[Vrets]

Except it's, um, free for the next 12 months.

Well, then nothing I wrote had any value.

It does make sense to upgrade at least one machine within that 12 month window if it is truly free to do so.

[karajorma]

But that doesn't mean you should upgrade now. In fact it is a pretty damn good argument for waiting 10 months and letting other saps deal with bugs and problems for that time.

[Fury]

Well, then nothing I wrote had any value.

You really should read posts more carefully mate. It was repeated numerous times. Makes me wonder about rest of the people here.

Frankly, this is an area where I'd like to see Microsoft adopt some of Apple's practices and make OS upgrades essentially a patch system.

They are, starting with Windows 10.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/antonyleather/2015/05/08/windows-10-to-be-last-version-of-windows/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2015/05/08/microsoft-windows-10-last-windows/

[Spoon]

You really should read posts more carefully mate. It was repeated numerous times. Makes me wonder about rest of the people here.

Says the person I just corrected a few posts ago about not reading a post correctly. Irony ho.

Deprecated software and operating systems are one of the many reasons we have ongoing security holes in all kinds of applications. Upgrades for the sake the the shiniest new things are not desirable; upgrades that bring about improvement are.  Anyone still running XP over 7 at the moment is, quite frankly, an obstinate fool (or, I suppose, broke).  The same will eventually - and likely shortly after release - be true of 10 over 7.

We could do without the insults? Or should I go about insulting every early adopter in the same vein? This thread already had plenty of equally good reasons why people want to stay with an older OS or want to step over to the new one. None of them are worthy of being called 'obstinate fools' because they prefer a different thing.

Frankly, this is an area where I'd like to see Microsoft adopt some of Apple's practices and make OS upgrades essentially a patch system.

Apple's system that almost seems to deliberately make old devices run slow as **** with OS updates so people will buy new stuff? Yeah, fantastic system. I'd definitely like to be at the mercy of Microsoft in that regard.

[Luis Dias]

Obstinate foolishness notwithstanding, I'd say that the reasons for having Win7 over WinXP are some orders of magnitude better than those that make the case for Win10 over Win7.

[Klaustrophobia]

Honestly, I'm shocked that everyone seems to be okay with this new "OS as a service" and "smartphone on your desktop (with all the apps and micro transactions that implies)" direction MS is trying to force.  When has converting what used to be a simple product to a subscription-type service ever benefited the consumers?  There's a reason this is a huge trend in business, and it's not because corporations and business owners simply want you to have nice things.

[BirdofPrey]

Not sure where you are getting that Windows will be a subscription from

[pecenipicek]

Not sure where you are getting that Windows will be a subscription from

I do believe that one of the early on rumors was that Win10 was gonna be subscription based, something along the lines of "basic OS free for all, extra features need money monthly/yearly.", or something to that effect.

[BirdofPrey]

I remember that rumor floating around, and it was based entirely on supposition, and has yet to be confirmed.  that Windows 10 is going to be selling for the usual OS price also runs counter to that idea.

[pecenipicek]

well, they moved office to that model, so yeah. i feel that at some point in the not so far off future, they'll move windozers to that model as well.

[Fury]

I don't think that is very likely to happen. See, majority of Microsoft products and services more or less depend on Windows. If consumer does not have Windows (which is prone to happen due to aversion to subscription model), then Microsoft can't sell their other portfolio either.

I believe this will stay true even if Satya Nadella has actually been driving their software development teams to produce products and services that work on other platforms than Windows. In the future MS will be less dependent on Windows, but subscription model is still very unlikely. In fact, it is more likely for Windows to become entirely free, as Windows licensing revenue from consumers is just a drop in the ocean.

[Klaustrophobia]

It's not for sure, no, but all the warning signs are there, and it's been heavily hinted at.  MS thinks (and unfortunately I agree) that they are going to be able to force-feed us this model.  Giving out 10 for free is step 1.  Once enough people adopt, they're free to do what they like from there on out because as your own argument goes, once 10 is the standard, the only choice at that point will be upgrade or be left behind.

