Windows 10: Millions of PCs still run Windows 7, one year after Microsoft ended support

Windows 7 reached its end of support period in January, but its market share numbers did not drop significantly over the last eleven months as users rejected Microsoft’s free Windows 10 upgrade offer.

Windows 7 was first released in 2009 and Microsoft pulled mainstream support for the operating system in 2015. On January 14, 2020, Microsoft ended critical security patches and technical support for Windows 7 and users were asked to upgrade to Windows 10, but millions haven’t abandoned it yet.

According to the latest figures from NetMarketShare and StatCounter, Windows 7 is still active on at least 17 percent of Windows PCs.

StatCounter latest figures suggest that Windows 7 is running on 17.6 percent of devices, which is about 8% lower than the 25.56 percent market share it had in January.



On the other hand, NetMarketShare reports that Windows 7 share is 21 percent, which is again about 10% lower than the share it had in January.



According to the figures from the United States government, 18.9 percent PCs were on Windows 7 and 75.8 percent on Windows 10.

Windows 7’s presence in the desktop market doesn’t mean Windows 10 is struggling, though. In fact, Windows 10 is now running on more than one billion devices and its market share is gradually improving.

But why is Windows 7 still the world’s second most popular desktop operating system? Admittedly, some people’s hands are tied because their hardware is outdated and upgrading to Windows 10 means buying a new PC.

The other major objection against upgrading from Windows 7 to Windows 10 is its user interface and overall experience. For some people, anything different to what they’re used to is bad. Windows 10 update quality concerns remain, too, though Microsoft tried to address those.

Windows 10 market share is likely to improve in 2021 when Microsoft is expected to announce Windows 10X and the Sun Valley update, which aims to make Windows better.

The post Millions of PCs still run Windows 7, one year after Microsoft ended support appeared first on Windows Latest

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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

 

Windows 7 Support ends in three years

Source: Windows 7 Support endet in drei Jahren – Windows Fur Unternehmen

 

Microsoft Increases Windows Vista & 7 Consumer Support to Ten Years

Redmond-based software giant Microsoft Corp. has recently updated its support policy for both Windows Vista and Windows 7 and will be offering extended support to the consumer versions of the two operating systems.

Previously, Microsoft provided 5 years worth of 'mainstream support' for consumers while only businesses got an extra 5 years of extended support. Now, all Windows users will be able to get security updates for 10 years after the operating system's release.

As a result of the policy change, Windows Vista's consumer support was extended to April 11th, 2017. Windows 7 support will end on January 14, 2020.





Source: ZDNet