Who's sticking with Windows 7?

[Mellon Head]

I'm going to upgrade my copy of 8.1 to Windows 10, but I'm leaving my installation of 7 alone. I never use Win 8.1, so it's no loss to try out 10. If I like it, I might move everything over to 10, if not, I'll stay with 7 and continue to dual boot when I need to.

Nothing really excites me about Windows 10, especially the butt-ugly UI, but I'm going to try it out anyway.

 

[bigmck]

another factor is that i will be pretty close to 76 years old when eol for win 7 rolls around. if i can still remember how to turn a computer on and why i did, maybe i'll consider a update.

 

[FerchogtX]

Personally, I'm sticking with Windows 7 until I buy a new laptop... and even then, I will see if I can avoid Windows 10... I mean, I like all about Windows 10, looks way better than 8.1... but FORCED updates are a no no for me, I fear of Black Screens of Death, classic BSODS, hardware and software breakdown, and all what Microsoft had to face recently with failed updates...

Forced updates? No Windows 10 for me... sorry M$, you are just too negligent to take such a course, indeed, that looks a like a curse rather than a course...

An example of why this sucks? Android and KitKat... you surely know about the limitations about writting on the external SD card... and Lollipop is not better... and I had to flash an Xperia M2 back to factory Jellybean 4.3 just for that... What is the use to have a 32 GB external SD card if I cannot access my documents with any of my favourite apps?



P.S. Has anyone experimented with disabling Windows Update service alltogether? Seems like the only solution to not brick your current Windows 10 install with faulty patches...

 

[lehnerus2000]

No & Probably No

I won't be updating my desktop from W7 to W10 any time soon.

I haven't decided whether or not to update my laptop.

I was giving it strong consideration due to the lower resource usage.
The earlier W10 previews used ~30% less RAM than my W7 install.
I've noticed that the latest update uses the same amount of RAM that W7 does (thus nullifying that reason to update).

W10's mandatory automatic updates would mean that I'd have to create daily backup images, which is ridiculous.

It seems to me that the best way to run W10 will be as a VM (using something like VMware Workstation) because of the instant snapshot feature.

P.S. Has anyone experimented with disabling Windows Update service alltogether? Seems like the only solution to not brick your current Windows 10 install with faulty patches...

I'm predicting that a bunch of "Windows Update Blocker" programs will be released for W10.

Some of them might even be legitimate ...

 

[FerchogtX]

I'm predicting that a bunch of "Windows Update Blocker" programs will be released for W10.

Some of them might even be legitimate ...

You don't even need that... just go to services -> stop Windows Update and change startup to disabled... end of story... If you see an update wont brick your system, re-enable WU service and go on...
I guess I'm doing that in case I really need to use W10...

 

[Callender]

Windows 10 updates

I'm predicting that a bunch of "Windows Update Blocker" programs will be released for W10.

Some of them might even be legitimate ...

You don't even need that... just go to services -> stop Windows Update and change startup to disabled... end of story... If you see an update wont brick your system, re-enable WU service and go on...
I guess I'm doing that in case I really need to use W10...

The official method would appear to be to download the "Show or hide updates" troubleshooter from Microsoft and uninstall problem updates before hiding them.

More info here:

How to hide or block Windows or driver updates in Windows 10

Edit: Seems that it's only for the Windows 10 insider preview at the moment. Maybe something similar will be released. More info here:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3073930

 

[groze]

I'm predicting that a bunch of "Windows Update Blocker" programs will be released for W10.

Some of them might even be legitimate ...

You don't even need that... just go to services -> stop Windows Update and change startup to disabled... end of story... If you see an update wont brick your system, re-enable WU service and go on...
I guess I'm doing that in case I really need to use W10...

Not sure you can disable that service in windows 10. I think it was Brink that tried disabling windows update with group policy and the update still downloaded and installed.

 

[gregrocker]

I have been using Windows 10 since October and never really went back to using Windows 7 even though I continue to support it 4-6 hours per day. After the 8 debacle MS learned to value feedback, spent millions processing it and have come up with a worthy successor to Win7.

That said, there are tens of millions of consumers who are probably not going anywhere for now. This may be because they are simply comfortable with Windows 7 which is far and away the best OS ever. But I'm thinking more of the millions who clung to XP until the bitter end and only grudgingly migrated to Windows 7, yet have come to love it and now are either not of the age or tech enthusiastic enough to change yet again.

For years we have dealt with the XPirees here ranting about Windows 7 getting off their lawn. I suspect many more will now feel the same about Windows 10, particularly if they feel at all pressured, or there is not enough done to introduce them to Apps. Many were scared off by how App-centric Windows 8 was, so now that Apps are evenly integrated into the OS and can be added to the side of an expanding Start Menu, it will be a shame if those alienated by Windows 8 don't come back to at least trial the most useful apps like Mail, People, Calendar, News, Skype, OneDrive, etc. - especially since they have a competitive advantage of being updated right in the tile which is something Apple can't do.

