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Microsoft has announced that it will no longer be selling Windows 7 Home Basic, Home Premium and Ultimate to OEMs after the 31st of October. Mainstream support for the OS is also due to end a few months later, on the 13th of January 2015.
Windows 7 Professional edition will presumably remain available to OEMs as an end of supply date has yet to be established. This news isn't particularly surprising as retail supply for Windows 7 was cut off in October last year, although many retailers still have some remaining stock left. Microsoft usually pulls OEM supply of an OS a year after retail.
This news comes just a few days before Microsoft is expected to reveal the developer preview of Windows 9, which will supposedly release next year, the company has already sent out invites to its event on the 30th of September.
For those of you who plan to stick to Windows 7 for the foreseeable future though, while mainstream support ends at the start of next year, extended support, for small fixes and keeping the OS secure, will last until January 2020.
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KitGuru Says: Windows 7 still claims around 50 per cent market share, maybe Windows 9 will convince users to upgrade. How many of you guys are still using Windows 7? Are you planning on upgrading to Windows 9 next year?
Source: Microsoft
Ok… That is just stupid, a lot of my clients, firms and compaies use Windows 7 ..
Then use windows 8. It’s better than windows 7 in almost every way.
Yeah no, Windows 7 is by far better then windows 8. That peace of crap can die. http://www.davescomputertips.com/8-reasons-why-windows-8-sucks/
he means in performance not in the functionality…retard detected. windows 8>windows 7…….windows 7 is 20-30% slower then windows 8 due to the restrictions eg lower direct x support etc
I’ve just recently dumped Windows altogether, microsoft are really painting themselves into a corner here, I would not be surprised to see Windows 9 fail as badly as Windows 8, if not worse.
Luckily, as the article states, you can still get professional, and support for security will carry on til 2020, so i don’t really get what you’re complaining about…
Yea, i will never upgrade to Win8. I will however upgrade to 8.1
Yea, Win7 is far better than win8. Not Win8.1 tho..
FYI I meant 8.1. Anyway Win8.1 can have a startbar, and is a hell of a lot less resource intensive than Win7.
I wonder if I can still snatch up a VLK for it…
I think I may skip Windows 8 and jump straight to 9. Hopefully M-Soft will have learned their lesson with the next Windows release.
In terms of functionality Windows 8, and still Windows 8.1, is close to useless for anyone using it professionally. Sure, it’s fast and decent for gaming, but it adds seconds and minutes on to almost every process that was easy under Windows 7. No, as a network admin or solo you’d be much better (as most do) using an optimized and streamlined version of 7.
It’s looking usable at the moment. Not perfect, and not the nice descendant of 7 that we’d all like, but much better than 8 and probably good enough to drop the now aged 7.
Trust me, 8.1 really isn’t the improvement it’s cracked up to be. Sure, it’s better than 8, but that’s not hard. 8.1 was just a few quick fixes and patches that don’t add up to much.
I use windows 8.1 for school and it made some things faster for me than it would be otherwise. If you’re not smart enough to figure out windows 8 or 8.1, perhaps you should go to Mac.
I’ll be using the Dev Preview when it comes out on MSDN.
It has nothing to do with being ‘smart’. I teach at a University, and do graduate level research on ancient philosophy – I’m pretty sure that qualifies as smart. Never assume. I’m also quite capable of using Windows 8; I’m not saying I can’t use it, I’m simply stating that it’s bad for professionals, which is a fact. If you look at the planned take-up compared to the actual take up, it’s obvious many other institutions (like my own, in Liverpool), have come to the same conclusion. I’ve timed the amount of time it takes to do certain tasks, even basic ones – opening apps, using different windows, searching for programs – because of the convoluted UI then it actually takes considerably longer (as a longer process) than 7 even though it’s faster at the base level.
You’re telling me it takes longer on Windows 8 to press the windows key and start typing than it does on Windows 7? My Windows 8.1 laptop can find a program I type in faster than my gaming desktop on Windows 7 (maybe because I have too many files, but it’s a noticeable difference), as well as the fact that on Windows 8.1 I can search for any file and it will have a higher chance of it appearing than it would on my Windows 7 machine (also probably due to too many files… I should clear some things up). I have my metro on my laptop tiered to make it easy to find the apps I use most often (eclipse, notepad++, and gaming programs such as steam) and it takes me seconds to press the windows key and press the button.
Unless we’re talking higher level usage, which I have found to be a pain on Windows 8.1 (such as not being able to easily change fonts and other system things), unless you’re not good at organization and using the search function well, your opening of apps could take longer. Now, I’m talking about 8.1 of course, where I can have all the desktop apps I want and never even care about a metro app (though I do use them at times, mostly note-taking), so switching through windows and the like is quick and easy. I also have gestures set up on my touchpad to make it even easier, and I’ve never found myself overshooting or anything.
Perhaps you just need to have the system more customized to yourself, which I can see would be bad from a professional standpoint, but it’s just as easy if not easier than Windows 7 to do most functions.
(Please excuse the rant-length of this, I didn’t expect to type as much but I had a lot to say, also ancient philosophy sounds pretty cool)
windows 8 is not better than 7 who is this guy,adam you may have a touch screen but that all is what windows 8 is ,i like to be in control of my pc hitting apps is not to my liking ,i will still use windows 7 ,it is a good os
As a network admin the Windows+X shortcut menu has made everything faster for me
8.1 update 1 is where it’s at.
then obviuosly you dont use a computer in a professional environment. win 8.1 blows win7 garbage out of the water. My systems all run about 15-20% more efficiently since I switched them all to win8 and sold the copies of win7 to people I dont like
If you’d read my comment you’d know that I work with a PC in a professional environment every day. I also work with the local museum network, National Museums Liverpool, and having recently unwisely decided to ignore their staff and directorial guidance, they’ve just updated to 8.1. As a result most of the staff are inconvenienced. Licensing is also different for 8.1 on networks which means things like Photoshop now require individual licenses, meaning we now can’t afford it. I doubt you’re involved in serious network admin for a company, otherwise you’d realise that you can’t legally sell on copies of seven bought and registered for a company. I also can’t say this enough as clearly you’ve totally ignored my actual point, so I’ll capitalise to help you read: IT IS NOT ABOUT EFFICIENCY IN A NARROW SENSE, IT IS ABOUT EFFICIENCY IN A REAL SENSE. It doesn’t matter if programs take 25% less time to load if the ui forces you to go through more steps than before to access it, adding more than 25% of the time on. It really isn’t that hard to understand.
You have a touch pad – that kind of answers the question. 8 with keys/mouse is hell, and remains hell with 8.1. The vast majority of professional systems don’t have touchpads and are running on older tech. I’m talking about people who wouldn’t know how to set 8 up to work the way it should out of the box, and even if they knew probably wouldn’t have time. It’s no good saying ‘you can modify this or that’ because that’s not a defence of the OS. You can also modify 7 to give it similar speeds in most things to 8 – but that isn’t a defence of 7.