Microsoft announces a new edition of Windows 10 - aimed for "real pro" users

Microsoft has announced a new edition of Windows 10, aimed for power users. The new version, Windows 10 Pro for Workstations has four major selling points over existing editions.

Firstly, there is ReFS (Resilient file system), a file system that provides cloud-grade resiliency for data on fault-tolerant storage spaces and manages very large volumes with ease. Using its integrity streams, ReFS detects when data becomes corrupt on one of the mirrored drives and uses a healthy copy of your data on the other drive to correct and protect your precious data.

Second major selling point is the support for NVDIMM-N memories that allow super-fast read and write times - and are non-volatile, meaning that the memory keeps the data even when the power is switched off.

Thirdly, Windows 10 Pro for Workstations adds a new, faster mechanism for sharing files called SMB Direct, which promises to improve speeds of sharing large files. SMB Direct requires network adapters to support Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA). It will reduce the load sharing the files puts on CPU and moves that load to the network adapter instead, resulting faster sharing and lower latency.

Finally, the new Windows edition adds support for server-grade CPUs, like Intel Xeon and AMD's Opteron series, allowing the operating system to utilize all the horsepower in such CPUs. This means support for up to 4 CPUs (currently max of 2 CPUs is supported) and support for 6TB of memory (current limit is 2TB).

Written by: Petteri Pyyny @ 11 Aug 2017 4:12

max777

Windows 10 already has ReFS. I'm using it. What pro users need is not to come in and find their work isn't running, because Windows Updates rebooted the machine.

11.8.2017 06:57 #1

8686

Isn't there some caveat with ReFS not being available when using RAID5 in storage spaces IIRC? Maybe this version will fix this. If so, and with the addition of faster SMB and support for server-grade parts, these are welcome improvements for those who use a re-purposed windows machine for a movie server.

11.8.2017 08:38 #2

Mr-Movies

Nothing here for power users. How about fixing bugs like Defender blocking your internet even though you turned it off. How about letting us turn off updates and keep them off easily. How about a better way to determine what updates we want and don't want, like it use to be! How about I can remove the Cloud non-sense and it actually goes away. And the list goes on and on...

I wounder if the non-volatile DIMM will help? or present even more problems when it keeps a corrupt piece of memory on a crash? Just a thought.

how about speeding up the boot speed too?

Thankfully we still have 7, the new XP. Microsoft will never learn their lessons, they just keep doubling down on their non-sense. Great company.

11.8.2017 08:56 #3

sandyl

Simple solution:

Windows 7.

11.8.2017 12:01 #4

hearme0

Lame.

As stated by Maxx777 - It's already F'ing in 10!!! WTF Microsoft

Non volatile RAM is nice but unnecessary.....PERIOD! (Except maybe in business with an occasional user needing this feature)

SMB Direct - Rather fast enough as is but.......there are bigger fish to fry than making SMB file sharing even faster.

And the doozy, If I ever catch an end-user (with the occasional exception of super power users like graphics or developers) asking for a Xeon processor on their Win 10 workstation, I'll slap a ho!

11.8.2017 15:15 #5

Bozobub

"Speed up the boot speed"..? I have my beefs with Win10, but boot speed is NOT one of them o.O' . Directly after the upgrade, my boot speed went to roughly 1/3 of that under 7 x64 Ultimate.

Do I miss 7? Yes and no. One thing that's VERY nice, is that full screen-exclusive programs now Alt-Tab properly without bugs/crashes; Oblivion and Skyrim are both great examples of where this used to be a huge problem but have no issues at all any more. There's a few other changes I like, here and there.

The main thing I miss about WIn7 Ultimate, however, is *absolute* control over updates, of course. Luckily, my *pirated* Win7 X64 Ultimate upgraded to *legal* Win10 Pro (why I bothered attempting the "upgrade" at all ^^') so I can at least stop forced driver updates (I run a few custom drivers).

11.8.2017 15:31 #6

BenjaminDChambers

Originally posted by Mr-Movies: how about speeding up the boot speed too?
What's wrong with the boot speed? I have an older laptop, and a full boot finishes in <5 seconds.

11.8.2017 15:33 #7

BenjaminDChambers

Originally posted by hearme0: Lame.

