Ask Paul: January 4 (Premium)

Welcome to 2019! Here’s the first set of questions and answers for the New Year.

G Suite-to-Office 365 migration guide?

dcdevito asks:

Paul, are there any guides that you are aware of to assist in migrating from G-Suite to Office 365/Outlook.com?

I focus more on personal computing than enterprise computing, but I had a vague memory that Microsoft might have such a thing. Turns out, what they will offer is a set of utilities that will help customers make that move. But that won’t be available until later in 2019. So I asked Brad whether he was aware of such a thing from Tony Redmond (our resident Office 365 expert) or Petri, but he was not. Sorry.

Outlook.com with a custom domain

simont asks:

For your move to Outlook.com, are you going to be using just the regular consumer version (domain name via GoDaddy and Office365 Home subscription or will you be using the commercial version via Exchange365. Related to this, will you be writing about the experience?

I am using Outlook.com, not Outlook on the Web with Office 365 commercial.

And I had intended to write about this a long time ago. But I’ve run into a technical snag.

So let me see if I can recap this accurately. I already have a custom domain—[email protected]—associated with my primary Outlook.com account, which is a Hotmail address dating back to the early 2000s. That’s the address I intend to use, so I’m already good to go. As you may recall from Microsoft’s response to a previous question about custom domains, there are two ways to connect a custom domain to Outlook.com: You can use GoDaddy as your registrar, or existing Outlook.com Premium customers (what I’d call previous Outlook.com Premium customers) can connect to a domain they own from any registrar, not just GoDaddy. I had already connected [email protected] to my Hotmail account when Outlook.com Premium was a thing.

But, I do what I do for a living. And I wanted to try to new approach too, so I could write about it on the site. I do have a bunch of custom domains, mostly at NameCheap. But I saw that I had one custom domain at GoDaddy already, too, so I set out some months ago to connect that to my Hotmail account and document the process. The problem is, the process never completed for some reason. And when I visit Outlook.com Settings (Premium > Personalized email address), the “Cancel setup” button doesn’t work. So it’s just sitting there, not working. I check it every few weeks, and there’s never a way to cancel setup and start over. I don’t see anything on GoDaddy’s site that would help either.

So, I’m not sure what to do. Maybe it’s time for a support call.

FIOS vs. RCN

mmcpher asks:

In “What I Use” you said you have relatively pokey RCN but would switch to FIOS in heartbeat if it were available. So what wifi router do you use and would your choice change if your were able to pull triple the DL/UL with FIOS? To mesh or not?

I currently use the RCN router and would use the FIOS router in such a case. But I would still use the Google Wi-Fi mesh network to get Wi-Fi throughout the house.

Google Fi with other phones

mmcpher also asks:

I know you strongly recommend Google Fi, particularly since they’ve expanded their roster of participating devices. But is there a tradeoff/dropoff if you don’t go with a Pixel phone? For years I have run non-ATT phones on ATT. Sometimes they were just unlocked but other times I was able to get other-branded phones to work on ATT (even when they were reported to be incompatible). I am currently unhappy with the call reception/performance with an unlocked Note 9 that ATT was fine with and which was supposed to work indistinguishably from an ATT-branded Note 9. What’s your sense of Google Fi’s flexibility in that regard?

Yes. The tradeoff is that you don’t get Google Fi’s seamless network switching, where in the US you will automatically switch between T-Mobile, Sprint, and US Cellular on the fly, based on which has the strongest signal. With other Android phones and iPhone you’re always on T-Mobile. And that wouldn’t bother me in the slightest.

There are a few other things to think about, especially on iPhone. But I’ve written about this elsewhere. Check out Hands-On with Google Fi and iPhone and Hands-On with Google Fi and OnePlus 6T, which covers the non-Google Android phone experience, for more info.

Popularity of Surface Go

davidD asks:

Interested in your take on the latest Surface figures from AdDuplex, especially 12.3% (& 4th place) for Surface Go, which seems to be at odds against your not so positive opinion of it – does this surprise you?

I never actually considered whether Surface Go would be popular or not: My job is to determine whether or not I think people should buy it. But given the desirability of the Surface PC lineup, and the fact that some huge percentage of Surface PCs in the world are Pro-like form factors, I’m not surprised that it’s selling pretty well.

But that doesn’t have any bearing on my opinion, which is easily stated: The poor performance, low battery life, and smaller-than-full-sized keyboard make this computer a non-starter, and something I could never recommend to others. I can’t help it if people buy crap masquerading as a quality product. It’s like the Cadillac Cimarron of computers.