I plan to stay with Win7 here at the top tech forums it built until traffic dies down enough to transition to Windows 10 support, when I will go to MS Community to join my colleagues who I worked together with to persuade MS of the mistakes made with Windows 8 and which they wonderfully corrected for Windows 10, a truly worthy successor to the best OS of all time. Some day the inside story of this course correction will be told.

 

[Layback Bear]

I'm thinking the most Windows 7 users are like me; came from XP.
Yes I like XP-Pro a lot.
Once after doing some research I decide to go to Windows 7/64 H.P.
In just a few weeks I was sure I was a Windows 7 user for sure.
I could do what I wanted to do with Windows 7 and I could snoop under the hood and even do more things.
It didn't take me long to figure out Windows 7 didn't need or want a lot of tweaking like the old XP.
I was even happier with Windows 7 when I found this forum.

Learning Windows 7 to me was easy; I'm still learning.

My point is just because I or someone else doesn't jump on the Windows 10 band wagon from the get go doesn't mean we are Windows 10 haters.
When the time comes and after a lot of research I will buy Windows 10 if is worth the money spent and meets my needs and desires.
This free Windows 10 is nothing but B/S by Microsoft to get the numbers up so it don't end up like Windows 8.

The question to me, is Windows 10 worth buying.
Rotten potatoes are free but I still don't want them but I will pay for good potatoes.

 

[GokAy]

I will dual boot Win10 I believe. On both desktop (Ultimate) and laptop (H.Prem.) I have Win10 10240 as dual boot. I did reserve on laptop even though I won't switch for the time being. I also have a Home and another H.Premium license which I plan to upgrade (and possibly pay to upgrade to the Pro version later). It is still too early for me to decide ultimately on this issue.

 

[Boozad]

While I'm upgrading two machines from 7 Pro and Ultimate and keeping 7 Pro with an Insider 10 dual boot I'll still buy at least one retail copy. It's juct pushing the button at the time the prices are best that matters.

 

[ThrashZone]

I'll sit on the fence for now
I removed build 10164 thinking I'd just replace it with the newer iso but there isn't one or M$ hasn't posted it yet :/
The download link has changed possibly the iso's are not going to be offered anymore ?
https://insider.windows.com/

 

[Arc]

I will go for windows 10. But not as an insider, most probably.

My laptop (windows 8.1) is ready for getting the free upgrade. Using the insider preview build 10240 on the desktop. Soon I will take the formal way to get windows 10 upgrade on it too.

 

[michael diemer]

Leaning against it. I was excited to hear about the free upgrade, but now it appears that it will not be possible to dual-boot. I won't risk losing Windows 7. I had no interest in 8. It seems that it's all about connecting these days, the hell with how things look. Vista and Seven are beautiful, 8 and 10 ugly. But that's the way the world is going. Aesthetics? Most don't even know what the word means anymore.

 

[groze]

Leaning against it. I was excited to hear about the free upgrade, but now it appears that it will not be possible to dual-boot. I won't risk losing Windows 7. I had no interest in 8. It seems that it's all about connecting these days, the hell with how things look. Vista and Seven are beautiful, 8 and 10 ugly. But that's the way the world is going. Aesthetics? Most don't even know what the word means anymore.

I am triple booting with 10 right now. You are kind of correct you need to do the dual booting a little differently though but it is possible. I boot with 7, 10 and Xubuntu and use grub as my boot manager. I have done a lot testing on this. I ran into some issues with booting but I got it fixed.

 

[Boozad]

7 and 10 dual boot just fine. I've been doing it for months.

 

[gregrocker]

Agree. Dual Booting is no problem, configured during install of second OS or add missing OS using EasyBCD.

You can include Linux in the Windows Boot Menu following Dual boot Ubuntu-Win7:

Even before the advent of WUBI I used to run my Linux installs using the Windows Bootloader

All you need to do here is when installing Linux ensure that you use the advanced options and load grub to the Actual Linux Partition, rather than the active partition, and use EasyBCD to add the grub loader to the Windows Bootloader.

As my primary Operating System will always be Windows this enabled me to keep control of the bootloader.

I often run multiple windows operating systems on one PC so this method this makes things a lot more controlled

 

[michael diemer]

My concern is not whether dual-booting is possible, but rather that Microsoft is not going to allow it. They're giving it away, after all. The idea is your 7 license is consumed if you accept the upgrade. While they may not have enforced this with earlier upgrades, my sense is they mean business this time. I'm not taking any chances, I like Seven too much.

 

[GokAy]

Well, true somewhat. Your Windows 7 key won't be deactivated. It is just that you won't be able to use them at the same time with dual booting. If you image/backup Windows 7, then you can go back to it easily without reinstalling. This is my understanding as of current.

 

[groze]

I triple boot legally. I have windows 7 retail on partition 1 and on partition 2 Windows 10 upgraded from windows 7 oem. It worked better that way.