Windows 10: Microsoft announces yet another Windows 7 support extension (for SMBs)

Microsoft announced yesterday that the option to get extended support for the company's Windows 7 operating system will be available to businesses of all sizes.

Support for the Windows 7 operating system ends in January 2020. Microsoft will deliver security updates for the operating system until that month but won't produce security updates or any other update anymore afterward for free.

The company announced previously that Enterprise customers may extend support by up to three years. The price of support starts at $50 per user and year and double each year so that $100 and $200 need to be paid per user in the following years.

Up until yesterday, that was the only way to extend support for Windows 7 (except for the exception of voting machines in the US 2020 election which would also be supplied with security updates).



Yesterday's announcement allows businesses of any size to extend support for up to three years.

With that in mind, today we are announcing that, through January 2023, we will extend the availability of paid Windows 7 Extended Security Updates (ESU) to businesses of all sizes. (Previously, Windows 7 ESU was only available to Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Enterprise customers in Volume Licensing.) The Windows 7 ESU will be sold on a per-device basis with the price increasing each year.
​

The extended security updates for Windows 7 will be sold on a per-device base and not on a per-user base like they are for Enterprise customers. The price per device depends on the year and edition of Windows 7.

Basically, the costs per year are identical for Windows 7 Professional and only half for Windows 7 Enterprise. It needs to be noted that the SMB extensions apply to the entire device while the Enterprise extensions to individual users.

Product Year 1 Year 2 Year 3
SMB: Windows 7 Pro ESU 50 100 200
SMB: Windows 7 Enterprise ESU 25 50 100
Enterprise: Windows 7 Pro ESU 50 100 200
Enterprise Windows 7 Enterprise ESU 50 100 200

Businesses may start to purchase ESU "through the cloud solution provider program" for Windows 7 Professional or Windows 7 Enterprise devices starting December 1, 2019.

Additional information is available on the Microsoft 365 Partner Center. Home users may install security patches provided by third-party security company 0Patch for their Windows 7 devices.

Closing Words


Business and Enterprise customers may purchase extended support updates for Windows 7 for up to three years which leaves Home users as the only group that cannot purchase extended support for the operating system. While it is unclear how many Home users would pay for extended Windows 7 support, it is not unrealistic to assume that a good chunk would if the pricing was right.

I think it is unlikely that Microsoft will announce a support extension option for Home users even though the company could probably make quite a bit of money from such an extension.

Now You: Should Microsoft offer support extensions for Home users as well? (via Born)

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Microsoft Botches Up UEFI Support for Windows 7 on ASUS Motherboards



Microsoft suggests updating to Windows 10 to patch Windows 7

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• Chris Merriman
• 
  @ChrisTheDJ
• 05 May 2016

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MICROSOFT HAS confirmed a potentially lappy-borking problem that it won't be fixing, because Windows 7.

Woody Leonhard, the respected Windows columnist, points to a problem involving Asus motherboards, which also appear rebadged in a variety of other manufacturers' machines, and the activation of UEFI Secure Boot for Windows 7 in a patch KB3133977.

Short version: install update, welcome to Borksville, population you.

Both Asus and Microsoft acknowledged the problem. Microsoft entitled the article "BitLocker can't encrypt drives because of service crashes in svchost.exe process in Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2", but we prefer to just call it "Trevor for brevity."

The firm's advice was that it's an optional update, leave well alone, you'll be fine, or alternatively turn secure boot off.

Then Microsoft did a silly, silly thing.

It moved the update from 'optional' to 'recommended' and anyone who reads this site regularly will know what happens when Microsoft does this. That's right boys and girls - it makes it automatically install, unless you've specifically told your machine not to.

So now, if you have one of the affected motherboard and you keep your security updates automatic like wot Microsoft recommends, then your machine will stop working properly.

We should add it's not permanently bricked, but it will take some mucking about in the BIOS to fix and that's a pain even for an experienced computer user.

Microsoft has, by offering a workaround, suggested heavily that it won't be fixing the problem, though we have asked the question, so expect a response in about a fortnight.

But the real kicker is this piece of advice: "Note The Secure Boot feature is supported in Windows 10. To learn more about the security advantages of this feature and about the upgrade path from Windows 7 to Windows 10, go to the following Windows website"

Holy toledo, this company really knows how to rub people up the wrong way.

After all - if the advice is to manually avoid the update or move to a version of the operating system where there's virtually no control over updates, then Microsoft is dealing in massive contradictions.

A more cynical site would suggest that it's yet another example of Microsoft running Windows 7 into the ground and adding built in obsolescence to encourage quicker updates. But we're not that sort of site.

Its the patching to force secure boot that is the problem win 7 does not support secure boot
hence it borks systems and well microsofts answer is Cactus >your Asshole > insert

from the inquirer

 

Microsoft Announces Windows 7 Retail Prices Ahead of General Availability

Wow... Apple is going to dominate Windows 7 in the notebook market... 29.99$ vs. 119.99$+. I wonder what the consumer is going to be choosing. *Laugh :laugh: Microsoft is going to continue to loose market share.

 

When will their be extension support for the Microsoft Edge browser?

Many are frustrated that the Edge browser does not have extension support for things like the LastPass password manager! A browser should not be released without extension support since many are already using password managers and other extensions. Now that
Microsoft will no longer update and continue Internet Explorer, the most current and secure Microsoft browser is Edge. Here is a notice from Lastpass:

Does LastPass support Windows 10 Edge ?

Microsoft Edge is the new, default browser available with Windows 10: Internet Web Browser for Desktop & Mobile - Edge – Microsoft

Microsoft has not yet announced extension support for Edge browser. As soon as we can, we will offer a LastPass extension for Windows 10 Edge.

The LastPass extension can be downloaded to any other browser on Windows 10. Simply visit our download page:
Download LastPass | LastPass to install the extension in the browser toolbar in Internet Explorer 11, Firefox, Chrome, or Opera.

The web vault at
www.LastPass.com can also be used on Edge to view your passwords any time.

If you are seeing any issues, please feel free to open a ticket with details on your issue and steps to reproduce.

PLEASE Microsoft get support asap for extensions like this! Thank you very much!