Best feature of Pro is Windows Sandbox, which I use to test/trial app installs in a VM. It's basically a disposable OS that spins up as fast as most apps. Sandbox runs on Hyper-V, which along with domain networking (for business) are the two main differentiators as far as I understand.
My point was moreso that its silly paying thousands of dollars for a computer and only getting a basic version of Windows, considering they give OEMs an insane discount on licensing (I really doubt ASUS paid $100+ for my Windows license). By comparison my Surface Book 2 had Windows Pro, granted that was a Microsoft system yes, but it would have been insane if it only came with Windows Home edition after spending over a thousand dollars on a laptop. I buy gaming systems because it meets my hardware requirements for dev work. Visual Studio consumes all available memory. Windows Home has strange limitations which I just don't care for as a literal pro user.
> its silly paying thousands of dollars for a computer and only getting a basic version of Windows
It very well may be but this one is not on Microsoft. Using their power to force decisions onto others is one easy way to land in hot(ter) water. This would probably be an abuse of dominant position which everyone wants less of.
OEMs have more negotiating power than regular users so it's no easy or cheap feat to force them. Arbitrarily defining which licenses can work with what hardware makes everything complicated for everyone, it needs constant updating as the hardware changes, it needs a lot of assumptions on how the user uses the PC, would probably create the garden variety loophole hunt for tricking the system.
The sensible choice here is to go for a product that really fits your needs especially since that market is very well served by competition. You have dozens of competitors and even the DYI option. You're not buying a black box. It can be a gaming PC with Windows Home just as it can be a gaming PC with a 4060 GPU. Nvidia or MS should have no say in what a vendor can sell.
They don't need to force anything, they could just negotiate a favorable license cost, and make sure people aren't getting mediocre versions of Windows after spending over a thousand dollars on a Windows machine. I'm definitely going to be buying System76 for my next desktop.
in practice MS will just keep injecting new ones in new ways and you're stuck wasting your time in a never ending battle against a user-hostile OS.
Microsoft has decided to use their OS to collect people's personal information and use it against them as a ad platform and no amount of registry edits or setting changes will make that untrue.
Best feature of Pro is Windows Sandbox, which I use to test/trial app installs in a VM. It's basically a disposable OS that spins up as fast as most apps. Sandbox runs on Hyper-V, which along with domain networking (for business) are the two main differentiators as far as I understand.
My point was moreso that its silly paying thousands of dollars for a computer and only getting a basic version of Windows, considering they give OEMs an insane discount on licensing (I really doubt ASUS paid $100+ for my Windows license). By comparison my Surface Book 2 had Windows Pro, granted that was a Microsoft system yes, but it would have been insane if it only came with Windows Home edition after spending over a thousand dollars on a laptop. I buy gaming systems because it meets my hardware requirements for dev work. Visual Studio consumes all available memory. Windows Home has strange limitations which I just don't care for as a literal pro user.
> its silly paying thousands of dollars for a computer and only getting a basic version of Windows
It very well may be but this one is not on Microsoft. Using their power to force decisions onto others is one easy way to land in hot(ter) water. This would probably be an abuse of dominant position which everyone wants less of.
OEMs have more negotiating power than regular users so it's no easy or cheap feat to force them. Arbitrarily defining which licenses can work with what hardware makes everything complicated for everyone, it needs constant updating as the hardware changes, it needs a lot of assumptions on how the user uses the PC, would probably create the garden variety loophole hunt for tricking the system.
The sensible choice here is to go for a product that really fits your needs especially since that market is very well served by competition. You have dozens of competitors and even the DYI option. You're not buying a black box. It can be a gaming PC with Windows Home just as it can be a gaming PC with a 4060 GPU. Nvidia or MS should have no say in what a vendor can sell.
They don't need to force anything, they could just negotiate a favorable license cost, and make sure people aren't getting mediocre versions of Windows after spending over a thousand dollars on a Windows machine. I'm definitely going to be buying System76 for my next desktop.
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If you're doing more than exclusively gaming, you get hyper-v, but if all you want is WSL2, you don't need pro... Even though it uses hyper-v ...
in theory, you can disable all the ads
in practice MS will just keep injecting new ones in new ways and you're stuck wasting your time in a never ending battle against a user-hostile OS.
Microsoft has decided to use their OS to collect people's personal information and use it against them as a ad platform and no amount of registry edits or setting changes will make that untrue.
I didn't even bother trying, but yeah Windows Home edition is severely locked down, they might as well call it the Childlock version of Windows.