Not the first time. I thought a Windows 10 update wiped grub, but Microsoft actually deleted my entire Linux partition. Others have experienced the same thing.

Windows is required for a couple of apps I need with no alternatives, but the only way it runs on any of my computers is in a VM.

Could be a bad board. I have a Pi 3B+ that intermittently crashes and shows insufficient voltage no matter what power supply is used.

Makes not the least bit of difference: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/jul/20/the-microsoftcrowdstrike-outage-shows-the-danger-of-monopolization

Literally hundreds of millions of people around the world have seen the Microsoft BSODs that resulted from this fuck up. Millions of people have had their lives disrupted. The vast majority of those will blame Microsoft. Executive boards and IT groups may know better but it won’t matter all that much - they will be aggressively looking to reduce their exposure to Microsoft’s near monopoly anyway.

I worked in sales for a Fortune 500 tech equipment and software manufacturer. When a customer had a serious outage with a single piece of our equipment it would cause them to stop and reevaluate their purchasing plans and dependence on my company.

IMO every government and business out there is going to be looking at this at every level and IT departments will be tasked to significantly reduce their reliance on Microsoft products. It will take years to actually happen, but I think Microsoft sales are going to take a serious, long term, and well-deserved hit.

Another tip: On Android phones, Tasker can be used to automatically activate Wireguard tunnels to your own or a commercial VPN host. Taskernet.com has one project that activates WG when off specific wifi networks, and another that I wrote that allows you to activate a tunnel on demand only when you open specific apps. Great if you want to access a home server occasionally (without detectable open router ports) or want an extra layer of security when running a financial app.

Intuit has been paying off our elected officials for decades to prevent the IRS from creating an online filing system. They have directly cost the American public probably hundreds of millions of dollars, and if there was any justice they’d be forced into bankruptcy.

There are a number of ways to access your Linux drives from Windows (I did it regularly when I ran Windows) and if your drive hasn’t been wiped your data is probably all accessible. Here’s a link that should help: https://www.howtogeek.com/112888/3-ways-to-access-your-linux-partitions-from-windows/

Windows went a step further on my machine. I thought it had just screwed up my bootloader, but when I went to restore it my Linux partition was completely gone. Windows Update had deleted the partition.

Malware is right.

For owners and potential customers of either brand it most certainly is.

There is zero excuse for Kia and Hyundai to have dragged this out for so long. Being expected to park your car outside, away from other vehicles can create some real difficulties, financial and otherwise for impacted owners. Those who live in urban cores with limited parking and people who live in areas with high levels of vehicle crime are particularly vulnerable.

Is an owner who parks in an underground residential garage or parks in a garage for work supposed to park miles away and take a cab back and forth? Are Hyundai & Kia going to pay for the damage caused by break-ins and vandalism because the car had to be parked on the street instead of inside a secure garage? Are these cars just supposed to be parked in a lot somewhere and not driven until Hyundai and Kia get around to correcting the defects in the cars they’ve sold?

These companies need to be subject to a nice, multi-million dollar class-action lawsuit.

Depends on the phone. Oneplus has a 65 watt charger.

These are the same people who want to know why Obama wasn’t in the Oval Office on 9/11.

I use a W10 VM for processing individual files once a week or so. With the required 2 Windows programs it takes about 3 minutes to complete the task and shut down the OS. Not worth switching.

I know that Boeing’s on everyone’s shit list these days, but the company doesn’t even make aviation tires. Unless a failure in one of Boeing’s systems caused tire damage this is probably due to poor maintenance by the airline, or a defective tire manufactured by Goodyear, Michelin, Bridgestone or Dunlop.

MacOS is okay, not terrific (I hate how much RAM it uses though).

On that note, I’ve been amazed how well Mint works with just 8GB of memory. I’ve had Firefox and Chrome running with plenty of open tabs, Thunderbird, Libreoffice Calc, and a half dozen other programs open while running W10 in Virtualbox. Mint just takes it in stride.

I had to go into the BIOS, turn UEFI to legacy, turn off secure boot, reboot to boot from the USB stick, install Mint, then turn legacy back to UEFI to get it to boot from the hard drive.

That is ridiculous and it does sound like a Lenovo problem.

I’m running Mint on a Surface Laptop (which was difficult to install because Microsoft), but getting Secure Boot working only required changing the UEFI settings to allow non-Microsoft Secure Boot certificates. With that set Mint boots just fine both with Secure Boot enabled and disabled. So do USB installation ISOs.

Secure Boot can still be a pain. To get Virtualbox working with it enabled required signing several kernel modules which took a while to figure out.

Mint is great though. After distrohopping for years I finally decided I wanted to just use the OS and GUI, not play around with them and I came back to Mint. The latest versions of Mint just work and work for years once they’re installed. For me, going back to Windows (especially W11) feels like punishment. I hope you enjoy the switch.

And btw secure boot is Mint’s fault. It just doesn’t support it yet

Not the case. I’m typing this on a Surface laptop running Mint with Secure Boot enabled. Even the bootable Mint USB can be run with Secure Boot turned on.

Who said anything about a bot? You’re a Russian tool and useful idiot.

Information? You mean пропаганда.

A Lemmy salad with Russian dressing.