The PIN is local to the machine, so it doesn’t matter if someone compromised your cloud account, they won’t have the PIN to log into the machine itself. I can see where that might be useful for people worried about certain classes of threat.
Typically you can switch between password login and Windows Hello login. PIN is one of the Hello authentication methods, alongside fingerprints and facial recognition. Both of the latter require special hardware though.
PIN is best because I can vacuum the dust and cat hair off my keyboard without the login screen going ballistic.
I use the same Microsoft account on several PCs. I’ve always wondered, is my password supposed to be different on each of these machines? Should I change them?
Wow, is it possible now to write code in the command prompt? (I don’t mean MS-DOS/batch commands.) The lines are numbered now too!
If you’re logging in with the Microsoft account, it’s the cloud account’s password, so no. If you’re using local accounts, I suppose it couldn’t hurt but at that point you’re duplicating the intended function of the PIN.
Unless you want to sync your settings across multiple windows machines, don’t login with a MS account. Microsoft deliberately makes it difficult to use local accounts, to such an extent that it won’t let you do it while setting up Windows if you have an internet connection. Scumbags.
Lamalo
4643
That was changed in the latest 2004 installation. You can now install Windows 10 Home and create a local account while connected to the internet.
Pro always allowed that in previous versions.
Can you? I had read the exact opposite on multiple sites.
Lamalo
4645
I’ve done it two or three times in the last month, so yes.
What’s your reasoning for not using an MS account? Beyond an FU for making it hard to use a local account.
Cormac
4647
I installed a fresh win 10 system and I was able to skip the email account option. (Though I seem to recall reading that this was only an option in Europe?)
Lamalo
4648
Also now possible in the regular non N version.
Why in the world would I want to authenticate remotely on my home computer?
None of PIN, fingerprint, face, security key or picture password (actually not 100% certain on last two but don’t see why they would) require remote authentication nor do they require a local account.
So I assumed it was a more philosophical thing. Or you just don’t need any of the integrations it enables (most of which can be more clumsily enabled even with a local account, granted).
stusser
4651
I don’t want any of the integrations, I see no reason to remotely authenticate to my home computer, and it’s a philosophical thing-- I don’t want Microsoft knowing every time I unlock my computer.
Microsoft introduced a bug in Windows 10 last week that caused computers to bluescreen if they had a Thunderbolt dock attached. The bluescreen is fixed, but now my computer just reboots itself over and over before reaching Windows. Detaching the dock until the system boots is a workaround, unless you’re not standing at the computer!
instant0
4654
Cool, looks like today Windows 10 decided to have a repeat of the 2018-April episode where it hosed an external USB 3.0 dock 4TB drive.
Today it attempted to do it again… had to force shutdown the computer to stop it from ‘Repairing’.
Looks like it managed to “destroy” around 250GiB before I caught it. Now back to using DMDE to recover the lost files again… Wish there was an easier way to see the hidden “partition” where all the unlinked files are.
God damn it…
stusser
4655
Same drive? Maybe it’s just bad.
Anyway, setup backups.
