Downunder Posted June 2, 2015 Share Posted June 2, 2015 Microsoft are offering me Windows 10 for free it seems. Should I take up their offer? Currently Windows 7. [ATTACH]47646._xfImport[/ATTACH] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlyingVizsla Posted June 2, 2015 Share Posted June 2, 2015 I got the offer on my toolbar too. Yesterday, clicking on "Learn more on Windows.com" took me to a Page Not Found. Now, my biggest question, one that they can't (or won't) answer is what software & drivers are available for Win 10 and what backward functionality does it have. When I upgraded to Win7 I had to ditch my Canon laser printer (a $2,500 investment) and my modem because no drivers have been written for Win7, not even by a 3rd party. Also to go the way of the dinosaur were several programs from smaller software houses that couldn't or wouldn't keep up with development to the next iteration of Windoze. Notice that MS have skipped Win 9 and gone straight to 10. The offer is also to users with pirated versions of Win7 to get them back into the fold officially. I won't upgrade until I know I won't lose my critical programs and peripherals. Sue Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
old man emu Posted June 2, 2015 Share Posted June 2, 2015 I'm running Win 8.1 on the house computers and XP on the workshop one. I have a handy little freeware program for drawing wiring diagrams that runs like a dream on XP (and Win &, I'm told) but it has a known glitch that stops it saving, exporting or opening files. Now I have to spend the night out in the cold to finish my wiring diagrams. I really think that MS only keeps upgrading Windows to keep its employees in a job. Does anyone know if LINUX has been upgraded to operate in a 64 bit environment? OME Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Birdseye Posted June 2, 2015 Share Posted June 2, 2015 Does anyone know if LINUX has been upgraded to operate in a 64 bit environment?OME Yes, lots of various flavours in 64 bit available. According to my Win 10 offer, it won't be available for download before the end of July. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kgwilson Posted June 2, 2015 Share Posted June 2, 2015 All Win 8 users get the free upgrade as well it seems. Windows 8 has had such a bad rap with its foray into touch screen market when 95% of users are businesses & those who want to keep the mouse & keyboard architecture. The tiles system and annoying Charms coming up are the major issues. I have installed Classic shell with Win 8.1 so the look & feel is more like Win 7 or you can choose the XP look as well. Win 10 brings back the Start menu. I'd wait a while before diving into a new version. Even with the Beta version being tested by many it won't be until the live environment is given a good thrashing by hundreds of thousands of users that all the bugs will raise their ugly heads. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted June 2, 2015 Share Posted June 2, 2015 sue, you can install virtualbox, which creates a virtual PC running an older versions of windows on your PC. The general rule of thumb with windows is don't upgrade to the new version until they release a service pack. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neil_S Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 The general rule of thumb with windows is don't upgrade to the new version until they release a service pack. Amen to that..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
webbm Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Amen to that..... I don't follow that these days. Microsoft releases patches from initial release and after service packs - not to mention more service packs. I have found since Windows 7 that their first releases have been pretty good. Even after 3 service packs, you'll still see critical patches released. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pearo Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 All Win 8 users get the free upgrade as well it seems. Windows 8 has had such a bad rap with its foray into touch screen market when 95% of users are businesses & those who want to keep the mouse & keyboard architecture. The tiles system and annoying Charms coming up are the major issues. I have installed Classic shell with Win 8.1 so the look & feel is more like Win 7 or you can choose the XP look as well. Win 10 brings back the Start menu. I'd wait a while before diving into a new version. Even with the Beta version being tested by many it won't be until the live environment is given a good thrashing by hundreds of thousands of users that all the bugs will raise their ugly heads. I bought an asus touchsreen notebook a while back. Thought the touchscreen was marketing gimick that I would never use. Guess what, I hate using notebooks that are not touchscreen now!! It took a bit to get used to the win 8 thing, and I am guessing that most people who a windows powerusers (like myself) probably did not like it. But as a developer, I make a point of learning to use software out of the box, because thats what most of my user base will do. Once I get used to it, I tend to find it harder to go backwards. I don't follow that these days. Microsoft releases patches from initial release and after service packs - not to mention more service packs. I have found since Windows 7 that their first releases have been pretty good. Even after 3 service packs, you'll still see critical patches released. I reckon MS does pretty good these days. Vista was a bit of a cockup (there was mamoth changes under the hood with vista), but win 7 and win 8 was good. It will be interesting to see how win 10 goes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Pearo, my mum has the asus zenbook and whenever I hand her my $300 netbook I use for photos, she swipes the screen, every single time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arron25 Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Have been running 10 on test units since it was released to the Insider Program. It has its ups and downs throught the development versions, but most of the early bugs have been eliminated with the latest build to the point that I have now changed my main personal PC to 10 so to get the 'real world' feel.. I should be good when released.. there is an article some where that basically said 7+8=10. There was a long involved reason given for skipping '9' for the media frenzie, but the simple boring reason was to not cause naming confusion with Windows 95/98.. The biggest problem with original '8 was the out of the box 'Metro' screen that just frightened the loud mouth Windows Critic pureists ( read stick in the muds) that they canned it without actually bothering to do proper testing.. no real installer ever left the units they setup that way, as with the addition of two or three third party additions it once again looked and felt like '7.. but with the major advantage of the visable speed increase .. At the latest update 8.1.x MS has fixed nearly all the 'concerns'. Now 99% of machines I sell are Win8.1. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dutchroll Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Microsoft are offering me Windows 10 for free it seems. Should I take up their offer?Currently Windows 7. Do what I did after 20 years of DOS/Windows tinkering and building my own PCs. Finally get fed up and buy a Mac. