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Windows 10 free for all Windows 8.1 and 7 users for first year after release

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a bit of vagueness in those statements, free supported forever could simply refer to continued security updates and such that now would eventually cease after a certain date at the minimalist end to every time a new major version is released you'll be upgraded free again. don't hear anything bad yet, but details also somewhat skipped at this point.
 
lupi said:
a bit of vagueness in those statements, free supported forever could simply refer to continued security updates and such that now would eventually cease after a certain date at the minimalist end to every time a new major version is released you'll be upgraded free again. don't hear anything bad yet, but details also somewhat skipped at this point.
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They specifically say for the life of the device, and a license is tied to a piece of hardware...
 
lupi said:
a bit of vagueness in those statements, free supported forever could simply refer to continued security updates
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IMO this would have raked in a lot of money for MS if they had done this with WinXP.

---

One thought regarding the "Windows as a service" is that MS may alter how OEMs pay for Windows in response to the threat of free operating systems such as on Chromebooks, and get their money from the end users directly instead. However, if they sell the rental scheme purely on security updates, they're in for some disappointment IMO, or if they play hardball with end users by saying that the OS will stop working if the user don't pay their yearly subs, that is also likely to end in disappointment IMO.

I'm wondering - if MS originally gave me the option of either paying £70 for Win7 OEM or said it will be £7-£10 per year for as long as I stick with it and there weren't any weird restrictions (number of reinstalls, whether one comes with a CD and the other doesn't, that sort of thing), it would make me ponder which I should go with. If a big-name OEM user was presented with a similar deal in exchange for a cheaper product to begin with (say cheaper to the tune of £70), considering a lot of average users wielding cheap laptops that they mis-treat and only last a few years, it might be a better deal for them. However, this still begs the question of what would MS use as the carrot for Windows rental and what would be the stick.
 
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Rather interesting. I might get it... just because, why not, it's free, but I don't have plans to use it as my every day OS.

MAYBE I will use it for my gaming PC's OS. My main OS will still be Linux though.

Also, are they forcing cloud based authentication in this one, or can you still skip the live crap?
 
Very good move by MS.

There should be free OS updates in general. You pay when you buy a PC for a general licence to Windows. (Or buy an annual subscription as an alternative option... but I think the pay in one chunk model is a better model for most consumers.)

As it is very few people upgrade OSes without upgrading hardware at the same time. (Except for businesses who are on subscriptions anyway.) So MS will not lose money, and will avoid having to spend so much supporting old products, and will create momentum for new platforms.
 
GrumpyMan said:
Everyone charges for services eventually, everyone knows this...and if you think MS will give you something for free.....lol.
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One unified platform. Similar to what Apple does.
I think they have hopes of tying you to an app ecosystem with the windows store.
 
I read this post in a different thread and Lol'd 😀

PPB said:
Most likely the uber duper super gimped and cut down version of Windows 10 will be that nice free upgrade everybody is hyping so much. The other versions (the ones not terribly gimped or cut down or dumbed down) will be yours for some absurd ammount of money (your good ol' Microsoft as usual). That is probably your catch.

Or probably play the F2P game and deconstruct their entire marketing philosophy, making the core OS free but everything else (and I mean lots of software we take for granted and are usually shipped as part of the very OS) worth some bucks being cashed in a microtransaction. Leave the OS as barebones as they can (W10 shipped with IE1X, just to be used for downloading Spartan or Chrome, for example) and attempt to pull a moneygrab with almost everything else. Also try to separate software suites ala Android and make rip Office apart, making Word cost 5 bucks, Excel another 5, Powerpoint another 10, and that other crap I never install worth a little less, but make all of them individual installs.

My bet is option 1, option 2 would be nice (I just want the OS, I use office only for compatibility reasons, I wouldnt touch the rest of their software withy a 10 ft pole) but then again, this discussion is only relevant for those who actually pay for their Windows installation. The other 2/3rds of the population will most probably have another dilemmas regarding installing this new version of Windows (gotta give a really good reason to make those W7/XP fans change their minds, you know).
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Maybe they'll get you on Office? Will my old version of Office that works with Windows 7 also work with Windows 10?
 
