I think this is worth its own thread to draw attention. Basically, even thought the "official" time for upgrading has passed, Microsoft are still offering the upgrade for users of "assistive technologies".

Article explaining here http://betanews.com/2016/08/03/micro...s-10-loophole/

GET IT HERE https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/acce...ndows10upgrade

I have used it on two machines over the last few days and it works perfectly.

..... there was no need to hurry in 2016. You can still get it for free.

Well. Last night I caved

Call it coincidence, call it intuition ... actually it all started with me looking into wireless HDMI transfer, which needs miracast, which can be done with win-7 but is included in win-10 ....

When I - the passionate anti-win-10 fighter - hesitantly started to snoop, the first thing I came accross was "no more win-7 support from January 14th 2020". Ooops, that's a bit harsh. So I got two reasons to finally update now. The latter being pretty convincing.

A friend told me, it takes 5-10 hours! WTF. But the back-up actually took longer than the update. I started the update last night, went to bed and when I got up it was done.
Looks alright to me so far. A encroaching little bugger though indeed, feels a bit like moving in with a very nosy person whom you keep telling "nope, don't touch that and don't touch this"

So unless I'm the last dinosaur - or there are other dinosaurs out there - I guess it's time to give up the fight. If you decide to stay with windows, that is.

Next I'll have to update an older model and I sure hope it will be just as easy. And then my neighbour will no doubt dump her laptop on me to do it again, which I fear will be the one, win-10 will dump all the demo-effects, possible flaws and weaknesses on me. As it is when the stuff you're working on is not yours.

__________________
It's all a matter or perspective.
So move your butt and look at it from the other side

Hi Curley, thanks for your input. What is your experience regarding data loss (pictures, or other files) when changing from win-7 to win-10. Does the update support the backup of files or do you have to take care manually (saving on an external driver before and then move it back when win-10 is running). Thanks

You´re not

From where? I didn't see it on the same link as in the OP?

It's all still here, including most settings. I'm rather impressed actually.

You are given a choice before installation about wanting to keep all .... some ... nothing. So beware not to click past there too quickly.

Being a rather leery person I did do a separate back-up of my D-drive (where I keep my data), then a ghost of C and D on a separate hard disk as well as a system repair disc

Looks like you could do without all this. But I won't on the next two computers, I'm rather safe than sorry.

__________________
It's all a matter or perspective.
So move your butt and look at it from the other side

It's not written, but just use the Windows Update Tool (https://www.microsoft.com/de-de/soft...load/windows10) and run it on a Windows 7... It simply works. Free Win10 update (as long as you got a genuine Win 7 installation)

Ways change, chances don't

Here you go.

It doesn't even ask for a key (although - of course - I'd have one ) and it didn't ask about what version either. I had win-7 professional so it gave me professional.

good one thank you.

Looks not so easy for my laptop. Tried this update like 100 times. Installing, reinstalling, updating programs and drivers. Nothing works on my laptop. It takes like whole night to download update, than after restarting laptop it gets windows 10 logo and blue screen saying that is configuring and finishing updating . Starts at 75%, got stuck at 81%. After few hours of waiting, I do hard restart and I get message that couldn’t update and it is reverting to my old system. I tried always with options to keep my all files.
I think I’m stuck with windows 7.

Sorry to hear that. A friend told me out of 4 he updated lately, 3 went smoothly, one didn't. He couldn't figure out what the problem was though.
Sounds to me you did a bit too much though. Did you try the link I gave earlier?

I just did my old pc last night (yes, it's definitely a 'while you're sleeping' thing to do). No problems at all.

You can't be stuck with win-7. At least not after January 14th 2020

If you don't have an experience friend to have a look at it, if I were in your situation (after 100 trials) I would save all my personal documents * on an external drive and try again without "keeping my settings" (they're a mess by now anyway, no?).

If that doesn't work reinstall your win-7 new (don't forget to do * before!!), then update to win-10 - logically not your own settings as you don't have any - that should definitely work. Sounds like a long week-end though. But that's how I remember it used to be, which is why I'm so baffled this was so easy.

__________________
It's all a matter or perspective.
So move your butt and look at it from the other side

If your hardware/BIOS meets the minimum specifications for Windows 10 then it should theoretically install. Without knowing the specific model/specification of your PC it's hard ot answer.

Not sure that's true, TBH. Sure, it won't be 'supported' after that date, but no reason it should suddenly stop working. Actually might run better as it won't keep trying to download understand updates every few weeks.

I don't think I've ever needed my OS to be current or officially supported; just as long as you're not forced to upgrade any of the software you have running on it it should be fine.

I'd be sticking with W7 myself if my old machine hadn't died a couple of months ago. As is customary with new releases of Windows, I pretty much hate W10, which seems to be completely lacking in useful new features, while requiring something of a shift in mindset just to use preexisting functionality.

I'm still not sure why we now have both programs and apps, and what exactly is the difference, but I do know that it introduced a whole new range of possible confusion when trying to get up and running on a new machine+OS.

As a software developer myself I was always of the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" persuasion, which didn't always fit well with colleagues. Change for change's sake has become the new industry norm, and not just in the software world. No room for us dinosaurs any more

I agree with your entire post

I wrote a pretty good reply to it as well and then EF ... win-10 .... upc? swallowed it. So never mind .... no need to nod. LOL.

So not concerned about security patches? RHEL released several hundred security related patches last year, for example.

I'm quite happy running Windows 10. However, I've at least once had to do a clean install, and several times have had to intervene to get an update working. Most recently from 1809 to 1903. Got that working by clearing space on my OS drive and starting the update from the administrator account.

Yeah, me to (quiet happy), surprisingly. They either improved it since I last dealt with win-10 about 3 years ago or I've become more lenient.

I wondered about the clean install issue, which will be inevitable some day.
I put the update tool on a memory stick as instructed but they never asked me for my win-7-pro key. I have no idea if they "gave" me a win-10 key.
I suppose for a clean install I would have to first install my win-7, then the win-10 tool?

Well, I'm gonna have to cross that bridge when I get there. Might have to buy the whole thing new then?

__________________
It's all a matter or perspective.
So move your butt and look at it from the other side

FYI,

You can do a fresh install from the same update program by asking it to create a USB with full OS setup on it. The windows update program is available to download here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/soft...load/windows10

As for the activation, once you done the upgrade to windows 10, the Microsoft server recognizes your machine and its specifications and providing your don't do any major hardware changes before the reinstall, the Microsoft servers will authenticate your machine and activate your windows 10 again upon a fresh install. If however you do have changes and are unable to activate your windows, you need to simply contact Microsoft customer service and in 8 out of 10 they will give you an activation key.

good luck if and when you do the upgrade.

Renewed Microsoft Office 365 and for one week now my computer logs off after 15 seconds (hardly gives me time to put the kettle on, bastard!)


Anyway, tried all the usual tricks with Manual Repair, Power Save, links prescribed by Swisscom, nothing works. Apparently, it is a malfunctioning when updating / renewing and has been general for the last week or so. Of course, no way to join Microsoft for technical help. Anyone has been in same situation and found a solution, other than swearing at computer?

Did you tried to boot into the safe mode ?
Have you tried to rund a live cd os like knoppix ?

Yes, I've done the USB with full OS setup.

I was just wondering, if I ever need to do a format C and install from zero, would I first have to put win-7 from my CD, then update win-10 from this USB stick.