Outlook Mobile for iOS

yoshi asks:

Do you think we’ll ever see the elusive Outlook update for iOS? (of course, now that I asked this it will show up tonight)

Well, yes. Of course. 🙂 I did expect it well before now. Not sure what’s up with that.

Microsoft Edge on Windows 7

Dan1986ist asks:

Since there is a year left of support for those on Windows 7, how will Microsoft approach Microsoft Edge on that version of Windows, as they mentioned the Chromium-based Edge coming to all supported versions of Windows?

The timing on this is poor, obviously.  But for those businesses that will be paying for Windows 7 support after the official support lifecycle concludes, and there will be many, having Edge on that platform, and fully supporting it, is important.

I guess the real question here is whether Microsoft will actually ship this browser to Windows 7 for consumers. And what will happen after January 2020? I can only speculate, but with over 650 million Windows 7 PCs out in the world, Microsoft would be dumb to not let them upgrade to a safer browser.

Brad’s book

Josh asks:

Where can I tell Brad about a couple of tiny mistakes in his book? (Which is now available in hard copy in the UK on Amazon and I’d highly recommend).

Thank you for making me the front line of support for Brad’s book. It’s a job I never get tired of. 🙂

But seriously, you can simply email him.

Office 365 and free Skype minutes

Darekmeridian asks:

Office365 used to include 60 minutes of Skype Calls to landline and mobile all over the world has this changed because I started getting this e-mails saying I should renew my subscription. But I have Office 365 paid for well into the new year.

Microsoft still lists the 60 minutes of Skype calls each month to mobile phones and landlines as one of the perks for both Office 365 Home and Personal. But as one reader noted, this feature seems to have silently disappeared from the MSA services page, perhaps by mistake. So I have asked Microsoft.

Microsoft in 2019

SilentHero117 asks:

What do you think will be the main theme or themes for Microsoft in 2019? To me, it appears that AI was their main theme even though that is pretty broad and at times, vague.

I think it will actually still be AI. But as I coincidentally wrote this week, I think the company would see far better success implementing a “privacy initiative” (like its earlier Trustworthy Computing Initiative”) and focusing on that.

Thurrott.com sign-in with Microsoft account

stephenf asks:

Why don’t you offer logging in via our Microsoft account? The site supports Facebook, Google and Twitter.

I asked Tim about this. As it turns out, this is in the queue, but it’s a low priority based on feedback. I do agree it’s a good idea.

Typos

madthinus asks:

You need to talk me off the cliff today Paul, because on the 1st I lost my mind with a news post here on Thurrott and I am not happy with what happened. I turned into that angry guy on the internet. I have been going round and round and on the 4th I am still not in a place where I am ok with this. I wrote this question last night and then did not post it, but this morning it is still with me.

Just to cut to the chase here, what he’s concerned about is just a typo. Microsoft has originally expected to have over 1 billion active Windows 10 devices within 2-3 years and Mehedi miswrote that as Microsoft expecting to have 2-3 billion active Windows 10 devices within 2-3 years.

I appreciate the comments about trust, but I don’t really see this as more than a typo, and it’s the type of mistake I make—I think we all make—pretty regularly myself. We changed it as soon as we found out about it.

There’s always a tradeoff here. When I started at Windows NT Magazine, every article I wrote was edited by at least 5 different people, and it was a ponderous process that involved grammar, style guides, technical correctness, and more. But Thurrott.com, like the SuperSite for Windows, is more about guerilla publishing thanks to the needs of the web and the lowering attention span of us all. We try to be as accurate and correct as possible. But being able to fix something easily and repeatedly if needed—impossible with print—helps a lot. And makes this process better than it was in the old days, frankly.

Anyway. You should expect us to try to be accurate at all times, and to respond quickly to mistakes when they happen. I feel like we at least rise to that bar.

Xbox for Christmas

helix2301 asks:

Got an Xbox for Christmas do you suggest any accessories to add to my gaming experience?

You didn’t say whether you have an Xbox One X or S, but let’s generalize. Job One is the display, and if you can swing it, 4K with HDR will make a huge difference, will be the biggest upgrade you can make. I currently use my Xbox One X with a 32-inch 1440p display (sans HDR), and I’m pretty happy with it.

This isn’t technically an “accessory” but you should seriously consider an Xbox Game Pass subscription if you don’t have it. And a Seagate Game Drive for Xbox (2 TB) external drive (or similar) for additional storage. Since we don’t yet have a new Xbox One Elite Controller, maybe look into designing your own controller via Xbox Design Labs, or perhaps another custom controller (Microsoft makes dozens).

I don’t personally do this, but you might also want gaming headphones. Fortunately, the new controllers all sport a standard combo headphone jack, so you can use whichever model you prefer.