So, here are a few questions for all the doomsayers out there:
Does Apple charge for it's newer versions of OSX? Do they charge you a subscription fee to keep using the upgraded os? Did the free os stop working after a year unless the user paid a subscription fee?
The answers are No, No, & No.
How is this possible, you might ask?

Taken from an Apple tech site when Maverick went free:

"It's important to consider other revenue that Apple receives in addition to the initial product purchase price, specifically app store revenue. By eliminating the cost to upgrade, they ensure that significantly more customers upgrade. These customers are then more likely to spend more in the app store, because apps are designed for the newest OS. I think it's pretty safe to say that Apple has performed a comprehensive analysis and determined that their total revenue will increase with the new plan."

Sounds like Windows saw a success with their competitor & jumped on the wagon.
 
I was really hoping that Microsoft would take the Apple approach with Windows 10, I was getting tired of spending $120 for each Pro license.

I loaded the W10 preview on my old testing laptop (an old dual-core Pentium T4400 with a JMicron 64GB SSD) and it has been a really good experience. It's surprisingly snappy for a six year old CPU and terribly SSD. Not all the DX libraries are part of the preview, so some games crash when looking for certain DLLs, but manually installing DX packages and running in compatibility mode usually corrects it. Other than the DX issues, it feels really good.

I still think they have work to do to get rid of the Metro influences on certain Control Panel items. It's jarring to go from a familiar desktop environment to a full screen, overly simplistic, Metro "toggle switch" window, depending upon which setting you're trying to change. Desktop mode should have ALL desktop menus and interfaces. Metro mode should be all Metro style.

It's a really good move to try to get the entire 7/8 crowd on board. You can tell that they are trying to reach out to "nerds" by talking about game performance and Xbone streaming, but what they've announced so far isn't really very impressive. DX12 will be great, but the other features they need to work on.

1. Stream Xbone to PC? No thanks - give me the ability to stream ANYTHING from any W10 PC to another W10 PC or device. Not just games, but anything from the frame buffer. Also, multiple streams.
2. The DVR function only for games? Apply it to all frame buffer activity and let me adjust the recording time. (My guess is that you can probably reg hack it to do more than 30 seconds.)
3. Xbox Live integration... I'm guessing that I'll have to create an account in order to utilize any and all interesting features. Microsoft is likely banking on users creating Microsoft accounts in order to take advantage of all the live-tile and cloud integration. They already have a great combo deal ($99/yr) for Xbox Live, Office 365, Cloud storage, etc... so I'm guessing they're going to push that harder than ever to help justify the "free" experience.

As long as the free version isn't gimped, I'll probably upgrade most of my PCs. Of course, they haven't announced hardware requirements yet. Based on my experience, W10 will run really well (better than 8) on old hardware.
 
Chocu1a said:
My office 2010 still works on Windows 8.1.
Don't see how it wouldn't.
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Well, a lot of people are still on Office 2007. I suspect that may not be supported on Windows 10. That would be a reasonable choice, esp. since Office 2007 no longer has mainstream support anyway, but still would affect a fair number of cheapskates. If you have Windows 7 and Office 2007 and it works perfectly, why bother upgrading to Windows 10 if it means your Office 2007 no longer works?

But that's just speculation, since we don't know either way. The other big question as I mentioned earlier is drivers. My desktop and laptop only have official Windows 7 drivers/software. No official drivers for Windows 8, much less Windows 10.

Chocu1a said:
So, here are a few questions for all the doomsayers out there:
Does Apple charge for it's newer versions of OSX? Do they charge you a subscription fee to keep using the upgraded os? Did the free os stop working after a year unless the user paid a subscription fee?
The answers are No, No, & No.
How is this possible, you might ask?

Taken from an Apple tech site when Maverick went free:

"It's important to consider other revenue that Apple receives in addition to the initial product purchase price, specifically app store revenue. By eliminating the cost to upgrade, they ensure that significantly more customers upgrade. These customers are then more likely to spend more in the app store, because apps are designed for the newest OS. I think it's pretty safe to say that Apple has performed a comprehensive analysis and determined that their total revenue will increase with the new plan."

