Downgrade Windows 10?

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I have an old ASUS Windows tablet that came with Windows Pro installed on it. I only use it on my reloading bench to look up loading data, listen to iHeartRadio etc. It doesn't need Win Pro, and it has very little left-over drive space. Consequently, it's very slow. I'd like to get the lightest version of Windows 10 that I can, but there doesn't seem to be an easy (free) downgrade path. Any idea how I can accomplish this? NOTE: The Win 10 Pro was installed by ASUS during a repair.
 
Have you every tried any of the Linux distributions? If all you are doing is searching for reload data and listening to music it will do fine and is a very efficient operating system, doesn't need much memory or processing power. I have used Ubuntu in the past. It takes some getting used to but if you are computer savvy you can figure it out.
 
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There is very little (if any) on-disk space difference between Windows 10 Home and Windows 10 Pro. There are ways to free up space; clean out the temp files, run disk cleanup, etc.
 
windows 10 stinks IMO windows 7 was best + easiest + i HATE when hovering opens stuff not wanted. so far no luck eliminating that! sometimes there are memory upgrades for small change.
 
Another comment to say that there's no meaningful disk space usage between different Windows 10 "styles".

Your best bet is to do major house-cleaning. Remove every pre-installed app that Asus includes as a start. Run the disk cleanup tools that are built-in too, including the 2nd phase clean-up. Odds are it has saved a previous version of Windows 10 as a fail-safe backup and this takes multiple gigabytes of space. Get rid of it.
 
I've run the clean-up routines. . . as for Linux, I've run Ubuntu on other machines in the past, but I'm thinking that I'd have a problem with drivers for this tablet. I thought there was a "light" version of Win 10 out there--if so, "light" would be perfect for this situation. This tablet has a 32GB SSD and half of it is being used for the OS. Updates (literally) take days sometimes. Thanks for the suggestions!
 
Things like this will help. There are more, but extra settings and needless things make it run slower.
 
If you can swap HDD go there.

I run Windows 10 with tweaking tips and bare minimum through paid software called Parallels on a Mac Book Pro(MBP 2017/i5) with limited resources (128GB HDD and 8GB RAM). I think the install of Win 10 Pro(16GB)/Parallels(1GB)/Window App(2GB)/Swap Space(3GB) is under 25GB. Win10 is designed to run decently on barebones on low end computers that compete with low end Chromebooks.

The saving grace of my system is my MBP is the Incredibly fast SSD Hard Drive Apple installs. The likely culprit is a slow outdated HDD.
 
usually tablets have emmc storage that isnt upgradable

if you need space for music or photos etc you can sometimes use a sdcard or mini usb flash drive.. but that doesnt work for the boot drive.
 
Originally Posted by Robster
I thought there was a "light" version of Win 10 out there--if so, "light" would be perfect for this situation. This tablet has a 32GB SSD and half of it is being used for the OS. Updates (literally) take days sometimes. Thanks for the suggestions!

Are you thinking of "Embedded Windows" or something like that ? It's made to run on hardware that generally is used for (1) task (a computer controlling a piece of machinery, for example, or ATMs, etc). If it's that, I'm not sure how to buy a copy or license. Then again, I haven't checked either....

Here it is: Windows (10) IoT (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsforbusiness/windows-iot)
 
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Originally Posted by talest
Things like this will help. There are more, but extra settings and needless things make it run slower.




In the first video, guy says never to 'defrag' an ssd. Windows 'trims' AND SOMETIMES 'defrags' ssds (something to do with keeping the FAT organised, IIRC. Windows is smart enough to know when to do this. It's a part of maintenance that runs in the background.

He disables automatic Windows Updates. This is moronic. MS is constantly fixing bugs (not even talking about malware, yet), and they distribute firmware updates for devices made by Intel and others. When's the last time anyone here did manual firmware updates for, say, the CPU microcode, or the wifi hardware?

After seeing some of the debloat talk, I stopped watching. That stuff takes up disk space, but makes no difference to most users. (Full disclosure, I have a list of commands to debloat, and I uninstalled a lot of stuff on our 4 main PC's, once. Once.)

The number one tip for faster Windows: go from HDD to SSD (if applicable).
Tip two: get a newer CPU. Clockspeed is king.
Tip three: overclock the CPU (must have a CPU and motherboard that let you do this).

I built an overclocked i7 4790k, on the top Asus board at that time, and have three SSDs in it (OS, OS swap, and Lightroom swap dedicated).
It measures about twice as fast as my new MS Surface Book 2 *laptop*. I notice zero difference in web surfing or spreadsheet use. (Or Room Equalizer Wizard analysis of speaker measurements, a fair CPU hog).
I also have an MS Surface Go, a tiny, full-windows 2-in-1. It measures about 6 times slower than the 4790k, and it actually *is* noticably slowing in loading a dozen Chrome web pages at once, but otherwise feels just as fast while surfing.