As stated by Maxx777 - Its already Fing in 10!!! WTF Microsoft

Non volatile RAM is nice but unnecessary.....PERIOD! (Except maybe in business with an occasional user needing this feature)

SMB Direct - Rather fast enough as is but.......there are bigger fish to fry than making SMB file sharing even faster.

And the doozy, If I ever catch an end-user (with the occasional exception of super power users like graphics or developers) asking for a Xeon processor on their Win 10 workstation, I'll slap a ho! So... they're adding features you don't need, and putting them in a separate SKU, and because you don't need those features you don't think they should release the SKU?

They wouldn't be doing this unless there were demand for it. Its definitely a niche, but the demand must be there.

11.8.2017 15:36 #8

Bozobub

OF course. This version of Windows 10 pretty obviously is meant for high-end commercial server use and the like.

11.8.2017 15:47 #9

Mr-Movies

Originally posted by BenjaminDChambers: Originally posted by Mr-Movies: how about speeding up the boot speed too?
What's wrong with the boot speed? I have an older laptop, and a full boot finishes in <5 seconds. It boots slower on one of my laptops and as well on my of my Desktops that I upgraded from 7. Maybe grits cook faster in your region than mine? LOL

There are some things I really like about 10, some at best as the app cell phone non-sense doesn't float my boat, like the file transfer is much better on my Windows 10 (x64) Plex Media Server. It also seems to handle removable devices better than 7 does. I'm not real happy with the stripping out of some important stuff from the Control Panel, now Settings are found off the Start Menu when you right-click, more fragmented I think. I don't find it more stable either which has always been a problem with MS's OS's.

I haven't played with 10 much and only recently have upgraded a few machines so maybe after I play with it more I'll get over some the things that really bug me right now.

I would agree that these upgrades are business orientated only. I'll stay mainly with 7 more compatible and just over-all better. Typical MS step forward, yet take two steps back.

No slam though guys especially to you Bozobub as you've been around a long time and I respect your opinion most definitely!

11.8.2017 21:29 #10

pmshah

Originally posted by hearme0: Lame.

As stated by Maxx777 - It's already F'ing in 10!!! WTF Microsoft

Non volatile RAM is nice but unnecessary.....PERIOD! (Except maybe in business with an occasional user needing this feature)

SMB Direct - Rather fast enough as is but.......there are bigger fish to fry than making SMB file sharing even faster.

And the doozy, If I ever catch an end-user (with the occasional exception of super power users like graphics or developers) asking for a Xeon processor on their Win 10 workstation, I'll slap a ho! Non volatile memory is not of any use as it is nothing much different from hibernate. One just saves a couple of minutes over all.

12.8.2017 00:02 #11

KillerBug

Even with this there will not be a 'pro grade' windows 10. That said, there is already a version of Windows 10 that is closer to pre-grade than this will be. It is called 'Educational' and it is basically enterprise but without cortana. That, and there is Windows Server 2016...the 'server' version of Windows 10. No one in their right mind would consider using this for an actual server...but it supports 512 processors (charged per core, not per processor) and 16TB of ram. If a company has some kind of strange requirement that all their workstations use Windows 10, and workstations with 8 processors, then that's the only option.

Windows 10 already supports xeons; I use one at work (and wish our entire IT staff a slow, painful death for switching the whole company to it just because a few of the newest machines don't have Windows 7 driver support). Blocking more than 2 in a 'pro' release is crap, even blocking more than 4 in a 'pro' release is crap. Why? Because on the server side they went to per-core licensing. That means that if you have 4 4-core xeons, you can't run Windows 10 pro...but you can run a single i9 with the same number of cores. However, if you are running server, upping the core-per-cpu count will cost you extra. I wonder if motherboard manufacturers could side-step this...after all, a single threadripper is actually 4 dies all put on one big carrier.

As others have mentioned, a true pro version would not add features...it would just let you disable all the extras that come with the OS easily so that the corporate security and encryption suites are not running side-by-side, causing errors and slowing the machines down. I realize that you can kill most of this stuff using a combination of terminal commands, registry editor, and group policy editor...but IT takes 2 weeks to get around to delivering a new monitor that is already sitting in the stock room when you order it; they are not going to do any of that.