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlyingVizsla Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Lyle, how confident are you that Canon, Brother, HP and Belkin will have Win 10 drivers by July? My Win 7 (64) experience left me with no printers, scanner or modem. I don't want to be buying new peripherals, if I can avoid it. Sue Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Andys@coffs Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Carefully check to see if you are getting a free perpetual license upgrade. That is, your win 7 or 8 license is perpetual and is yours to use until you decide you no longer want to. I'm not sure that the free upgrade is perpetual rather I had heard it would be a 1 year term license, after which time you get to buy it all over again. That oft spoken thing about reality of free lunches comes to mind! Andy Edit. Actually in googling it's not clear that the new license is a subscription model but it is clear you don't have to decide immediately, the free offer lasts for 12 months so don't necessarily rush into anything would be my guidance Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Perry Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Do what I did after 20 years of DOS/Windows tinkering and building my own PCs. Finally get fed up and buy a Mac. Well,. . .since Mac runs on an uprated Linux system,. . . I can't say I'm surprised that you like it Dutch. . . .lovely system. Just had a look at my mate's £1,200 macbook, over which his Wife spilled a mug of cappucino ( dunno what brand,. . starbucks,. . .costa etc. . .) and it's destroyed the logic board, which I can get and replace for around 390 quid, plus a keypad. . . . ( she also flung a stone from the lawnmower and took out an argon filled double glazed picture window 2 days later, but what the hell,. . .she is drop dead gorgeous, and a really GOOD singer and frontwoman for a 1940s Glenn Miller style band, so he's forgiven her already. . . . . ) Good gear MAC. . . . . . if the proles could afford it. . . it would be even better ! I'm still running an old copy of Signlab 5 on a machine I built years ago, using Win 3 SP3,. . .it won't work on W7,. . .no drivers. And to update to the current Signlab 9 would cost around £500.00 + 20% George Osborne. . . .( VAT ) I have Coreldraw 17 on one machine and Corel 12 on the old one,. . . .still,. . .being no longer a forward, progressive and dynamic leader in the graphics industry, I don't really give a rat's ass,. . . .it works. The old HP laptop I'm using here is an AMD turion X2 64 proc with only 4gB ram, and Windows 7. . .but it does the job, and it's a nice seventeen inch monitor as well, ( oh, sod it . . .what's that in kilometres,. . .? ). . Ideal for geriatric blind buggers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 windows 10 has dropped the media centre, which is one of the main functions of my PC. Windows is falling behind newer operating systems, In contrast to reinstalling a new O/S on my nexus tablet, I download a single file and write that to the tablet, after I boot and login, google backup reinstalls all my apps and reinstalls all of my settings. Total turn around about 6 hours. Windows 7 reinstall takes 2 days, I have to manually add the appdata folder to my backup to store my settings, you boot up and windows update adds 6 fixes, reboot and windows update then wants to install 207 fix and you have to manually install every bit of software. Android is the future Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Phil macs run on a Mach kernel (taken from Steve Jobs old company Next's old O/S) and a Freebsd base operating system. Android is written on a Linux port called busybee Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rankamateur Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 Like Andy I had also heard that Windows 10 was moving to annual subscription, so your free upgrade for one year will just be a baited hook. Like Sue I lost a nearly new expensive Canon printer in my haste to upgrade to Windows XP. I took a different line on that though, have never bought another Canon product, they made the choice to hang their customers out to dry for want of a driver. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 the more expensive versions of windows came with a virtual PC running XP as an option Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
keith.b Posted June 3, 2015 Share Posted June 3, 2015 I formatted and wiped windows, installed linux mayo 17.1 64bit, only a couple of hours to be up and running, including installing libre office. Everything plug and play.... all drivers found. [ATTACH]47652._xfImport[/ATTACH] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dutchroll Posted June 4, 2015 Share Posted June 4, 2015 Phil macs run on a Mach kernel (taken from Steve Jobs old company Next's old O/S) and a Freebsd base operating system. Android is written on a Linux port called busybee It's probably fair to say that MacOS and Linux are "cousins". If you go to the command line interface MacOS quacks and acts pretty much like Unix. Windows however, is a bastard-child created by a clever and somewhat ruthless marketing man. I know he was aiming (quite successfully as it turned out) to conquer the PC market by making Windows "able to be made compatible with everything" but when the consequence of this is incessant fiddling and tweaking to get stuff to work correctly with it over a period of many years, I was bound to tire of it eventually! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted June 4, 2015 Share Posted June 4, 2015 FreeBSD, Linux, and Mac OS are all derived from Unix. Windows is suffering from too much success, they have to make it work for over half a billion users, across a mass of different applications. Apple only has to deal with a small group of technical illiterate computer users, with a small handful of applications. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kgwilson Posted June 4, 2015 Share Posted June 4, 2015 Apple always had a better GUI as it was designed like this from the beginning. It has been the benchmark and still is for graphical design software users since the original Macintosh all in one with the 10 inch monochrome screen in 1984. The earlier Lisa was not that successful & Steve Jobs was kicked off the Lisa project & spearheaded the Macintosh project & the rest as they say is history. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fly_tornado Posted June 4, 2015 Share Posted June 4, 2015 Apple have always targeted illiterate users, its why they are so successful. Microsoft from the start was part of IBM's big computing platform. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dutchroll Posted June 4, 2015 Share Posted June 4, 2015 Apple only has to deal with a small group of technical illiterate computer users, with a small handful of applications. You clearly haven't seen my sister, or even worse, my mother-in-law, using Windows......... When you've converted your whole house to MacOS and still have to spend time searching the web for and installing drivers because your relative can't get the friggin Windows laptop working with a reasonably commonplace printer, and she asks "how come you just switch on your computer and it all just works?", you know Microsoft has made a mess of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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