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I respect the writer's persistence. I got a new Acer laptop with Windows 8.1 on it and decided to give it a shot. I already had a live USB ready to go but decided I'd see how much I could work on Windows before getting frustrated.

Not long apparently. Once the setup process started asking me for an e-mail address with no option to skip I gave up and put Linux Mint on it. Keep doing your thing, Micro$oft.

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Check the bottom of the screen (you may have to look carefully). You're looking for something like Sign in without a Microsoft account (not recommended) -> Local account - there's a similar flow when creating a new user.

It is there, but it's (obviously deliberately) hidden behind one hell of a UX antipattern. I guess they want people to use Microsoft accounts more than they want people to be able to use Windows.

And Microsoft accounts are still stuck using only 16-character passwords (!), and I'm not completely clear on what does and does not get 'synced' - if it's my %AppData%, I don't trust SkyDrive, so that's definitely out.

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