Would You Rather A Spinal Tap Or A Windows 11 ISO?

Source: ServeTheHome Would You Rather A Spinal Tap Or A Windows 11 ISO?

It’s Officially Oot And Aboot

Ready or not, Microsoft have now made Windows 11 publicly available, and you can grab the Windows 11 ISO directly from them right here.  If your system meets the requirements then all you will need a USB drive of at least 8GB, or a high capacity dual layer DVD if you still roll that way.  After you’ve downloaded the Media Creation Tool, fire it up and find something else to do for a while, as it will take a while to download and configure the boot media even with a high speed internet connection.  There is also an option to upgrade a Windows 10 version 2004 or newer in place, while it will tend to work we do not recommend the upgrade over a fresh install.

If you are still on the fence about whether Windows 11 is for you, Ars Technica just published their review of the new OS. The article delves deep into the nitty gritty of Microsoft’s new OS, with a fair accounting of the good and bad aspects of it; also acknowledging that no software releases nowadays launch without a smorgasbord of bugs which need patching.  The window management updates received acclaim, but not so much the Start menu, taskbar nor widgets.  The new security features were also lauded; while at the same time Ars acknowledge the vast amounts of waste that those requirements will produce.

If you do make the jump, both AMD and NVIDIA have released new drivers hand crafted to work with Windows 11 and, coincidentally, improvements for the Battlefield 2042 beta which arrives in several hours.  You can grab AMD’s Radeon Software Adrenalin Edition 21.10.1 from this page, NVIDIA’s GeForce Game Ready Drive 472.12 can be acquired here.

Microsoft has an official download page for Windows 11. You can find it here directly from Microsoft. We strongly suggest getting your ISO directly from Microsoft other than from other sources. On that page, you will want to select Windows 11 from the drop-down menu. Then click download.

Video News

About The Author

Jeremy Hellstrom

Call it K7M.com, AMDMB.com, or PC Perspective, Jeremy has been hanging out and then working with the gang here for years. Apart from the front page you might find him on the BOINC Forums or possibly the Fraggin' Frogs if he has the time.

9 Comments

  1. willmore

    I’m not going to wander away from the PC for a measly two minute download. Maybe wander down and get a drink and come back.

    Do you think the upgrade in place option will get better with time? I’m not looking forward to a fresh install.

    Reply
    • Jeremy Hellstrom

      Naw, after that, when setting up the boot disk and installer … always takes forever. I hope I am wrong but upgrade in place always seems to keep whatever personality problems your OS currently has and then adds new ones … then again I’m that guy who always does fresh install/factory reset on new GPU drivers.

      Reply
      • willmore

        Yep, you’re probably so used to working with a fresh install that it doesn’t bother you how horrible stock Windows is. It takes me a good six months to be even able to stand a new install. Add in all the things they broke with a new version and it’s just painful for way too long. If there were a better way to migrate a user’s data, that would be great. Program managers like Steam go a long way to make it easier, but there’s still a few dozen other apps that I would need to install and customize. And there’s always that one or two that you forget until you get in a situation where you wonder why something is so painful and it dawns on you that you forgot to install a hex editor or something.

        And that’s assuming that they didn’t breaking anything so badly that your old programs will even run anymore. I wonder if Microsoft employees are more like you or me? I’m guessing they’re more like you or they would have solved this problem by now.

        Thank goodness Linux doesn’t suffer from this. In place upgrades from major version to major version is a standard function for most distros. Even if you have to take off and nuke it from orbit, you can just move over your user directory and have 99% of things just work. As more time goes on, I find fewer and fewer reasons to even keep Windows around. I know that they thing they’re adding in useful stuff, but everything they change is one thing I used to find useful that they removed.

        Reply
        • Jeremy Hellstrom

          Slipstream still works in Win10 and presumably Win 11 … bit of work to set up and you do need to remember all the software you want when you make it but it is an idea. I haven’t bothered doing this in forever and I vaguely recall some software failed to properly install, but for the most part everything worked. You do need to occasionally update it as well, the update cycle on software is getting ridiculous and you could end up with old, vulnerable versions of software.

          https://superuser.com/questions/1610967/how-to-slipstream-windows-10-with-uefi-and-secure-boot-enabled

          Reply
          • willmore

            That’s not a bad idea for someone like you who does a lot of installs and needs their custom stuff to be there.

            If Microsoft wants to make windows better, they could really come up with a standardized way for apps to install–like *every* UNIX like system out there. App management is as easy on Linux and *BSD as it is on a phone. Install package, remove packet, update all packages, etc. It’s all super simple. Need a new package that depends on some odd library? No problem, it’ll get installed automatically.

            Reply
            • Jeremy Hellstrom

              They did, Windows Store and UWP … it went even worse that we assumed it would! I can’t imagine an APT install type thing ever working on Windows well, they prefer you pay them for their custom SCCM software, or Windows as a Service on a VM and such.

              Reply
              • willmore

                Very good points! Thanks for the great conversation!

  2. Josh Russell

    I know you posted a link to the system requirements, but the CPU and TPM requirements should be stated, even if those without it are able to install it anyways (which could be dangerous/problematic? to those who don’t know).

    Reply
  3. Quentin

    Spinal Tap were the first to take it to 11. Microsoft have a tough act to follow. 🙂

    Reply

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Latest Podcasts

Archive & Timeline

Previous 12 months
Explore: All The Years!