There is only one word on my mind: "idiots".

This whole "planned obsolescence" crap is borderline trash for paid software. I can understand it for FOSS stuff like Linux, but Windows? Don't they get enough revenue to continue support for even atleast XP?

Yet another Windows-related date being completely blown out of proportion by idiots.

Windows 7 is entering extended support.

All that means is that it won't receive any new features, and tech support for retail store-bought copies is no longer free. That's it. It's still getting critical bug fixes, it's still getting security updates, and you'll probably still be able to buy it for a while.

Which is to say, dear Internet, please un-bunch your collective panties.

Come on, there will be five more years of security patches. As much as I'm sorry that XP is not supported any more working for a software company myself I understand that supporting several versions of your product at the same time is a big PITA. The actual problem is that compatibility is not good enough.

Mainstream support has ended for Windows 7, but Extended support continues for another 5 years. This means there'll still be security updates and product information updates related to Windows 7. There's simply no more free tech support for basic issues (which not a lot of people take advantage of anyways), no more new features, and no more changes to the overall design.

Also, their policy takes into account if it takes longer than expected to release new product updates. IE: If Windows 8 was only JUST being released, it wouldn't be until 2017 that mainstream Windows 7 support would expire, and 2022 for extended support.

I know it seems somewhat silly to arbitrarily set dates on how software support is addressed, but consider that many companies which produce software just up-and-up stop supporting older versions out of the blue without warning, which can be a rather annoying thing to go through, especially if you just recently bought an older copy of something. At least you get a minimum of two years warning with Microsoft, plus whatever lead-time you have on news of newer versions.

By the way, have you read the What is the difference between mainstream support and extended support? section at the same page? They say the second lasts longer. OK, Microsoft, is that ALL the difference?

They better come up with some really compelling reasons to upgrade to Windows 10 because they are still stinging from the mass rejections of Vista and Windows 8. Windows 7 was the only product of the last several years that was actually accepted by the masses. If Windows 10 turns out to be "teh suxx0rz", I don't know how much longer Microsoft can stop people from converting en masse to some flavor of Linux. Killing off support for Windows 7 without having a product on the market that people are willing to upgrade to may be the final nail in the coffin.

But not adding more features is bad enough. The truth is Windows 8 sucks the big one.
Win 10 looks better so far but still nothing compared to 7.

If Microsoft keeps it up for long, they are going to drive people to Linux.
Once software devs start making more software for Linux, it is the beginning of the slide for MS

Caa mon..
Are we really complaining?

Died? It's like you couldn't use it anymore.
But remember that windows 98 and XP installation CDs haven't been magically destroyed yet

smeezekitty wrote:

Once software devs start making more software for Linux, it is the beginning of the slide for MS

Or once wine is usable out of the box (which imo, isn't too far from happennng in a bunch of years)

mirh wrote:

smeezekitty wrote:

Once software devs start making more software for Linux, it is the beginning of the slide for MS

Or once wine is usable out of the box (which imo, isn't too far from happennng in a bunch of years)

Last time I tried it, it still had ways to go. There is still a lot of unimplemented functionality.
Also, it was slow

I just upgraded from windows 7 to 8.1 a few mins ago. But its amazing to me how fast something can become obsolete.

"obsolete" is a funny word.

ahendricks18 wrote:

I just downgraded from windows 7 to 8.1 a few mins ago. But its amazing to me how fast something can become obsolete.

FTFY

Nobody complained when XP's mainstream (not extended) support expired, nor did they when support expired for 95, 98, 2000, and so on.

But now suddenly everyone starts whining how the world is going to end now that Microsoft won't bring new features to a 6 year old OS and how everyone has to pay to get phone support now. The writing has been on the wall since the release date.

And somehow everyone is quiet about Google, which leaves millions of users in the cold after only 3 years without any form of prior announcement - while they are probably able to fix this flaw by pushing an update using Google Play Services, bypassing OEM's and carriers - but they don't feel like doing that.

3 years? At one point Android phones stopped receiving updates well before a 2 year subsidized phone contract expired. Patched ROMs can pick up the slack in some cases, but some phones have locked boot loaders (I'm looking at you Motorola Mobility).

Kaasschaaf wrote:

Nobody complained when XP's mainstream (not extended) support expired, nor did they when support expired for 95, 98, 2000, and so on.

But now suddenly everyone starts whining how the world is going to end now that Microsoft won't bring new features to a 6 year old OS and how everyone has to pay to get phone support now. The writing has been on the wall since the release date.

And somehow everyone is quiet about Google, which leaves millions of users in the cold after only 3 years without any form of prior announcement - while they are probably able to fix this flaw by pushing an update using Google Play Services, bypassing OEM's and carriers - but they don't feel like doing that.

When XPs support expired, there was an OS out that didn't epicly suck (Windows 7)

Now the last MS OS that doesn't suck is about to have mainstream support expire. It isn't about how old it is. Its about how many
users it has and how terrible its replacement is.

And people are hardly being quiet about Google and Android. Its all over the tech news sites.

Kaasschaaf wrote:

And somehow everyone is quiet about Google, which leaves millions of users in the cold after only 3 years without any form of prior announcement - while they are probably able to fix this flaw by pushing an update using Google Play Services, bypassing OEM's and carriers - but they don't feel like doing that.

Please, don't start to compare ARM and x86 operating systems...
Things are really different there, not last update delivery.

And btw if you read your article it mentions that webview component can be remotely updated only since 5.0. So Google would be on its own for affected jelly been and below versions

smeezekitty wrote:

When XPs support expired, there was an OS out that didn't epicly suck (Windows 7)

By the time 7 was out, the majority of computers was Vista-level. compared to 3 years before...
And by the time 7 was out (and still today) Vista is nothing different than a diverse skin of 7

When XPs support expired, there was an OS out that didn't epicly suck (Windows 7)

By the time 7 was out, the majority of computers was Vista-level. compared to 3 years before...
And by the time 7 was out (and still today) Vista is nothing different than a diverse skin of 7[/quote]

Right. But Vista really isn't that bad.
Heck I am running Vista now. Microsoft messed up by saying 512MB RAM minimum
because it led to lots of unusable machines being pumped out by OEM.

But Windows 8 doesn't have very much adoption

I bought Windows 7 Ultimate retail.
I think it was the last OS I ever buy.

I have loads of Windows XP OEM licenses and perhaps 10 each of Vista and Windows 7 OEM licenses from different broken laptops and other dumpster finds. I will keep using Windows 7 with my online systems but when it isnt practical any more I will make the move to random nix OS.

This has nothing to do with me hating Microsoft or anything like that but Im not very found of the "modern Internet" with APP stores, adds, bloat and massive information gathering. With an open source OS you at least have some control over the crap you are running, well if you take the time to read the docs that is.

In the far future I think I will end up in a cottage in northern Sweden without Internet or a cell phone living a 100% offline life.