What are you doing for your Windows 7 64-bit systems, now that EOL is coming up in Jan. 2020?

[VirtualLarry]

I think I have one multi-boot Win7 box somewhere around here, I'll be sad to see it go.

Anyone want to speculate an over/under, for MS doing something "underhanded" to basically lock-out, or otherwise, make existing Win7 installations "virtually unusable", after the EOL date? Something more "vicious" than just the current Windows Update-delivered "Win7 is about to expire" nag-screens that are popping up?

Edit: Or do you think that they will publically push-back the EOL date, and provide public security patches for a little while longer? (I think I remember reading something about paid support for Enterprise customers, per-seat, and the price goes up every year. It would be nice if they even offered that to normal end-user and OEM PC customers.)

 

[mikeymikec]

Underhand: I doubt it. The only underhand thing they've done is denied Win7 and Win8x users the choice of installing MS Office 2019. There'll be a lot of hangers-on to Win7 like there was for XP, and a sizable amount of those will be businesses.

The only reason the EOL was pushed for XP was because of its use in low-end ultra-portables because Vista was completely unusuable on them.

I switched from Win7 to Linux as my main OS, and installed Win10 as my gaming OS. I still prefer Win7. Using Win10 these days seems to be a voyage of discovery in two ways: 1) What's the "bug of the month' going to be? 2) What petty, small-minded and deceptive method is MS going to use to try to get users to do what it wants (use MS accounts, OneDrive, etc) next?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Underhand: I doubt it. The only underhand thing they've done is denied Win7 and Win8x users the choice of installing MS Office 2019. There'll be a lot of hangers-on to Win7 like there was for XP, and a sizable amount of those will be businesses.

Well, MS did patch Windows 7 Windows Update, to deny service to people that had "newer" CPUs (that were otherwise compatible and worked fine with Win7). I expect something similar from them, once it EOLs.

 

[mikeymikec]

Well, MS did patch Windows 7 Windows Update, to deny service to people that had "newer" CPUs (that were otherwise compatible and worked fine with Win7).

Yup, that too.

 

[JackMDS]

Putting aside security Win 7 is EOL long time ago, 3rd party security vendors will go on with supporting their products.

So... if One Realy needs to go on with Win 7 One can go on using good 3rd party security Apps,i and leave the ""Drama Queening"" to dealing with his/her favorite Sport, Music, Media "Celebs" Supprot.--.

 

[Mantrid-Drone]

It'll be just like XP - reams of web and print pages dedicated to 'upgrading' and what you can/should do with your apparently now suddenly redundant Win7 PC. Mostly of the stuff will be reactionary **** with the usual forum and other annoying online prats acting like unpaid Win10 sales staff berating like naughty school children those who've not made the switch.

I predict that Win7 will live on longer than XP has. It was only at the end of last year that the percentage of Win10 users actually exceeded Win7 users worldwide. So it is not a bad bet that there will still be a significant percentage of people (20%?) happily using Win7 on a daily basis 3 years afterwards and beyond.

Incompatible new third party software, particularly browsers and consequently partly inaccessible or poorly displaying web sites will be the long term problem. But the fact is you can still use XP online safely enough for general browsing at the very least. Even now there are still a number of anti-virus and other security programs that are kept specifically compatible with it because the market is still there.

The real Win7 kill started a long time ago in that no new retail PCs etc have had Win7 installed for years. That was the first and will continue to be the most significant factor in its long term decline. The official Win7 EOL is merely a way marker most users will ignore.

 

[corkyg]

Just keeping on, keeping on. Maybe Linux.

 

[C1]

The average home user should be able to coast on Win 7 for quite a few years after its MS retirement.

Im still using XP and I get along spectacular, mainly because of all the neat legacy apps that I have. (Using my 13" Fujitsu Pentium M with XP I run circles around the people screwing with their mobiles trying to keep up in technology class.)

First now Ive been evolving to "7" as Im getting so many good 1st thru-3rd generation i5 laptops from church sales which I am slowly switching to. The driver is that "7" allows wide use of many of my legacy 32 bit apps (installed as compatible XP).

Oh, ya, again. I dont need more & more, just need better & better.

MS was going the way of all the many now defunct software developers by providing the more & more as rationale for users to switch. But finally, as always, individual apps start to become too complicated & messy for average/neophyte users who typically use only basic features. Hence, MS has switch the road toward proprietary single source and developer owned stores for apps with a seeming ultimate objective of pushing a rental (ie, recurring expense fee) type model.

.

 

[PingSpike]

I've already migrated myself and my HTPC to linux awhile ago. That mostly works. I built a Windows gaming VM with its own graphics card...then found I hadn't booted it for a year. I was happy with the games I had that were linux native, I don't play games that much anymore. And steam proton has narrowed the gap.