[Fury]

Not exactly no. They need to stick to their own licensing terms, or they are liable to face numerous lawsuits. Which means that if you buy a Windows 10 license, which at the time is one-time payment and licensing terms does not have anything on subscription, they cannot force you to subscription. But seriously, subscription for Windows is very unlikely to happen. But even if it does, it wouldn't change your existing license and terms.

Subscription as an alternative to one-time payment is still possible. But even this is highly unlikely, because previous licenses already entitles consumer to any future updates to Windows 10. And if MS is going to stay true to Windows 10 being "the last Windows", well...

[jr2]

Admit it, you overzealous upgraders. You only did it because you wanted the latest operating system for its own sake.

...Except that when Vista came out, RTM leaked to torrent sites a month or two before the release date -- I installed it, tested it out for a week or two (triple-booting with XP + Linux, of course), said "Nope!" and nuked the Vista partition.

I'm hardly an overzealous upgrader.  In fact, I like to get old OSes running on newer hardware.  Just because.  If 10 was another Vista, I wouldn't be so happy about the free upgrade (although I might have "gotten" it, uninstalled it, and left it on the "shelf" for later use in a free / cheaper Win 11 / 10.1 / whatever upgrade).

[S-99]

My own opinion: 10 is based on nt6 like vista and 7. It eventually became a stable platform. I'm not worried about the 10 core os being unstable, really am just worrying about the new versions of programs that come with it that might be. 10 is more or less windows 8 done right. Sort of like how 7 is vista done right.

I actually did like vista a lot sp1 on up. While other people lamented it, my using of linux really made me like it a lot. Plus i enjoyed the actual program upgrades from the previous versions of **** found in xp. Aside from needing more horse power, that users didn't find it familiar (this point i really find moot, i didn't have a problem with the start menu not saying start), and that vista from day one had problems from stability and drivers from manufacturers; when sp1 came out, it was a hell of a lot better than xp (uac clone of gksu for the win!!!!; if you don't understand not running as administrator 24/7, then you don't understand why uac exists, and why this was one hell of a thing needed for so long).

I'm quite fine with nt6 stability. Just worried about the new programs that are required to run with it is all. This is why i don't mind the upgrade to windows 10. Control panel got ****ed with, oh well, i'll learn and live with it if possible, but most likely possible. The mini start screen start menu; fine, classic shell for the win.

We're not going from one version of nt to a completely other here like with xp to vista. I don't fathom many problems aside from ironing a few bugs that comes with a new release. And we probably shouldn't see many, or at least not many that will concern or affect me. After all, we're essentially dealing with a better release of windows 8; that i will install classic shell on (omg!!!, i really don't care for web content popping up in place for what i have locally installed when using the start screen, that greatly impedes and confuses the user, and the tech support that i perform at my job; yes, upon finding a windows 8 computer i am working on, i do ask if they would like a normal start menu, and that the change will take about a minute, most say yes to classic shell).

This is why for the money (unless you run a highly detailed setup, which i will call genericly win7/vista legacy(for the hell of it), don't upgrade, or don't upgrade because you don't want too).

Not to say that i don't disagree with the direction to a point where microsoft wants to take their os. I have always strongly believed for a long time that you put what the user wants to do first ahead of what the product wants, and even wants you to do (i do get into the nitty gritty with that; i always turn off aero, hardware peformance goes to the user), a start menu that suggests web links over a program you have locally installed is counterintuitive and confusing. Classic shell fix.

Whenever i load out a windows 8 computer, classic shell is installed by default. Yup, i know my users.

EDIT: My only rant with vista, 7, and 8 is that explorer.exe sure does crash a hell of a lot more often compared to xp.

[BirdofPrey]

I actually like the new settings in Windows 10 much more than the XP style control panel that has lasted into Win 7.  I always ended up having to go to the old style control panel where each setting has its own icon.  Win 8 was crappy in that half of the settings were in control panel and the other half were in setting, but win 10 has MOST of the options in or easily accessible from Settings, is slightly more logically organized, and has better descriptions on what each section actually DOES.