Sounds like Windows saw a success with their competitor & jumped on the wagon.
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Except Apple also makes a good chunk of money selling the hardware. Aside from their Surface line, MS doesn't.
 
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Eug said:
Except Apple also makes a good chunk of money selling the hardware. Aside from their Surface line, MS doesn't.
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Microsoft makes a VERY good chunk of money from corporations, datacenters, OEMs, and cloud services. The mindshare and downstream finances they gain from this free Windows 10 move will pay off in ways that will probably make them wonder why they ever charged for the OS in the first place.
 
therealnickdanger said:
Microsoft makes a VERY good chunk of money from corporations, datacenters, OEMs, and cloud services. The mindshare and downstream finances they gain from this free Windows 10 move will pay off in ways that will probably make them wonder why they ever charged for the OS in the first place.
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I think that's what they're counting on. Or at least hoping.
 
therealnickdanger said:
Microsoft makes a VERY good chunk of money from corporations, datacenters, OEMs, and cloud services. The mindshare and downstream finances they gain from this free Windows 10 move will pay off in ways that will probably make them wonder why they ever charged for the OS in the first place.
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When MS says free upgrade i am not sure that applies to Businesses. They might still charge business but if Apple makes 30% on each app purchase MS might do the same and forgo the initial price of the OS for potentially more money later. Also MS is the underdog for mobile so free is a way to entice people to stay with MS from the desktop to mobile devices.

I am sure Valve is giving MS a cut of sales as well in order to be the platform of choice on the Xbox.

While i just got a new andriod tablet and do not play to move to MSFT 10 mobile, i am not doubting my decision as there could be strong reasons to go to Win10 on a tablet and phone.
 
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Chocu1a said:
One unified platform. Similar to what Apple does.
I think they have hopes of tying you to an app ecosystem with the windows store.
Click to expand...

Probably this. That said, Apple isn't as unified: iOS is a fork of OS X, but they are different OSes at the end of the day. Windows Phone seems to promise to be more closely related to its laptop/htpc/desktop brethren.

JimKiler said:
When MS says free upgrade i am not sure that applies to Businesses.
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Maybe? Businesses usually get volume licenses...and those are quite different. IIRC, you can't upgrade a volume licensed Win8 copy to 8.1?
 
I did some Googling around and it seems Office 2007 does install and run on Windows 10.

There are a few bugs reported, but that seems like precisely that - bugs - not Windows 10 dropping compatibility for Office 2007. Or at least I hope my supposition is true.
 
Eug said:
I did some Googling around and it seems Office 2007 does install and run on Windows 10.

There are a few bugs reported, but that seems like precisely that - bugs - not Windows 10 dropping compatibility for Office 2007. Or at least I hope my supposition is true.
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Its a 8yr old program. Stop being so cheap and get the new Office or 365. Or Libreoffice if you don't really need MS Office.
 
escrow4 said:
Its a 8yr old program. Stop being so cheap and get the new Office or 365. Or Libreoffice if you don't really need MS Office.
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its not really that simple, for most people who own 2007 there is ZERO reason to upgrade to a newer version if all they use is Word and Excel, which I would guess is most all most home users use, sure some use outlook but for them its not worth the price of the upgrade or learning something like libreoffice which they have prob never heard of
 
Anubis said:
its not really that simple, for most people who own 2007 there is ZERO reason to upgrade to a newer version if all they use is Word and Excel, which I would guess is most all most home users use, sure some use outlook but for them its not worth the price of the upgrade or learning something like libreoffice which they have prob never heard of
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While I agree here, it's also a bit silly to expect a company to go out of its way to support an ancient version of Office. But some old versions of Office - older than 2007 - still work IIRC.
 
Muadib said:
I can't get excited until I know what they plan to do after year one....
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What they plan to do with what? If you currently own 7 through 8.1 you get an upgrade, and everyone on Win10 gets new features for the life the device.

I don't get the constant posts about "after year one" - they're trying to drive adoption. After year one, they'll charge some amount for a Win10 license probably...but they made it clear this isn't some subscription model.
 
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