As a side note, since windows 8 we have been told that windows is being crippled on the desktop to make it better for tablets. I recently got a deal on a windows 10 tablet (under $80), and it had a bios that would boot Linux so I picked it up. For giggles I tried using windows 10 on it for a while...it is USELESS for tablets. Among other issues, you would either need a resolution so low that things would not fit on screen or a screen so big that a laptop would be more compact...or a bt mouse. The onscreen keyboard doesn't even come up when you click a text entry box, and when you open it manually, it just covers up what was there; it doesn't shift stuff out of the way like on Android/iOS...wtf? It would be even worse on a phone. Great work microsoft...you ruin it for desktop, get it wrong on tablets...and now your pro-pro version doesn't even include the stuff that should have shipped with regular pro.

To end on a positive note: Since being forcibly upgraded to Windows 10 (I was the last person on my floor because I actually stayed late and came in early so they eventually grabbed my machine while I was at lunch and prevented me from working all afternoon), I have gotten to know my co-workers better and I get more overtime. When the system crashes 4 hours into a project (a save takes up to 45 minutes now so we don't save until done), that's 4 hours of time and a half I'll be getting. When the system freezes I just leave it and go talk to people...come back half an hour later and sometimes it has unfrozen...worth the gamble when a restart will destroy hours of work. Good work Microsoft! While I doubt this was your intention, you have coworkers talking to eachother more...usually about how much they hate Windows 10.

12.8.2017 09:05 #12

DoktorThomas

Originally posted by sandyl: Simple solution:

Windows 7. Premium solution.
The best update for win10 is a new OS written by a company who cares. Where are the coders? There are billions to make. �2017

13.8.2017 13:52 #13

ChappyTTV

As with others, my biggest beef with W10 is the forced updates. I've even used the wushowhide.diag.cab to hide unwanted updates, but somehow, some of them still sneak thru and install themselves (hello 1703).
What pisses me off most is that every single update stops my ESET Nod32 AV service (ekern) and doesn't turn it back on, but Defender gets activated again! Seriously, WTF MS?
Also, 8 out of 10 updates fuck up my Logitech mouse settings, some of them were so bad that the s'ware had to be reinstalled and a couple of times, the reinstalls failed until I uninstalled the update(s).
I used to be one of the lucky ones, all thru XP, Vista and W7, I never had update issues...well, very rarely anyway, I was hit with a few of the truly buggy ones that messed with most users until they were patched, but regular ones never affected me. Now, I want nothing to do with WU until I'm ready for them.

14.8.2017 18:35 #14

Mr-Movies

I've had that problem too with Bitdefender. I added a REG Key recently "WindowsUpdate/AU/2h" which was one of several ways to supposedly kill the updates but it didn't work, even with Measured Service on. What seems to be working for me is to Kill (Disable) both Windows Defender & Windows Updates in Services. I'm hoping this holds but time will tell.

Every time my Plex Server reboots, and of course 1/3 of the updates fail from MS anyway, it causes me all sorts of issues.

You have to love Microsquish!

14.8.2017 20:24 #15

JGJD2001

windows 10 updates has caused me to rebuild the bloody machine twice , i got fed up and put in a firewall inbetween the machine to stop windows updates

Who Dare Wins

15.8.2017 18:50 #16

ChappyTTV

Originally posted by Mr-Movies: I've had that problem too with Bitdefender. I added a REG Key recently "WindowsUpdate/AU/2h" which was one of several ways to supposedly kill the updates but it didn't work, even with Measured Service on. What seems to be working for me is to Kill (Disable) both Windows Defender & Windows Updates in Services. I'm hoping this holds but time will tell.

Every time my Plex Server reboots, and of course 1/3 of the updates fail from MS anyway, it causes me all sorts of issues.

You have to love Microsquish! I'll have to try that and see if it works, but it really seems to me that MS is pushing updates too quickly and they're buggier than ever before.
1st few times it shut off my AV tho, I didn't notice that the tray icon wasn't there for some time, that pissed me off. I still can't figure out what it's doing to my mouse Setpoint settings tho, I continually have to reset my custom button settings. Logitech has no answer and of course, MS doesn't f'ing care about either issue.

