Railfan Technology > Microsoft news.

https://yro.slashdot.org/story/18/02/19/1550230/man-seeking-new-copy-of-windows-7-after-forced-windows-10-upgrade-sues-microsoft

Ho Hum

I'm not surprised at all. Some company sued MS about a year ago for their forced upgrade to Windows 10.

There were a number of products available to block the forced upgrade for those that knew what was about to happen. For the unwary, MS surreptitiously loaded Windows 10 onto Windows 7/8/8.1 users one small piece at a time. After a couple of weeks, users would turn on their computer, or perhaps be forced into a reboot and be greeted with a 'Welcome to Windows 10' screen. That happened to a friend for whom I had replaced their XP laptop with a Windows 7 laptop and 2-3 weeks later, she got upgraded, without a recovery path.

While I wouldn't mind if Chrysler Corp quietly upgraded my CAR to a 2018 model, screwing with my computer will not result in a happy 'customer', aka, screwee. It's also widely publicized that Microsoft has made deals with various computer and component manufacturers to NOT offer Windows 7/8/8.1 device drivers for their new products. I call that COLLUSION, how about you?

BRAtkinson Wrote:
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> It's also widely publicized that
> Microsoft has made deals with various computer and
> component manufacturers to NOT offer Windows
> 7/8/8.1 device drivers for their new products. I
> call that COLLUSION, how about you?

How about posting the whole story? The real truth.

Technology marches on.

What IS going to happen is new processing technology being introduced that requires new extensive coding. What is NOT going to happen is vendors are NOT going to spend mega time and money on R&D to come up with the needed updates for backward compatibly on a steadily decreasing number of older systems.

BTW, that is common normal business practice in the technology world. I would never expect new versions of software or operating systems to work on hardware that is 10 years old or more.

So your claim of collusion is one of simple not accepting what the future brings.

jst3751 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> How about posting the whole story? The real truth.
>
> Technology marches on.
>
Here's a link to an article from a year ago that is one of several I've read in the past 2 years or so about Intel and other vendors not supplying Win 7/8/8.1 drivers for upcoming gear.

https://www.theverge.com/2016/1/16/10780876/microsoft-windows-support-policy-new-processors-skylake

While I understand the business model of old designs being phased out and no longer supported such as writing Windows XP drivers for the new Intel chips, by prematurely preventing Win 7 users from using newer equipment while Win 7 is still fully supported is collusion, or corporate pressure, if you'd prefer. Intel and other companies have always produced 'backdated' drivers for older, not-the-most-current versions of Windows whenever they came out with something new. While restricting new drivers to Windows 10 only is 'good business' from Microsofts' viewpoint, the customers are forced to endure difficult to learn and oftentimes expensive conversions so Microsoft can make an extra buck or two.

They did it to me and I called their tech and he told me how to "uninstall" the upgrade. Its my computer dammit, leave it alone except for essential security upgrades.

I cheerfully maintain an old laptop with Windows 7, never connected to the internet in its entire life. Runs the old versions of Photoshop Elements, older versions of Word and Excel.

It only talks to the outside world via sneakernet, using thumb drives.

BRAtkinson Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> While I understand the business model of old
> designs being phased out and no longer supported
> such as writing Windows XP drivers for the new
> Intel chips, by prematurely preventing Win 7 users
> from using newer equipment while Win 7 is still
> fully supported is collusion, or corporate
> pressure, if you'd prefer. Intel and other
> companies have always produced 'backdated' drivers
> for older, not-the-most-current versions of
> Windows whenever they came out with something new.
> While restricting new drivers to Windows 10 only
> is 'good business' from Microsofts' viewpoint, the
> customers are forced to endure difficult to learn
> and oftentimes expensive conversions so Microsoft
> can make an extra buck or two.

Hate to burst your bubble, but main stream (primary normal) support for Windows 7 ended 3 years ago. Main stream (primary/normal) support for Windows 8.1 ended a month ago.

So no, it is right on schedule. The only thing covered under extended support (Windows 7 until January 14, 2020 and Windows 8.1 until January 10, 2023) are security updates.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/18 12:35 by jst3751.

