Which is a terrible app. I made the mistake of buying a HP printer and that app crashes more than it works (and the printer doesn't work without it, of course).
Wait, you have to have an app to print? On Windows? Can't you just install the driver and print using the Windows print interface? I understand that they have software that might have extra features, but basic printing should only require a driver, at most.
Pretty sure you can just use the drivers. You certainly can on my HP printer.
Yeah, the highlighted download on the website will be HP Smart And All It's Infernal Bullshit, but if you're in the habit of reading and not just clicking next, next, next then usually there's a basic driver to do what you want.
Most of HP’s printers have a “Basic Print and Scan Driver” that is listed as “For IT Professional use only” on their support page. I fear the day where HP Smart is the only option.
On USB with the basic driver specifically, modern HP printers will let you use the device for exactly 10 print jobs before it locks all functionality and demands that the unit be connected to the network and an HP account registered.
I told my girlfriend (now wife) when we moved in together that i had over rule: you're not allowed to purchase anything HP. May the company burn in hell.
I just wish one could help it.
At work I mostly curse microsoft but at least they have some useful stuff. But nothing that is worth all the shit if there was any option. Its also quite blatant how they change their services to be dumber and more annoying to use most likely only to later start selling some premium version of it that is less painful to use.
I wondered what was happening. I got a notice my daughter installed this app (under 13 account) and was like why would she do that. We don't have any HP devices. Brother for life.
You bet it.
I got one toner refill for like $6 for Brother laser printer which is happily chugging along with factory installed drum after 2600 pages printed during over 6 year period. No DRM, no driver drama, and you know what happens to jet printers with such sporadic usage.
At work we pay Microsoft thousands for developer licensees, have windows pro, and there is still ads in the OS....
Windows exists to service them not us.
If work doesn't care then you shouldn't care. At my workplace, they promoted a dumb woman who is in some sort of weird relationship with the manager.
Its been 2 months and the backlog of work keeps growing. I am just enjoying watching the ship sink.
I don't own the business so i don't care.
Lots if employees have stock based compensation and therefore do own part of the company. A tiny fraction of a company's market cap can still be a huge component (over 50% is not uncommon in tech) of an employee's compensation.
Yes they are in fact doing this. I noticed this (working in IT) recently across several machines. Fucking Microsoft. I removed and blocked it immediately.
What mechanism is installing it? We image workstations and they're very locked down and managed. Is Microsoft circumventing it's own control mechanisms or is this one of those "bring your own" situations where you don't really manage the machines.
I'll never install a legit copy of Windows anymore. For personal use I am using trusted enough modified versions that limit bloat and connections to Microsoft services. And I probably use those once a month.
I started messing with Linux to build a home server a few months ago. I am now fully in the Linux/FOSS cult, and as soon as I figure out how to either run Adobe on Linux or use the alternative software, I am nuking Windows on my personal computers. The bloatware is insufferable, not to mention shit like this.
I'm there with you, I built my NAS about 8 months ago and now I'm slowly migrating everything to Linux. Once I get an AMD GPU for my gaming system I'm going to nuke my dual boot and run solely Linux, with Windows in a virtual machine if I ever need it. I'll just run a dual GPU setup, RTX 3090 for the Windows VM and whatever AMD card I get for the host.
Install Linux. Saying it yet again. Be done with this crap, install Linux, if really really necessary, have wincrap in a VM, and now enjoy your computer
To anyone who reads this: I know everyone talks about Linux around Lemmy, and that you've already been offered to install Linux a million times.
I understand how much it puts you off.
But this time, give a try. For real. Try it, there's nothing to lose.
The reason we don't ever shut up about it is because Linux is just so much better that many of us don't imagine how we lived without it. Unironically.
Spend a week on Linux. Install Mint, or Manjaro, and run them - not in VM, use dualboot. You can easily delete Linux afterwards if you don't like it, straight out of Windows. Run it for a week.
The second sentence of the last paragraph. That's what turns me off of switching. I have absolutely no clue what any of that means. Not all of us are tech savvy and Linux seems to be aimed at those who are. The jargon alone is enough to be maddening to the average person.
I'm trying Ubuntu now. I've had it installed for about three months. I only switch to Windows 10 to play Starfield. The only problem I've had... (delete, it's a long story I don't want to write). I had to reinstall, I couldn't figure out how to reinstall and keep my settings and apps, so I had to redo everything. I'm glad I still had Windows (because I wanted to play Starfield), because I would have been screwed--I had formatted the USB stick I used to install Ubuntu the first time. It's been probably over 10 years since I needed to use a recovery disc to get Windows running again.
It's unfortunate that AAA game developers won't support Linux. But, the money isn't there, and we live under capitalism. Without reliable, plug-n-play, easy-as-Windows game support, Linux will remain niche. I'm sure the point has been made before, but here it is again, and still.
No. I like being able to play games without having to check if I can play them and really dont want to be associates with annoying af people promoting linux everywhere
at least if it's auto-installed, you don't need to have your windows tied to a microsoft account just to set up your damn printer. there's some models where the stand-alone driver installer just doesn't work worth a shit, and the 'app' is the only thing that works (there's also a few that go the other way, the 'app' fails but the stand-alone driver is fine).
I recently had to set up a Windows 11 pc in S mode, and they needed S mode disabled to install Quickbooks. S mode could only be disabled through the Microsoft Store, and it wouldn't let me access the Microsoft Store at all without creating a Microsoft account. Eventually I managed to disable S mode by booting recovery media, and making registry edits from the command line there.
Now that the machine is out of S mode, it lets me access the Microsoft store without an account for free apps. But from inside S mode (which many PCs ship with) it would not let me access the store at all without an account. It's also worth mentioning that you have to intentionally avoid connecting the computer to the internet during the initial set up, or it will require you to create a Microsoft account to use the PC at all.
11 now basically ARP scans any network you join, adds things like HP printers found on the LAN to Device Manager, as"unknown device" in some situations, likely auto installing drivers in others.
Seems like it's getting installed on PCs which have an HP printer nearby even though they never used it. I don't have any printer at home and none of them have any HP app in them.
This doesn't super surprise me. I own a Tobii 5 eye tracker. Brilliant piece of tech, but it infuriates me that the one and only way to get the drivers and software for it is to plug it in and let the MS store just install them for you.
adding DWORD value of 32bit lenght named AllowCortana with value 0 to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Search in registry editor,
There's plenty of powershell scripts to "reclaim windows" etc. I was a sysadmin in mixed environment for 15 years and Windows Enterprise you can disable all the creepy features on. This was critical infra environment with explicit firewall rules for everything and no traffic from the end user that didn't go through our proxies.
It won't. The issue isn't technical. Apple has been so hostile towards the PC gaming industry that nobody cares anymore. It's generally understood that if you want to play games on PC then you use Windows, or even Linux if you are inclined. Nobody buys a Mac to play games; therefore nobody writes games for Mac.