15.8.2017 20:15 #17

Mr-Movies

That doesn't surprise me Chappy, you just have to look at their customer posts and how they don't handle or even try to fix known issues from much earlier Window's OS's that continue to be the same issues.

I had Windows Updates set to Manual in Services originally but that didn't do the trick (FYI), like previously stated I hope Disabling the Services continues to do the trick.

15.8.2017 23:17 #18

KillerBug

Originally posted by Mr-Movies: That doesn't surprise me Chappy, you just have to look at their customer posts and how they don't handle or even try to fix known issues from much earlier Window's OS's that continue to be the same issues.

I had Windows Updates set to Manual in Services originally but that didn't do the trick (FYI), like previously stated I hope Disabling the Services continues to do the trick. The funny thing about Windows Updates is that the vast majority of people who disable them did so either because of broken updates destroying windows or to prevent Windows 10 from installing against their will. Meanwhile, Microsoft says Windows 10 needs mandatory automatic updates because when people turn them off they are not secure. I realize some of them do prevent real problems, but the majority of them either deal with things most people don't use or screw things up.

I really can't figure out what Microsoft is up to. They are clearly trying to move to a free/ultra cheap Windows model. Office hasn't had a good new feature in a decade and really isn't as good as the version from 10 years ago. Their servers are worthless in a world with Linux, and they know it. Bing is a joke...when is the last time you said, "Let me Bing it"? I've heard "google it" in songs. Their phones are dead. Their tablets are overpriced trash, although they do make a lot of money? And then there is the Xbox...arguably their strongest future asset...which could be a great vehicle for Windows 10 while also offering games that would legitimize Windows 10 on PCs...and they don't do that. So...Microsoft...what exactly do you think the company will be 5-10 years if you are basically spending all your time making your increasingly worthless products worse and worse?

16.8.2017 20:13 #19

ChappyTTV

All good points KillerB, especially concerning Office! I HATED the ribbon style that they went to, things I could do in my sleep were suddenly foreign to me. They say it's more "intuitive" now, not in my eyes...
I'm interested to see just how long this "Windows as a Service" model they've gone to, provides enough of a revenue stream, or lack of, before they change course once again.

16.8.2017 22:30 #20

Bozobub

If you dislike the ribbon menus in Office after 2003 � like sensible people generally do � try "UBit Menu" (legally free for private use). It adds a "Menu" dropdown, that contains *the entire original Office 2003 interface*. It doesn't interfere with the ribbon menus in any way, as well, and works in every Office version I know of, and in every Office program (Excel, Project, etc.), as well.

If you're skeptical, fine, but try searching for "ubit menu review" 1st =). I've been using it for years and haven't come across a bug yet. Pretty much saved my sanity with Excel, most specifically, and Word as well (I have Office 2013).

16.8.2017 23:11 #21

ChappyTTV

Originally posted by Bozobub: If you dislike the ribbon menus in Office after 2003 � like sensible people generally do � try "UBit Menu" (legally free for private use). It adds a "Menu" dropdown, that contains *the entire original Office 2003 interface*. It doesn't interfere with the ribbon menus in any way, as well, and works in every Office version I know of, and in every Office program (Excel, Project, etc.), as well.

If you're skeptical, fine, but try searching for "ubit menu review" 1st =). I've been using it for years and haven't come across a bug yet. Pretty much saved my sanity with Excel, most specifically, and Word as well (I have Office 2013). I had heard about that one my friend, but my employer (The City) doesn't allow installation of anything like this on their network machines and I no longer require it anyway. I was an Officer in the Fire Dept and I took on a major project of managing the complete overhaul of the departments Policies and SOP's as part of a requirement for International Accreditation. Basically, I ended up doing most of it myself for a few years...I really could have used it then, but I'm done with all that now...thank gawd!
Even tho I hardly ever use Office in retirement now, I'll give it a look.

16.8.2017 23:31 #22

Mr-Movies

My work is the same but I could use it at home, will try it out.

17.8.2017 08:44 #23

ren97

The end of the article states that win 10 will be able to support 4 cpus imstead of 2 and 32 GB of RAM. It lready supports 256 cores and 512 GB of RAM?

