News Microsoft Says the Days of Free Windows 7 to 10 or 11 Updates Are Over

[ezst036]

A move to MacOS is more likely.

Agreed, and significantly so. However since Linux was announced to have reached 3% in July, it's now at 3.19% At that accelerated rate Linux will reach 4% faster than it hit 3, and 5% faster than it's going to hit 4. (and let's not forget that Linux hit 3 faster than it got 2%.)

Linux Hits All-Time High of 3% of Desktop PC Share After 30 Years

Linux achieves its highest market share ever.

www.tomshardware.com

Conversely, Mac seems to have plateaued. Being a sole-provider has its hard limitations that Apple will be very challenged to overcome. Linux OTOH can run on anything including Macs.

That makes Mac the hare and Linux the tortoise. Slow on the uptake but there's no real limit.

 

[3tank]

You guys that Microst was going to let you upgrade for free and not pay to have your personal information and data stolen by them and fed to Big Brother and their advertising partners?

 

[USAFRet]

You guys that Microst was going to let you upgrade for free and not pay to have your personal information and data stolen by them and fed to Big Brother and their advertising partners?

To be clear, they are finally cutting off the free upgrade from an OS purchased 14 years ago (Win 7), to an OS that was released 8 years ago (Win 10)

That free upgrade was in place for 8 years.

Or should they just support free upgrades forever?

 

[hotaru.hino]

You guys that Microst was going to let you upgrade for free and not pay to have your personal information and data stolen by them and fed to Big Brother and their advertising partners?

What personal information? All of my Microsoft Account's information can't be identified to me because I didn't put any of my actual personal information down.

Until companies start requiring government issued IDs to be inputted into their system, there's nothing stopping you from entering false information.

 

[stonecarver]

Not bad when you look at it this way from 2009's windows 7 key we got give or take 4,628 days use out of that key.

 

[computerdave911]

Microsoft has issued a statement marking the end of free updates from Windows 7 and 8.X to Windows 10 and 11, but free upgrades from Windows 10 to 11 are still encouraged.

Microsoft Says the Days of Free Windows 7 to 10 or 11 Updates Are Over : Read more

i just did one for a customer today, its still working, i see nothing from microsoft online only from other people not being able to activate release preview,, so it could be a rumor , my guess is its only going to block windows 11 23h2

 

[WrongRookie]

I don't get it why would you want to use os that is old and doesn't get updates?

Eventually a Windows platform stops getting updated and that alone is enough to move to the next os. I'm surprised they kept this long for 20 years.

 

[USAFRet]

I don't get it why would you want to use os that is old and doesn't get updates?

Eventually a Windows platform stops getting updated and that alone is enough to move to the next os. I'm surprised they kept this long for 20 years.

This is about no longer being able to use a Windows 7 license to activate a new Win 10 or 11 install.

 

[WrongRookie]

This is about no longer being able to use a Windows 7 license to activate a new Win 10 or 11 install.

But the users who bought a license to get a free upgrade to windows 10 or 11 using 7 had atleast 10 years time to move over to atleast 10.

Them not doing that doesn't sound like they had no intention of moving over to the latest oses to begin with. In which case I mean..I can't see the appeal of using a very old os that's out of date.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

But the users who bought a license to get a free upgrade to windows 10 or 11 using 7 had atleast 10 years time to move over to atleast 10.

Them not doing that doesn't sound like they had no intention of moving over to the latest oses to begin with. In which case I mean..I can't see the appeal of using a very old os that's out of date.

This is NOT the thread in which to debate this. This thread is simply all about Microsoft finally putting an end to the ability to use those old keys for upgrade purposes. Please keep all comments restricted to that topic.

 

[WrongRookie]

Ok I apologize for not talking about the actual context.

That said...its odd that Microsoft says this only for there to still be possible to upgrade without a key?

 

[dimar]

Why does Microsoft need to make a statement at all? MS can do whatever it wants anyway. It doesn't make any sense.

