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And this is treated as a bad thing?!
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Send only info about your device, its settings and capabilities, and whether it is performing properly.
In other words, even after turning off all the settings, your data still gets collected.
The rest of the installation process wasn't fun either. It was worded in this weird, condescending tone, like "Let's get everything set up for you", and "Let Cortana help you get things done!".
Thank goodness for FLOSS and GNU/Linux.
No the offline account trick still works.
You have to use CLI to get around it, I don’t consider that functional for the average user
No for sure thats criminal, but its possible. Rufus makes it easy with a single click to bypass it. But when not using that silly media creation tool Windows may not boot on Thinkpads etc.
Thinkpads with Windows are a joke, they are basically nonfunctional without all these lenovo drivers for anything.
Or you just use Rufus to create your USB installer. It provides the ability to add that option to the installer just before the burning process. Mouse clicks only, no CLI needed.