given them the choice.
SysStreaming Win10wiwi app enables to take control for free
Win10wiwi is a small software application that is very simple to use: Most users will just click on one button and the “get Windows 10” updates will be uninstalled and marked as “hidden” preventing them from being reinstalled. It also recovers the storage space (between 3 and 6GB) that is often silently being used to host Windows 10 installation files, “just in case”, which is not very kind to users that have limited storage capacity, in particular on SSD storage.
But there’s more: During the study conducted to develop Win10wiwi, SysStreaming has identified several updates that enable some telemetry on the users’ system. Telemetry can report back to third parties various things: usage statistics and behavioral data in particular. Some experts say that telemetry is often hard to differentiate from spying!
Win10wiwi makes it possible to the users to disable the identified telemetry components in Windows 7 and 8.
Lastly, Win10wiwi can also be used to actually download; enable and install the “get Windows 10” components so that users that have decided to upgrade to Windows 10 can do so just with 3 clicks.
Win10wiwi has been released as a beta version on October 9th and has left the beta stage on October 16th. It has been downloaded more than 1000 times, by more than 800 users, has freed more than 850GB of disk space and processed more than 3900 Windows Updates components so far. Users of Win10wiwi are individuals as well as IT professionals who offer support and maintenance services to various entities.
Win10wiwi is freely available online on its dedicated web site: http://win10wiwi.com
What does Win10wiwi stands for? "Windows 10 when I want it"!
About SysStreaming
SysStreaming is a French consulting and R&D company, founded in February 2015 by Yves Gattegno, an experienced entrepreneur who has previously founded Qualystem Technology, a pioneer in Desktop Virtualization acquired by Neoware in 2005. Yves, an inventor and the author of more than 12 patents as well as a specialist of innovation, has acted as a technical director, virtualization and innovation specialist for Neoware and then for Hewlett-Packard.
SysStreaming board of partners also includes Hervé Yahi, serial entrepreneur, whose more recent venture is to be the founder and CEO of Horizontal Software, Philippe Bornens, founder and managing manager of Invivo Environnement and Christian Melquiond, director of IT services at ASI and former director of the sailing school “Les Glénans”.
SysStreaming R&D department creates innovative software and embedded solutions, aimed at giving more controls to users over their systems, software and devices.
SysStreaming Consulting department provides consulting services related to audits and innovation: pre and post investment audits, technical audits, patents, intellectual property, innovation financing and funding, mostly in the software and embedded industry.
Contact
e-mail:press@win10wiwi.com
web site: http://win10wiwi.com
SysStreaming SAS
34 rue de l’Orme Sec
94240 L’Hay les Roses
France