I’m not sure about Office, but after buying a copy of word 2016 I never updated it and never suffered for it. Just turn off automatic updates, refuse when it prompts you to update no matter how dire the message, and have the option to also keep Microsoft products up to date turned off in Windows Update settings.
Edit to add: as a private freelancing person I could “take my chances” but it might not fly in the business world.
You can, and it was recently very affordable. Might still be actually.
“Sold Out” but what a great deal at $40 it was! Edit: they still have the Windows version for $60.
The only way I’ve found to reliably prevent updates is to keep my hard drive so full that MS can’t download an update to my machine — that’s how I’ve managed to stay back on 1703
I don’t recommend doing this, and as soon as someone makes a new machine I want to buy, I’m going to move on, but as I’ve said many times here, I despair of replacing my Samsung Galaxy Book 12, and I doubt that I’ll ever find a device which suited me so perfectly as my Fujitsu Stylistic ST-4110
That’s hilarious. Kind of bad for the health of your SSD though. Or maybe you’re still using an IDE HDD. 
You likely can get away with that on Windows for far longer than you can with MacOS as Apple on a regular basis, obsoletes older libraries and frameworks as they update the OS.
I only expect that to accelerate with switch to ARM. And Apple is already telling Devs that Rosetta is an intermediary step and will go away at some point.
In other words, if you bought the Mac Office today which is still mostly x86 code though Word and Excel are farther along in being native (the core executables are) when Apple pulls the plug on Rosetta which may happen sooner than many expect, you will be stuck.
And a big warning that the demise of Rosetta is at hand will be when Apples Pro apps are fully native, and we hear that’s set for early 2023
SSD, and yes, but it would be far less healthy for the device for me to through it against a wall in a fit of rage because I simply can’t stand how styluses were crippled in Fall Creators Update.
Since early 2020, that concern about SSDs isn’t really valid anymore due to advances in both the silicon (purer) itself as well as software controller advances.
If anything, we’ve reached the point that spinning drives are actually less durable in that regard (MTBF on read/write cycles). The two remaining virtues for corporate are absolute capacity at the highest end, and that they can still be securely wiped if needed.
We finally got WSA but the Japanese Amazon Appstore has even way fewer apps than the Windows store. Which other Android Appstores are available and how do you sideload them? Thanks.
This will let you install a version of WSA with Google apps (including the Play Store). You can choose to install a rooted version or a non-root version:
@jhoff80 , thanks. Just to be sure, this is not the program that reportedly had malware
How to Install the Google Play Store on Windows 11 (howtogeek.com)
" Update: The solution we originally covered here no longer exists on GitHub as it contained malicious code. If you followed the instructions here, read our guide on what happened and what you should do. We are evaluating possible trustworthy alternative solutions and hope to update this article soon."
I just came to warn exactly that, we had a couple of customers in Thailand that did this malware and all, and they are still dealing with aftereffects including stolen credentials
PS: Although they certainly wont go after an individual for it, installing the play store and google apps on the Windows Android subsystem is still a legal gray area.
Additionally we hear that Google is in the process of implementing their own version of TPM which will exclude installation on Intel or AMD chips, though that may be bluster on Google’s part to get some concession from MS
“Powershell Windows Toolbox” is the software that had malware.
The Magisk method linked should be trusted, but of course that’s up to you to decide if it’s worth the risk.
Makes sense. Thanks again👍🏽
So, I took that leap of faith and installed the Play store with three MagiskOnWSA disk and so far everything is looking alright. Quite impressed how smooth everything runs. MS should really get Google to play (pun intended) along.
I eventually updated the GBook2 ARM to Windows 11 a while ago. It runs smoothly, and apart from the expected annoyances (no quick brightness controls while in a fullscreen app) the only issue is that wifi doesn’t reconnect upon wake from sleep. Toggling the wifi connection on and off fixes it.
FWIW, the driver for device Qualcomm(R) Wi-Fi B/G/N/AC (2x2) Svc lists a date of May 28, 2019… seems old. Version 1.0.10600.1000. Seemingly no updates available.
That driver is the current version for the Wifi Bluetooth chipset for WOA.
Allegedly, slowness/reluctance to rev drivers for what they consider core services was one of the early reasons that Apple started looking to make their own chips (especially when they got security religion) and bought a bunch of Intel IP for LTE and 5g modems.
OTOH, the fact that Apple has yet to release a 5g modem of their own (though rumors are it might finally appear in the new iPhones today) shows how incredibly complex modern chipset/antenna design has become.
Changing subtopics, Windows Central weighs in on foldable displays and Windows 11s current limitations with it.
I agree with his premise that there are lots of areas where it needs to be optimized, but I disagree that it’s MS fault. Almost since the beginning, because Windows is open, changes/innovations to the user experience have come via third party partners first, and then later incorporated into Windows itself as it gets broadly adopted. WIFI and Bluetooth being notable examples.
That being said, the Surface line, early on was the exception, but not so much in recent times with for example very little being done IMHO to further optimize the UI for something like the laptop studio.
BTW. about how long did the 11 update take for your system? The reason I ask is that it also finally became available for one of Lenovo’s previous WOA systems, which the customer bought 50 units of.
Sorry, don’t recall. After you told me it’d take forever I decided not to wait around to see it happen. 