"History cannot repeat itself if we refuese to allow it" ~veo

19.8.2017 18:32 #24

KillerBug

Originally posted by ren97: The end of the article states that win 10 will be able to support 4 cpus imstead of 2 and 32 GB of RAM. It lready supports 256 cores and 512 GB of RAM? The article says that maximum ram is going from 2TB to 6TB.

As for CPU vs core count, it is something like this...If you had a system with 3 single-core processors, Windows 10 Pro would not support that; you would need server 2016 for that. However, if you had a pair of 128-core processors, that would be just fine. This is not a technological limitation; it is just something arbitrary that Microsoft came up with; the core of Windows 10 supports 512 cores on up to 64 sockets.

21.8.2017 19:22 #25

ren97

"History cannot repeat itself if we refuese to allow it" ~veo

21.8.2017 19:40 #26

Bozobub

Actually, yes. The more limited restrictions are due to licensing, not actual necessity.

21.8.2017 21:39 #27

Bozobub

*double post-

21.8.2017 21:39 #28

ChappyTTV

Originally posted by ren97: no KB is right when he says that, it's strictly a licensing limitation as it is now.

21.8.2017 22:35 #29

ren97

ah physical cpus and 2-6 TB. I see.

"History cannot repeat itself if we refuese to allow it" ~veo

22.8.2017 00:26 #30

Mr-Movies

All MS OS's these days are based on their Server OS, they have been doing this since they started focusing on NT as their base platform after the 95' days. They just strip down to the various versions based on the server OS.

So opening up to 4 Opteron's and 6TB RAM is a Workstation move for Windows 10 Pro as others had implied previously. It's a marketing move just like down tuning their OS's for Home Basic versions, Pro versions, and so on.

There are gamer's that will use 4 Opteron's and boo-goo RAM for their platform so it could be said this will benefit them as well.

Cores and Physical CPU's are quite different so KillerBug is right on.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE QUOTE:
Quote: Finally, the new Windows edition adds support for server-grade CPUs, like Intel Xeon and AMD's Opteron series, allowing the operating system to utilize all the horsepower in such CPUs. This means support for up to 4 CPUs (currently max of 2 CPUs is supported) and support for 6TB of memory (current limit is 2TB).

22.8.2017 06:37 #31

KillerBug

Originally posted by Mr-Movies: All MS OS's these days are based on their Server OS, they have been doing this since they started focusing on NT as their base platform after the 95' days. They just strip down to the various versions based on the server OS.

So opening up to 4 Opteron's and 6TB RAM is a Workstation move for Windows 10 Pro as others had implied previously. It's a marketing move just like down tuning their OS's for Home Basic versions, Pro versions, and so on.

There are gamer's that will use 4 Opteron's and boo-goo RAM for their platform so it could be said this will benefit them as well.

Cores and Physical CPU's are quite different so KillerBug is right on.

ORIGINAL ARTICLE QUOTE:
Quote: Finally, the new Windows edition adds support for server-grade CPUs, like Intel Xeon and AMD's Opteron series, allowing the operating system to utilize all the horsepower in such CPUs. This means support for up to 4 CPUs (currently max of 2 CPUs is supported) and support for 6TB of memory (current limit is 2TB). It is a bit odd that they have gone with this method, even from a workstation perspective. You can get 18-core xeons and quad socket boards in a large workstation...that's 72 cores. Even with the current 'pro' you can have 36 cores...but you can't use an old server with 4 8-core processors in spite of the total core count being lower. On the server side they charging per core...this kind of sucks for those with only a couple 18-core processors and it isn't really a deal even if you had a system with 64 single-core processors. But still...at least it isn't like they are saying that 32 cores is twice as much as 36 cores in a server...only a workstation somehow. Also, it is by socket. If someone put multiple CPUs on a single socket, that's still just one socket. In theory Intel could put 4 16-core CPUs on a single socket and then run 4 of those in the new pro-pro for a total of 256 cores (the maximum pro supports). Not sure why a company would make such expensive chips for such a niche market, but they could if they wanted to.

22.8.2017 22:38 #32

Mr-Movies

I would agree with you typical MS.

22.8.2017 23:19 #33

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