Offline with Windows 7 is a good setup !

My Windows 7 at home works just fine. I don't care about "support". They still do security updates.
Windows 10 sucks.

joemvcnj Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My Windows 7 at home works just fine. I don't care
> about "support". They still do security updates.
> Windows 10 sucks.

Yep

joemvcnj Wrote:
> Windows 10 sucks.

I thought 8 and 8.1 sucked when I encountered it on a friends computer. 10 is even worse. Add to that the fact that most home users of Windows 10 have no choice whatsoever of what updates will be applied and when...including a significant number of 'tracking' and 'telemetry' updates they tried to stuff down 7/8/8.1 users computers.

Thanks, but no thanks. I'll stick with 64-bit Win 7 Pro on my big box and laptop, and XP on my 'gotta keep it for some applications' box.

march_hare Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I cheerfully maintain an old laptop with Windows
> 7, never connected to the internet in its entire
> life. Runs the old versions of Photoshop
> Elements, older versions of Word and Excel.
>
> It only talks to the outside world via sneakernet,
> using thumb drives.

Windows 7 is still supported by Microsoft, tentatively until 2020, so there's no need to be paranoid with that version. Support has officially ended for Vista and older versions (including XP), so you're welcome to "Sneaker Net" those older ones, if you must.

I absolutely refused all "FREE" offers for Windows 10 Upgrade, so none of my Windows 7 machines were molested. More people need to be cynical, then they won't be suckered or baited.

BRAtkinson Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It's also widely publicized that
> Microsoft has made deals with various computer and
> component manufacturers to NOT offer Windows
> 7/8/8.1 device drivers for their new products. I
> call that COLLUSION, how about you?

You might want to get your Windows versions correct, so you have an ounce of credibility when you make accusations. Your comment below implies Vista is older than XP (not true). It's also widely known that Vista had more compatibility issues than XP:

There's no way it will work under Windows 10...it won't even load because it was designed for Windows 3 through Vista...maybe XP.

(Your comment from the "Windows 10 and Photo shope" thread)

Anyway, I'm not disagreeing with your collusion comment. Tech industry has baited consumers with "new features shell game" for two decades now, but the novelty is wearing off, and Moore's Law is slowing down, so the industry is now being more forceful. I guess the drug pushers are now playing hardball. :-)

cchan006 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Anyway, I'm not disagreeing with your collusion
> comment. Tech industry has baited consumers with
> "new features shell game" for two decades now, but
> the novelty is wearing off, and Moore's Law is
> slowing down, so the industry is now being more
> forceful. I guess the drug pushers are now playing
> hardball. :-)

And if you don't like the drugs they're pushing there's always Linux.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/22/18 06:39 by newtonville150.

cchan006 Wrote:

>
> You might want to get your Windows versions
> correct, so you have an ounce of credibility when
> you make accusations. Your comment below implies
> Vista is older than XP (not true). It's also
> widely known that Vista had more compatibility
> issues than XP:
>
> There's no way it will work under Windows 10...it
> won't even load because it was designed for
> Windows 3 through Vista...maybe XP.
>
> (Your comment from the "Windows 10 and Photo
> shope" thread)
>
Thanks for the flame job. Let's see how good your memory is when you're 70, like me.

newtonville150 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> cchan006 Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Anyway, I'm not disagreeing with your collusion
> > comment. Tech industry has baited consumers
> with
> > "new features shell game" for two decades now,
> but
> > the novelty is wearing off, and Moore's Law is
> > slowing down, so the industry is now being more
> > forceful. I guess the drug pushers are now
> playing
> > hardball. :-)
>
> And if you don't like the drugs they're pushing
> there's always Linux.

Sorry -- not practical, because there is NO support at ALL for Linux for ordinary home users like me. If there were, I would go to Linux in a heartbeat. I cannot stand Microsoft's arrogance and cruelty. (I wonder how long it will be before Microsoft has made all theircomputers so frustrating and hard to use that ordinary users, and even people in businesses, find they have become impossible to use?)