I think I'll probably spin up a Windows 10 VM of some type, with a rolling snapshot script to save the day when updates hose it. I've been planning on that anyway. You know, for Windows emergencies.

My wife's PC I still have no idea what I'm going to do. I actually thought about using a iSCSI HBA to store her hard drive on my server so it could be fast restored when hosed but it didn't work quite the way I wanted when I was researching and using a network device for I/O would be a bad performance hit. If I try to put her on linux I'll have to listen to her complain something doesn't work with it, because it does. If I update her to Windows 10 I'll have to deal with maintaining that. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Nothing. It's already behind a firewall as it should be and does not really go online other than online games, but as long as the game is updated it should be fine. I turned off windows updates years ago when I heard about how aggressive they were trying to push windows 10.

I have a feeling they will keep pushing back the EOL date like they did with XP though. Too many companies recently switched to 7 and will not be willing to switch yet again to a new OS. That is a huge costly project with zero benefit to the company.

 

[Oyeve]

I have around 40 PCs at work running win7. I dread updating them all to win10. I am the only IT guy here and it sucks balls.

 

[mikeymikec]

I have around 40 PCs at work running win7. I dread updating them all to win10. I am the only IT guy here and it sucks balls.

If they're all the same spec then that cuts out a lot of hard work.

 

[Oyeve]

If they're all the same spec then that cuts out a lot of hard work.

Yeah, 95% are. I'll just image all the new drives.

 

[badbanana]

anyone should be allowed to keep their OS of choice for as long as they want. invest time and money to protect it like education and common sense.

 

[ultimatebob]

anyone should be allowed to keep their OS of choice for as long as they want. invest time and money to protect it like education and common sense.

Nobody is holding a gun to your head and making you upgrade to Windows 10. That said, you're not going to get security updates for it anymore, and most software manufacturers will stop supporting it as well. That will include web browsers and anti-virus software as well.

So, if you're happy with your old and insecure software, you can keep it for awhile. At some point, you're going to run into problems accessing web sites that only work on the latest versions of Chrome or Firefox, though.

 

[Oyeve]

Decided to just do the in-place win7 to win10 updates. Works rather well, for once. Did around 4 systems so far.

 

[ultimatebob]

Decided to just do the in-place win7 to win10 updates. Works rather well, for once. Did around 4 systems so far.

That's kinda ballsy to do in a corporate setting. Odds are you're going to find at least one old driver or legacy application that's going to puke after being upgraded to Windows 10.

 

[mindless1]

What are you doing for your Windows 7 64-bit systems, now that EOL is coming up in Jan. 2020?

Nothing. No reason for me to switch my Win7 boxes.

Something more "vicious" than just the current Windows Update-delivered "Win7 is about to expire" nag-screens that are popping up?

I have windows updates turned off, so have never seen a single nag screen or anything of the sort. I don't need security patches for home use systems behind a router.

At the same time I wouldn't go out of my way to install Win7 on a new system or newly/redeployed, unless it didn't have Win8 support.

 

[Oyeve]

That's kinda ballsy to do in a corporate setting. Odds are you're going to find at least one old driver or legacy application that's going to puke after being upgraded to Windows 10.

Nah, I set up all the PCs in the place. Actually, weve had two refreshes since I've been here. The first one was horrendous as my predecessor built all of the PCs using the crappiest of components and all on WinXP. I updated all of the PCs to SFF Dells and installed Reinstalled WinXP. Then I updated all PCs again to Win7. Each PC is on a domain and all users just have user access so all of the SW installs are identical. The only real issue is that each PC only has 2gb of ram and the ones that have 4 only use 3.x as its a 32bit environment. In other words, they run slow as molasses IMO as I use Win10-64bit and have 16gb of ram and SSD drives. So, I may still do all from scratch and use SSD drives.

 

[Mantrid-Drone]

I use XPMode 32bit on a VM with only 1GB of dedicated RAM but, and it is a big but, it is all on a SSD and that really makes a difference.

I have a true XP 32bit 'dual boot' installation on the same PC installed on a dedicated HDD but I've not booted it in over a year, for a number of good reasons. It uses the maximum RAM allowed by a 32bit system and it is still slower for most tasks in comparison to the VM XPMode with just 1GB on the SSD.

Indeed I have some programs on the Win 7 64bit 8GB primary system which I installed on a HDD rather than the smallish SSD, just to save space. That same XPMode 1GB running on the SSD is actually faster at some similar tasks eg. checking for updates to the identical programs I have on both systems. I notice it particularly with the Windows System Control Center tool suite which has to check over 300 individual programs.

SSD FTW whatever the OS.