 

[Tac 25]

in reply to the OP.

those who want to upgrade from 7 to 10 or 11 should have upgraded for free by now. There was a long time that it was free. The few still using 7 probably have an important reason, and don't plan to upgrade at all.

all the three pc here in my house are already on Windows 10. Reason for upgrading is so that I could play Dead or Alive VI in all of them. Game requires W10 to be installed. Anyway, one of the pc's, the oldest one.. can still boot with W7, it has W7 on a separate HDD - because I have an old Xbox game that require W7 to be able to start.

 

[computerdave911]

i just upgraded a hp today from 8 to 10, i dont think this applies to OEM computers,
cheers,

 

[Jagwired]

The TPM requirement for Windows 11 was a bad decision by Microsoft. They should have started requiring TPM in later versions of Windows 10 to force manufactures to include TPM hardware. Tons of people with perfectly good PCs are excluded because of the Windows 11 TPM requirement.

 

[froggx]

To be clear, they are finally cutting off the free upgrade from an OS purchased 14 years ago (Win 7), to an OS that was released 8 years ago (Win 10)

That free upgrade was in place for 8 years.

Or should they just support free upgrades forever?

is there a particular reason not to? i doubt there's any real overhead to doing so, otherwise they would have cut this off years ago. at this point it's kind of like "why now? why bother at all?" it might even be net negative because people seem to be taking this poorly. most people wouldn't use the upgrade now, but they had gotten used to the idea that they could use it, so the interpretation ends up "microsoft is taking this 'valuable feature' away from me."

instead of trying to get people to stop clinging to this expired Win7 upgrade offer, microsoft should just announce that they'll keep the keys valid forever and play it kinda like Android and say "once you buy windows once, get upgrades forever; a commitment we've had for the past 15ish years (*massive block of disclaimers in small print goes here*)." it's disingenuous, but it'll play a lot better than this "end of free Win10 upgrades, we aren't kidding this time" announcement.

The TPM requirement for Windows 11 was a bad decision by Microsoft. They should have started requiring TPM in later versions of Windows 10 to force manufactures to include TPM hardware. Tons of people with perfectly good PCs are excluded because of the Windows 11 TPM requirement.

you realize that'd also exclude people using computers without TPM from upgrading to later Win10 versions, right?

 

[TJ Hooker]

The TPM requirement for Windows 11 was a bad decision by Microsoft. They should have started requiring TPM in later versions of Windows 10 to force manufactures to include TPM hardware. Tons of people with perfectly good PCs are excluded because of the Windows 11 TPM requirement.

That's exactly what they did.

Microsoft just made hardware encryption part of Windows 10’s minimum requirements

A Trusted Platform Module chip is dedicated entirely to encryption, helping keep information secure. Microsoft now requires one for all Windows 10 devices.

www.digitaltrends.com

If you bought a prebuilt PC that came with Windows 10 within the last ~7 years, it will meet the Windows 11 TPM requirement.

That requirement is typically met with a FW-based TPM (filling in for a dedicated HW TPM), which is supported by pretty much any CPU released within the last ~7 years. Even my 2015 Skylake (Intel 6th gen) build supports TPM 2.0.

 

[Amdlova]

Got one cheap OEM windows 10 key, upgrade to 11 and go back to Windows 10 again. The activation is Linked to my e-mail. Only draw back only works with US-EN not working my mother language PT-BR heuheuhue

 

[Amdlova]

That's exactly what they did.

Microsoft just made hardware encryption part of Windows 10’s minimum requirements

A Trusted Platform Module chip is dedicated entirely to encryption, helping keep information secure. Microsoft now requires one for all Windows 10 devices.

www.digitaltrends.com

If you bought a prebuilt PC that came with Windows 10 within the last ~7 years, it will meet the Windows 11 TPM requirement.

That requirement is typically met with a FW-based TPM (filling in for a dedicated HW TPM), which is supported by pretty much any CPU released within the last ~7 years. Even my 2015 Skylake (Intel 6th gen) build supports TPM 2.0.

Some people can install windows 11 with the supermicro TPM 2.0. Not cheap but may work