News - Microsoft warns mainstream Windows 7 support ends Jan 2015

[zaph0d]

Well - I guess that means DirectX 12 is a bust for Window$ 7 then. It'll be an 8.1+ exclusive to try and force a little extra adoption.

[Biscuit]

This bit of information appears to be completely lacking in the article.

The difference between free mainstream support and still having security support is the point. In much the same way windows XP didn't support many great software features, some that I'm going to be coding against today, but still had security.

If the windows 7 today does exactly what you need, the windows 7 in 2015 should still too. Unless you need new functionality, in which case, you will have to pay. 5 years of mainstream support is a fairly good deal, 10 years of security critical support is a bargain.

Compare it to say Solaris or OSX. Hell OSX is awful, if you don't buy the new version, you might find your three year old device with well known critical security bugs.

Pretty sure apple supply OSX versions for free now! As long as you are in the X86 land of course.

[MickyTek]

I still wont touch windows 8 or 8.1 with my worst enemy, I can prove that my games run laggy and horrible on windows 8 and 8.1 but they run perfectly under windows 7, so until Microsoft do some thing about this operating system 8.1 as they call it I will not be upgrading EVER

I would Love to see Game Developers move over to Linux and dump being reliant on Microsoft, its about time Microsoft learnt that you can not mess your customers around like this and just expect them to sit back and do nothing, its about time we moved away from Microsoft as Games run like a pile of dog **** under windows 8 and 8.1, not touching that crap for anything, I hate it

[ZaO]

So we're still getting free security updates until 2020. That's alright. I can't imagine many home users will still be running W7 by that point. Bit crappy if we have trouble running new hardware though.

And yeh, I'm also really hoping that a complete switch to Linux is possible before then. That just can't come soon enough for me!

[Percy1983]

I still wont touch windows 8 or 8.1 with my worst enemy, I can prove that my games run laggy and horrible on windows 8 and 8.1 but they run perfectly under windows 7, so until Microsoft do some thing about this operating system 8.1 as they call it I will not be upgrading EVER

My games run better on 8.1, we must have different taste in games or something.

[Saracen]

I would Love to see Game Developers move over to Linux and dump being reliant on Microsoft, its about time Microsoft learnt that you can not mess your customers around like this and just expect them to sit back and do nothing, ....

I agree, but sadly, what we have here is a combination of chicken and egg, and huge entrenched inertia.

It took MS' s attitude with W8 to get me to bother to switch to Linux, and I've been programming computers for 40+ years, so I'm not exactly technically illiterate. Why did it take me so long? Because everything Iran was MS-based and moving everything was impossible, and the part that was possible was a huge pain the backside. Hence .... inertia.

So the not-so-tech-literate general user? Fat chance, I'm afraid.

[Agent]

I would Love to see Game Developers move over to Linux and dump being reliant on Microsoft, its about time Microsoft learnt that you can not mess your customers around like this and just expect them to sit back and do nothing, its about time we moved away from Microsoft as Games run like a pile of dog **** under windows 8 and 8.1, not touching that crap for anything, I hate it

It's not a simple case of them just moving. Linux still has issues with API's and GPU drivers from a games developers perspective. It can cost a lot more in development costs to port than would ever be gained. Let's not start on supporting all the different distros out there.

[hapilynvraftr]

Is it just me, or does 5 years seem like too short a time span to support an operating system? I realise the rate of new tech adoption is faster these days, but there will be some people would bought Windows 7 machines potentially less than 2 years ago (pre-Windows 8 release) now looking at their PC not obtaining security updates within 3 years of purchase.

Although debatable, given Microsoft's domination of the desktop environment, I would've expected security support for a minimum of 5 years after the product is discontinued. Surely that would be a more sensible measure of how long a product is supported, instead of initial release date, to give customers a degree of confidence when purchasing.

I realise this isn't going to be practical for all situations, maybe some kind of scaling for support time span could be implemented based on market share or units sold?

Given Microsoft's size and customer base I think they need to take more responsibility for these products.

I agree on this.

[DanceswithUnix]

It's not a simple case of them just moving. Linux still has issues with API's and GPU drivers from a games developers perspective. It can cost a lot more in development costs to port than would ever be gained. Let's not start on supporting all the different distros out there.

Nah, Loki games said they had demonstrated you could profitably port games to Linux years ago. It was poor choice of contract terms from early games that took them down. So yes it is hard, but conditions seem better now than then so it should be profitable now too.

[shaithis]

5 years for a desktop OS?

That's 1-2 years more than Apple support theirs for and 2 years more than Ubuntu LTS.

Anyone know a desktop os that gets more than 5 years support?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Well - I guess that means DirectX 12 is a bust for Window$ 7 then. It'll be an 8.1+ exclusive to try and force a little extra adoption.

It appears so,considering newer DX11 versions don't.

[Agent]

Nah, Loki games said they had demonstrated you could profitably port games to Linux years ago. It was poor choice of contract terms from early games that took them down. So yes it is hard, but conditions seem better now than then so it should be profitable now too.

Loki games ceased to exist ~13 years ago. I don't particularly think that's a good example when talking about profitability - certainly as not only were they a commercial failure, no one brought them out or continued their work / business line with any serious commercial aspects.

http://richg42.blogspot.co.uk/2014/0...r-quality.html

That's from Valve's Rich Geldreich. His summary:

To ship a major GL title you'll need to test your code on each driver and work around all the problems. May the "GL Gods" help you if you experience random GPU corruption, heap corruption, lockups, or TDR's. Be very nice to the driver teams and their managers/execs, because without them your chances aren't nearly as good.

Testing and debugging is major time, thus money. When you factor this in against the percentage of people who game and will buy the title on Linux...it's quite small. Turning a profit is a very serious concern.

I'm not sure which bit exactly you're "Nah"ing to? The development cost issue is real. Certainly when you're talking about larger titles with heavier engines. If it was profitable, people would be porting more.

While most of my experience is with smaller team game development (4-10 people), not a single time has porting to Linux been economically viable for us.

[aidanjt]

...and 2 years more than Ubuntu LTS.

Not since 10.04. 12.04 and 14.04 have 5 years desktop suppport.

[JGJones]

...and 2 years more than Ubuntu LTS.

Not since 10.04. 12.04 and 14.04 have 5 years desktop suppport.

It's hard to compare Windows desktop support to Ubuntu LTS support.

Windows desktop support is typically as followed: 5 years mainstream support, updates to Windows, ie performance, IE and so on plus security. When this ends, it goes into Extended support - which is another 5 years of security support - only security updates but nothing more - overall 10 years of security support which is very decent.

Ubuntu LTS comes with 5 years desktop support and when this end, that's it, no extended support. BUT on the other hand - Ubuntu LTS desktop support cover all software that is provided in their main repository - such as LibreOffice and all other software you've installed which is in main - not just the operating system itself.

Windows's long term security support though isn't matched by anyone I know of.

[ZaO]

Let's not forget that Linux distro's are typically free/donation based. So you shouldn't expect as much from them in the way of support. Yet the support is great considering. Not to mention that it's open source, and so the community will usually take over support when needed And come to think of it, Windows surely needs more support when it comes to security. I bet the amount of Malware for Windows based systems that is floating about, absolutely Dwarfs what is going about for Linux distro's!