If you notice a difference after 'optimizing' your PC, it's almost certainly nothing more than expectation bias.
 
1. Telling a novice computer user to overclock is terrible advice. Overclocking is completely unnecessary unless you're chest-thumping over benchmarks. It's has absolutely no impact on day-to-day computing.

2. Clockspeed is not king. RAM amount and HDD speeds are. If doing something like "get a newer CPU" is even possible on whatever he's running, the CPU is not his limiting factor. If more RAM and an SSD don't solve speed issues, the entire base architecture of his setup is outdated.

This day and age there's no reason the average windows email/internet computer user can't get 8-10 years out of their setup as long as it's been properly specced initially. Longer if they're Linux users.
 
Originally Posted by Subdued
1. Telling a novice computer user to overclock is terrible advice. Overclocking is completely unnecessary unless you're chest-thumping over benchmarks. It's has absolutely no impact on day-to-day computing.

2. Clockspeed is not king. RAM amount and HDD speeds are. If doing something like "get a newer CPU" is even possible on whatever he's running, the CPU is not his limiting factor. If more RAM and an SSD don't solve speed issues, the entire base architecture of his setup is outdated.

This day and age there's no reason the average windows email/internet computer user can't get 8-10 years out of their setup as long as it's been properly specced initially. Longer if they're Linux users.


Sometimes clockspeed IS king, but like all things computers, the only constant answer is "it depends".
 
Originally Posted by rubberchicken
Originally Posted by Subdued
1. Telling a novice computer user to overclock is terrible advice. Overclocking is completely unnecessary unless you're chest-thumping over benchmarks. It's has absolutely no impact on day-to-day computing.

2. Clockspeed is not king. RAM amount and HDD speeds are. If doing something like "get a newer CPU" is even possible on whatever he's running, the CPU is not his limiting factor. If more RAM and an SSD don't solve speed issues, the entire base architecture of his setup is outdated.

This day and age there's no reason the average windows email/internet computer user can't get 8-10 years out of their setup as long as it's been properly specced initially. Longer if they're Linux users.


Sometimes clockspeed IS king, but like all things computers, the only constant answer is "it depends".


Yes, that's true. There are some CPU-dependent tasks that require a beefy processor. Anything done on a tablet aren't it, though.
 
Originally Posted by Subdued
1. Telling a novice computer user to overclock is terrible advice. Overclocking is completely unnecessary unless you're chest-thumping over benchmarks. It's has absolutely no impact on day-to-day computing.

2. Clockspeed is not king. RAM amount and HDD speeds are. If doing something like "get a newer CPU" is even possible on whatever he's running, the CPU is not his limiting factor. If more RAM and an SSD don't solve speed issues, the entire base architecture of his setup is outdated.


*I* did not tell anyone to overclock. As I stated, it *is* the third most significant option to speed up a PC. In my case, I got a continuous 15% increase in Lightroom processing. When I'm processing 4,000 to 5,000 images at once, and each one takes 8 to 10 seconds, that's TWO HOURS additional processing time. Maybe not important to a child wasting away hours in mommy's basement...

When you've upgraded to a fast SSD, clockspeed is the next most apparent increase. Almost all PCs are running 8GB of RAM, no more is needed in the context of this thread.

Everything I've posted *is* common knowledge for Photoshop/Lightroom users, who run into performance problems every day.

I wonder why you are so upset... Ego issues? You don't own a subaru, do you? :p
 
Originally Posted by bobdoo
Originally Posted by Subdued
1. Telling a novice computer user to overclock is terrible advice. Overclocking is completely unnecessary unless you're chest-thumping over benchmarks. It's has absolutely no impact on day-to-day computing.

2. Clockspeed is not king. RAM amount and HDD speeds are. If doing something like "get a newer CPU" is even possible on whatever he's running, the CPU is not his limiting factor. If more RAM and an SSD don't solve speed issues, the entire base architecture of his setup is outdated.


*I* did not tell anyone to overclock. As I stated, it *is* the third most significant option to speed up a PC. In my case, I got a continuous 15% increase in Lightroom processing. When I'm processing 4,000 to 5,000 images at once, and each one takes 8 to 10 seconds, that's TWO HOURS additional processing time. Maybe not important to a child wasting away hours in mommy's basement...

When you've upgraded to a fast SSD, clockspeed is the next most apparent increase. Almost all PCs are running 8GB of RAM, no more is needed in the context of this thread.

Everything I've posted *is* common knowledge for Photoshop/Lightroom users, who run into performance problems every day.

I wonder why you are so upset... Ego issues? You don't own a subaru, do you? :p

What makes you think I'm upset? I'm just participating in a conversation. Maybe you're being defensive.

And no subaru here, just a jeep and a minivan
 
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