For average users who can take a bit of care to avoid untrusted websites, the Microsoft Defender Antivirus that ships OOB with Windows 10 is enough – the good thing of sticking with Defender is you don’t need to renew any subscription, it just keeps working, whereas the third-party antivirus which may be better (?) is unsafe after the subscription expiry. Similarly, the PC shipped with a 30-day limited edition of McAfee antivirus.
Tip: Before launching any of the Microsoft Office apps like Word or Excel for the first time, Microsoft recommends you activate Windows 10 if it is not done automatically. I got her to uninstall the Office (Office 365) App, launch Word, press update, and then press activate from the About menu to get the Home and Student edition license activated for good.
Whereas the latter (Word/Excel/PowerPoint) on a new PC like this that ships with Office home edition license will allow you to activate on the first run and provide you with a perpetual license – obviously, you don’t get any (or limited) cloud storage nor the other Office 365 subscription benefits. The former (Office app) is a shortcut placed by Microsoft to convince you to sign up for a trial and then proceed to pay for an annual subscription. Yes, there is a subtle but crucial difference between the two. On examination, the issue turned out to be that she had launched the “Office” app (aka Office 365 app) that was displayed prominently in the start menu and not the individual apps like Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, or Excel. Everything had gone well, but Microsoft Office kept saying it requires an Office365 subscription – this shouldn’t be the default as the PC was shipping (she had paid extra money for the same) with a perpetual license for Office 2019 Home. She opened the package and proceeded to set up. A relative of mine, a recent graduate on my recommendation had bought an HP laptop for personal usage for Rs.45,000 (USD 607): AMD Ryzen 5 3500U, 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD, 1 TB HDD with Windows 10 and Microsoft Office 2019 Home & Student Edition. The latest frustration for me happened today. I have experienced them to be upfront on what they charge you for – you may not like the premium price but that’s ok. Though I am not a fanboy of Apple products, I admire Apple for remaining clean in this regard.
The excuse they provide is that there are wafer-thin margins in the business, unlike Apple, who operate on the higher end of the market. Unfortunately, this stealth mode operations are a common theme in the world of Windows PCs and Android Smartphones for decades. There is nothing wrong in upselling, but they need to be transparent on what is already provided and what’s the upgrade for. I am annoyed when companies design products to get the paying customer into doing things that are good for the manufacturer’s top-line and expensive for the customer.
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