2048
Going on a slight tangent before trying out that SD-card-as-extra-storage operation: the slightly more pressing matter of Windows 10 and its End-of-Life…
My ‘main’ computer (a quite old but still capable HP AIO) is, unbelievably, still running Windows 10 Pro, which is over five months out-of-date and no longer receiving security updates from Microsoft. Despite having a good processor, and plenty of RAM, Microsaft have arbitrarily decided that it’s not good enough for Windows 11 and should be scrapped.
I’ve written before about installing Windows 10 & 11 IoT on various PCs, and this would certainly be a viable option for this computer, but I’ve also written about installing Linux (Mint) on a couple of PCs in an attempt to move away from my dependence on Microsaft. Even if I switch to an IoT version of Windows, that option won’t last forever; eventually they too will be out-of-support and by then we’ll be staring at Windows 12 (though Microsaft’s OS almost certainly just be called CoPilot by then; Windows is dead) and it’ll be 100% subscription-based with no wiggle room to wrangle a blessedly-lightweight IoT onto old hardware.
ANYWAY…
To head-off this inevitable dead-end, I am, as I said, trying out Linux, but I haven’t committed to Linux yet.
This is where the ‘main’ computer comes in: if I divest myself of Windows on there, and install Linux, I’ll have to use Linux!
Will it be annoying? Zark yes! But not as annoying as trying to hurriedly learn Linux in five-to-ten years’ time when the IoT gravy train finally hits the buffers and I have to scrabble around in a panic (and as an older person…) to learn a new OS.
Yes, it’s the right decision.
…but I’m not just jumping off a cliff.
Time to admit to something rather embarrassing: one of the reasons it’s taken me this long to get around to updating the OS on my main PC is the sheer volume of ‘tabbage’ going on; across three different browsers, in seven windows, I have just over 40 tabs on the go. This isn’t a huge number really (I often have more than that in just one browser on my phone) but they are carefully laid out across the three browsers for different purposes.
Honestly, I couldn’t face shutting down all those tabs in order to replace the OS, so I did nothing about it for months & months…
About that not jumping off a cliff: so what I’ve done this evening is setup my laptop next to the (allegedly) out-of-date desktop and go through all the browsers, windows, & tabs, and recreate the exact layout on the other PC.
Wot a cop-out.
But you have to pick your battles.
And now I have no excuse!
I’m going ahead with that idea using the SD card as a storage drive in the PavNAS, but I’m going to attempt to do it from the laptop; if that works, I know I can still do everything I need to, even if the old AIO doesn’t survive its trip down the Linux-hole.
See you on the other side.
