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Regarding the privacy issues... Having spent half an hour or so reading some of the FAQs on the MS site (i.e. half an hour more than 99.99% of users will ever do), it's far from clear what data is sent to MS and whether it is definitively possible to stop it (other than disabling all network connectivity). Best Practice at least, if not legislation, requires that a data subject should be able to understand what data is collected and how it is used, and on that point alone MS fails miserably. Perhaps you'd be so good as to enumerate the steps a novice Windows10 user - with confidential info on their system - needs to make to prevent Windows sending keystrokes, text, handwriting, speech, images and other potential confidential data back to Microsoft. Such a summary would be extremely useful and, if it's not possible to provide, rather confirms my fears.
Regarding my unfortunate and unrequested "update"... It's absolutely true that the length of update was a result of my deliberately choosing to eschew many of the system "upgrades" MS try to push at me. Suspect what you like, I'm quite sure I never requested - or gave permission - for Windows Update to make changes, and certainly not at that point. As I say, in the middle of a VS2013 debug session the machine crashed; on restart it went into the update process without giving any option of cancelling or delaying. This is just bad UX design, regardless of whether there's 1 update or 100 to apply. Previous versions of Windows have allowed more control and transparency over the process, and removing this control - just as in the "dumbing down" of windows "apps" - is a retrograde step. Yes, I'm using Win 8 rather than 8.1 for a number of good reasons. Call me old-fashioned (I'll take it as a compliment) but I take the approach of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". There are scores of updates to Windows updating components I have never used and never will. I don't want my bandwidth and harddrive taken up with irrelevant stuff I don't want or need, all introducing instability and risk. If there are bugs in software I use, I will update those components. I appreciate a large proportion of the "fixes" are security-related, but again we all live with risk in the real world and are (generally speaking) free to choose the level of risk we expose ourselves to. When a car is recalled for a potentially dangerous flaw, the customer is invited to bring the vehicle in for upgrade at a time of their choosing. You don't see Toyota staff car-jacking vehicles and depriving their owners of their liberty by dragging them off to be fixed when it suits them.
Whilst the title of this post can be construed as shouting, I don't agree with you that it's irrational. I've been working with Microsoft software since the late 1980s and as such the majority of my professional experience is with it. I'm not in a position to abandon it lightly, though stupidities like today's farce means I am very much less likely to make personal purchases of Windows-based devices in the future. It is also rapidly accelerating my move toward retirement. The rot set in with Win95 when they moved from File Manager to Windows Explorer. That echoed a move away from the user being in control and made Windows a vast, unmapped jungle through which the user had to explore rather than manage. Of course I recognise that Win10 is incomparably "better" in very many ways than Windows 3.11, but it is also, in very many ways, very much worse too.
Hope your headache gets better soon. 
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The first thing I'd have to say is that there is a lot of talk about information being sent to Microsoft but of course that is an extremely disingenuous way of putting it. Data is synched with your Microsoft account. This does not mean that Microsoft has direct access to it. This arrangement has been perfectly acceptable (one assumes) to people using Googlemail or any other online email client, users of the Cloud, and so on so it's a little difficult to see why everybody's getting so het up about it now that MS is doing the same. (Well I say now, Office 365, One Note and the like have been doing this for some time).
However if you simply cannot bring yourself to believe that Microsoft doesn't have a team of people sitting around reading your documents then there is a very simple solution. Don't sign in with your Microsoft account. Retain your local account when you upgrade or create a new one and use it exclusively. It does mean you can't use Cortana, OneNote and so on but presumably you wouldn't want to anyway if you're worried about confidentiality. I can't remember offhand the specific point during the upgrade at which you tick the boxes to get this arrangement but the option is definitely there (despite what some people have said in this here forum). If you don't spot it, however, it's easily 'mended' (Settings > Accounts). That's really all there is to it.
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Thanks for the clarification. As mentioned in my original posting, I don't associate my Microsoft account with my Windows installation, and would choose to continue that way. I'm a little sceptical that even so, Win10 will not post data back to MS - it may not be directly associated with me personally, but even in terms of usage data may include sensitive info. I think it's pushing it a bit to say that "synching with your MS account" doesn't mean that MS doesn't have direct access to it. Unless the implication is that storage of MS account data is outsourced, which makes things even worse really. I don't suppose for a moment that MS would have a team of people sitting around... but that's obviously not the issue. The issue is that if that data is being sent over any network, and stored anywhere, then there is the potential for it to be intercepted/stolen/abused. You will argue that I have that data on my local PC (and yes, I don't take all the latest security updates), but the difference there is that I am the one responsible for managing the security of that data. If it's sent - without my full knowledge and agreement - to a 3rd party (MS or someone else) then I am no longer accountable for its security. That breaks the trust between me and, for example, my clients.
Using Googlemail or other cloud services is rather different since the nature of the service is clear - the data is being sent and stored elsewhere. *IF* it is true that Win10 "silently" passes info over the network, regardless of where to, that is not an obvious and inherent part of using the operating system.
Anyhow, I do appreciate your response and it is at least a little reassuring that the option to install and use Win10 without the need to associate it with a Microsoft account is still there.
Cheers!
(Still not planning on installing it, though  )
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Movie Quote Of The Day
We never discussed the possibility of a retainer.
Which movie?
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Rambo XIVXXIIIXVIX : Discussion Gun
Rules for the FOSW ![ ^]
if(this.signature != "")
{
MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + signature);
}
else
{
MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found");
}
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Better than my "Overbit, the movie"
Mongo: Mongo only pawn... in game of life.
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Ugh, I don't remember. It's either Killer Bees or Meet Joe Black but I can't remember!
Geek code v 3.12 {
GCS d--- s-/++ a- C++++ U+++ P- L- E-- W++ N++ o+ K- w+++ O? M-- V? PS+ PE- Y+ PGP t++ 5? X R++ tv-- b+ DI+++ D++ G e++>+++ h--- r++>+++ y+++*
Weapons extension: ma- k++ F+2 X
}
If you think 'goto' is evil, try writing an Assembly program without JMP. -- TNCaver
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Path.Combine comes to mind on this one 
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To Kill a Mockingbird?
If you have an important point to make, don't try to be subtle or clever. Use a pile driver. Hit the point once. Then come back and hit it again. Then hit it a third time - a tremendous whack.
--Winston Churchill
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Lack of discussion.
Sequal---> get yourself prepared for the consequences 
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Well done. You're up tomorrow.
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Don't tell such lies dude, this is totally confusing!
It's V.'s thing and he sets it every day, NO MATTER WHAT! 
Rules for the FOSW ![ ^]
if(this.signature != "")
{
MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + signature);
}
else
{
MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found");
}
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Wow you make it sound like this is something serious.
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It's codeproject, we are doing serious business here eh?
Rules for the FOSW ![ ^]
if(this.signature != "")
{
MessageBox.Show("This is my signature: " + Environment.NewLine + signature);
}
else
{
MessageBox.Show("404-Signature not found");
}
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QRYDN GMRNRYLF
Clue 1 - Gentlemen Singles Champion
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--EDIT
Maybe I should wait.. 
You have just been Sharapova'd.
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Ok, "Novak Djokovic".
--EDIT
Didn't notice Brittle1816 has already answered it below.
You have just been Sharapova'd.
modified 3-Sep-15 7:35am.
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I guess you had the answer well before Brittle1816 but didn't post it so Brittle1816 wins!
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