No one has yet mentioned the two "creators updates" Microsoft has forced on Windows 10 users. They are NOT "updates", but are new versions of Windows, and should have been named "Windows 11`" and "Windows 12". the "update" that was released in the fall of 2016 deleted all the users customized settings and returned all setting to factory settings. What a pain that was to fix! Then they released ANOTHER "creators update" last fall (2017), but this time it had many parts that were completely incompatible with machines that were not almost brand-new. Many computers could not even boot up after that last "update", and the only way around that was to -- you guessed it! -- buy a new computer! Even computers only a year or less old stopped being able to work. Dell (and other computer manufacturers) must be really making a mint off of THAT!
And if THAT is NOT collusion, I don't know WHAT is! Disgusting!

And, in response to the comments about planned obsoleting of older things being a "normal" business practice, I say that that is completely unethical ad cruel to all of us customers. Unfortunately, Microsoft is not alone in being arrogant and cruel to its customers. "Take it or leave it, bozo!" seems to be the usual attitude for some time now that almost all top managers in almost all businesses now have towards their customers. What a shame!

Margaret_SP_fan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sorry -- not practical, because there is NO
> support at ALL for Linux for ordinary home users
> like me. If there were, I would go to Linux in a
> heartbeat. I cannot stand Microsoft's arrogance
> and cruelty. (I wonder how long it will be before
> Microsoft has made all theircomputers so
> frustrating and hard to use that ordinary users,
> and even people in businesses, find they have
> become impossible to use?)

I have two desktop computers that have both been running versions of Linux Mint
since 2009, and a laptop that runs Windows 10 (was delivered with Windows 8.1.)
I liked Windows 7, but I've not had any significant problems with Windows 10 or Linux Mint.
The whole point of Linux is that it's community supported...though to be honest I've
not really needed any support...everything just "works".

BRAtkinson Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Thanks for the flame job. Let's see how good your
> memory is when you're 70, like me.

It's not age. Many people RUSH to post their responses. Often times, I'm late to respond, because I double-check to make sure what I remember is correct, and I often qualify some of my comments as guesses and speculations.

So maybe we can all learn and make all the threads on TO better?

> I cannot stand Microsoft's arrogance
> and cruelty.

Yet most people refuse to acknowledge the monopolistic approach that Apple uses for its computers.

> No one has yet mentioned the two "creators
> updates" Microsoft has forced on Windows 10 users.

There are/were published ways to avoid those.

> They are NOT "updates", but are new versions of
> Windows, and should have been named "Windows 11`"
> and "Windows 12".

Actually Windows 10.16xx and 10.17xx

> the "update" that was released
> in the fall of 2016 deleted all the users
> customized settings and returned all setting to
> factory settings. What a pain that was to fix!

Very true and a very big problem.

> Then they released ANOTHER "creators update" last
> fall (2017), but this time it had many parts that
> were completely incompatible with machines that
> were not almost brand-new. Many computers could
> not even boot up after that last "update", and the
> only way around that was to -- you guessed it! --
> buy a new computer!

True, there was not extensive hardware checks run before the update was run, which if had been done would have prevented the update from being installed on incompatible hardware. Microsoft muffed up big time on this.

> Even computers only a year or
> less old stopped being able to work.

Maybe they have been newer computers, but the hardware in them were already reaching the EOL. That is a fault of the computer MFG for selling computers using hardware that is already reaching end of EOL.

> Dell (and
> other computer manufacturers) must be really
> making a mint off of THAT!
> And if THAT is NOT collusion

While it is certainly poor business practice, collusion it is not.

> And, in response to the comments about planned
> obsoleting of older things being a "normal"
> business practice, I say that that is completely
> unethical ad cruel to all of us customers.

So, you think a manufacture should be required to support something made 10, 15, 20 years ago? Where does it stop?

> Unfortunately, Microsoft is not alone in being
> arrogant and cruel to its customers. "Take it or
> leave it, bozo!" seems to be the usual attitude
> for some time now that almost all top managers in
> almost all businesses now have towards their
> customers. What a shame!

Apple has that attitude. So does CSX, UP, BNSF, and about a million other companies. It is an unfortunate decline in the mind set of the United States.