I own Windows 11 and my computer and preferred OS (Fedora) support TPM and Secure boot. Is it worth the time to configure that stuff to run W11, or should I just continue to run W10 since I don’t do anything but run a couple games?
I have a robust backup, so even a system wide Nuke is a day’s worth of re-installing, worst case.
Honestly, since I boot W10 so rarely, it’ll kinda be nice not to have to update it every time.
One thing to keep in mind is that while you might be able to securely run 10 with enough work, software companies are going to eventually drop support for it too. So if you want to play new games, it’s a ticking clock on when that won’t be an option.
It would probably be worth it to get something like Bazzite set up for your gaming needs sooner rather than later.
I really have no clue where these people in this thread are getting this from. You’re not going to just suddenly get hacked or viruses if you go online with an unsupported OS. If you disable your firewall then yeah but disabling your firewall is stupid.
You’ll be more vulnerable because discovered exploits won’t be patched so be careful, but just don’t be stupid.
Install Windows LTSC. It looks and behaves just like 10, and will continue receiving updates for quite some time. It’s meant for mission-critical stuff like ATMs and cash registers, but it’ll work on any PC. Which means no ads, and no random forced restarts if you get behind on updates. I run it on my DJ laptop.
I’ll be probably downvoted to hell, but my hardware is so old it won’t even support Win10. So, I’m running 8.1. I use Bitdefender for firewall and antivirus. Obviously, everything is regularly backed up. So far, I haven’t had any security issue, so as long as the hardware holds (had to change a few pieces already), I’ll be using it. I imagine Win10 would be even more secure.
SANS did an experiment, some years ago, where they set-up a Windows machine that was a fresh-install, & connected it to the internet, but they had another machine between it & the internet, recording all the actual-packets going to/from it.
It was trojan’d within a few minutes, from all the automatic attacks, by other trojan’d MS-Windows machines.
I thought they disabled the firewall too
Why was it exposed to the internet with all ports open? Even Linux is getting hacked if you’re fucking rawdogging every packet that shows up…
(yes I know it’s likely from a bunch of BS services only Windows would be dumb enough to enable by default, but the point still stands that any computer that’s exposed to the internet directly needs to be carefully locked down)
Single player games? Don’t connect to internet and you will be fine.
Multiplayer games? Only if LAN only. Internet connection requires security updates.
If it doesn’t connect to the internet, it should be able to just keep doing what it’s doing indefinitely. You will eventually get a significant amount of clock drift if it can’t update the time from the network but you can manually set the time once in a while to fix that.
That’s surprising about the time thing. Why is that? My cheap battery powered watch doesn’t significantly drift from the actual time. Why would a PC be any different? Just curious.
Honestly no. Proton should be able to handle anything but loot box games with shooting mechanics.
What do you play?
I’m in a similar position to OP, kinda. MonHun Wilds will occasionally, and as far as I can tell completely randomly, cause my entire system to completely freeze while in Linux (also observed in Stellar Blade IIRC) which just doesn’t happen in my Windows dual boot. Also modding Skyrim is magnitudes easier on Windows, but it’s mostly the first thing that is my motivation.
I need windows for flight sims. My problem is not so much the software, it’s the hardware. I have a head-tracking camera, a set of pedals, a throttle, and joystick. All need separate drivers. None support Linux. My throttle is so old that it hasn’t been supported since W7 and it’s work to get it going on W10.
It’s just way easier to dual boot than to try to get all that hardware running on Linux.
FYI, Microsoft Activation Scripts has a method to activate extended security updates on Windows 10 machines. This should give you at least another year of updates.
E: It appears that this gives an extra 3 years of updates. I’ll be trying it out tonight on my last W10 machine.
Edit2: If you go this route (as I just did), please also see the FAQ entry here. There is currently a glitch with commercial ESU keys (which this exploit uses) and Windows Update will continue to claim that your device will no longer receive security updates. This is also effecting W10 LTSC systems. However, you can verify that the license key is active through Command Prompt and instructions are given in the FAQ.
