I have the opposite problem. I run windows 7 on a low-end piece of hardware just for a home built arcade machine running emulators. It needs windows to drive the front end software (Hyperspin). Trying to run this on Windows 10 is a nightmare. The disk activity on win 10 is horrendously and slow, plus Hyperspin doesn't natively run on 10.
I had to reinstall win7 on that system recently, and it absolutely refuses to do the online registration for it even though it's a valid (MSDN) license key. I think maybe they took the servers down or something because I get a comms error. So now after 30 days it keeps popping up a dialog box every 10 minutes saying that "I may be the victim of counterfeiting". How helpful of them.
I still don't have a solution for this so if anyone has an answer I'd be glad to hear it.
A couple of years ago a fairly large, multi-storey apartment building was put up in my town. It was constructed entirely of wood. While the roof was being finished, a worker who was putting in some overtime on a sunday accidentally started a small fire which quickly got out of control. It ended up taking the entire building out, costing millions of dollars, but thankfully no lives.
Wood is great, but it does have downsides. I wouldn't like to see a real-life sequel to The Towering Inferno.
I don't want to assume that a wooden building under construction would be less safe than multiple conventional buildings. Grenfell was a particular error in cladding choices, but still. Remember https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/fire-breaks-out-dubai-sky...
Was it balloon timbered with plywood walls? I've seen those popping up quickly, and they look very flammable, with thin support frames and walls, and a high surface area to volume ratio.
The wooden building in this article looks different, with much thicker wooden posts and flooring. The article said a test structure lasted four hours at 1000C temperature flames.
We had the same exact thing happen in Houston. The lot it sat on is now a big eye sore since, I assume, the owners of the building and insurance companies are probably still duking it out in court.
All buildings should be built with metal studs like US commercial spaces are required to. Lighter construction mass, doesn't burn, and doesn't get termites.
As referred to at the bottom of the article (an additional edit after the article is posted), there is an "official" way to stop your PC from being automatically rebooted after an update is installed:
1. Click on the “Start” button and type
gpedit.msc
press Enter.
2. In the Local Group Policy Editor, go to
Computer Configuration ->
->Administrative Templates->
-> Windows Components->
-> Windows Update
3. Double-click on “No auto-restart with automatic installations of scheduled updates”.
4. Select "Enabled", and then click "OK".
5. Close the local group policy editor.
Hrm. My Windows knowledge is possibly dared, but don't Group Policies simply apply registry values? So, if those are known, they can be applied (and, hopefully, be effective) on non-Pro editions of the OS?
In my humble opinion, mental models are like software design patterns. You kinda have to understand them to understand them, otherwise you end up falling into the "when all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail" situation, which I guess is a mental model too!
I'm really disappointed that Google has decided to do this. I've been using these all over my house for a couple of years now and, at least for Google Play Music and Tune-In Radio, they work really well. When the price dropped recently, and there was speculation they would be discontinued, I bought another four of them for my own use and for gifts.
They're not really comparable to Bluetooth receivers. The killer feature is synchronized multi-room audio without paying exorbitant prices for proprietary speakers (Sonos I'm looking at you...). I have them hooked up to powered speakers (PC 2.1 style) in the bedroom and bathroom, a mini-stereo on the deck, a ghetto blaster in my workshop and my media room AV amplifier. For parties it's fantastic to have seamless audio around the whole house.
I have to wonder why Google did this. It seems like a strategic move to push people towards their "smart" speakers. Personally I really don't want something with a microphone in it, just good quality sound at a good price. Very sad.
By the way, it's easy to cast audio only from YouTube or any other app - just go to the Google Home app and cast your phone's audio to the device or group.
The other incomparable feature is wifi casting vs bluetooth streaming. You can pick a playlist/album from your phone, hit cast, and ship your phone off to Alpha Centauri without the music disconnecting. Much less battery drain than Bluetooth, and higher quality audio regardless of if you're taking advantage of the optical output to a high-end DAC.
My only gripe is that sometimes you can keep your phone in your pocket and use the volume buttons to adjust the casted volume, and sometimes it doesn't work. Might be an iOS thing though.
Or people just opted for speakers with Chromecast Audio built in than messing with the dongle. There's a ton of cast-enabled speakers on the market and the volume control experience is much better with them, too. There's also an awful lot of cast-enabled receivers on the market as well if you want to drive your own speakers.
How is that risky? They're discontinuing the hardware, casting isn't going anywhere. Unless you're one of those people that would be offended by someone getting your gift on sale.
I agree. It's probably because sales were trending down.
That said, nothing stops another company from stepping in and taking a license for a smart speaker without neither the microphone nor the speaker, in a tiny form factor...
> That said, nothing stops another company from stepping in and taking a license for a smart speaker without neither the microphone nor the speaker, in a tiny form factor
There's already a bunch of audio-only Cast-enabled products without a microphone. There's no need to license google assistant just to get cast. Speakers & receivers with cast built-in has been a thing for a few years now. The dongle was just an upgrade path while the broader ecosystem built up.
Sorry, I was being silly and I really meant Cast speaker, which is what a stripped down smart speaker is. AFAIK you still need a license or at least some help from Google to get that working, since the protocols are proprietary.
I had to reinstall win7 on that system recently, and it absolutely refuses to do the online registration for it even though it's a valid (MSDN) license key. I think maybe they took the servers down or something because I get a comms error. So now after 30 days it keeps popping up a dialog box every 10 minutes saying that "I may be the victim of counterfeiting". How helpful of them.
I still don't have a solution for this so if anyone has an answer I'd be glad to hear it.