How long will Windows 7 be supported?

Would I be shooting myself in the foot if I upgraded only to Windows 7  now?

No. Win 7 is stable & mature

I don’t want to spend time troubleshooting Windows 8 like all the recent posts.

Neither do I. That's why I probably won't upgrade again until Windows 9

What’s your guess for how long Cakewalk will support Windows 7?

Who knows - best guess? A LONG time

WinXP is 11 years old.
Win7 (3 years old) isn't going anywhere anytime soon...
You'll be fine installing/using Win7x64 for the next several years.

A rule of thumb would be seven years after product is removed from the market - so expect about 2020?

Can 8 be successfully installed over 7 or is a clean install necessary? Anyone done it?

I actually bought a new laptop earlier than planned specifically to make sure I could get Windows 7 rather than be forced onto 8.

I may well make the move at some point but Windows 7 is really solid for me so I'm sticking with what I know for now.

mrneil2


The Background

Running X1 Producer Expanded in Windows XP on a Vostro laptop (see signature). From reading the forum it makes no sense to upgrade to X2 since it doesn’t support XP and will not work when the next X2 patch is released.

The Question

           I’m a noob and really just want to make music, primarily audio tracks and EZ drummer.  Maybe a softsyn or two.  Small projects.  Have never gone over 12 tracks.

Would I be shooting myself in the foot if I upgraded only to Windows 7  now?  I don’t want to spend time troubleshooting Windows 8 like all the recent posts. 

What’s your guess for how long Cakewalk will support Windows 7?  Would I be in the same boat in 2 years?  

What trouble shooting posts for Windows 8? If you can run Windows 7 you can also run Windows 8.

You could DL the upgrade assistant and see how you fair.  

"Either MS does a lot to W8 to make it more large-monitor friendly or it will be resoundingly ignored by a user base that's adverse to change in the first place (time is money and all that)."


How is it large screen unfriendly? 

Yes it DOES windows as we know them.  Only the Metro apps don't.

Bill51


Yes it DOES windows as we know them.  Only the Metro apps don't.

Hmmm.. Well..six of one, half dozen of another, here. 

I mean, Microsoft has been playing around with their product line-up for some time, and not always in ways beneficial to some of their users. I took a look at their Visual Studio 12 beta some time ago (it's out now..) and boy was that thing ugly. The user interface wasn't Metro, but rather an extension of its plain is better ethos. Yuck. The point I'm trying to make is that style and function are contextual. In a mobile situation you're interested in timely information that is useful in the context of being disconnected from the usual PC. Your need to interact is not quite as great, and the user interface reflects that. Pads and tablets are a step up; a little more interactivity, slightly better display, but you're still not going to type your college thesis on it. But on a PC, we expect the full symphony. 
 
As I mentioned in another thread - MS is afraid of Apple's scale, and is trying to emulate it. Win 8 Metro would be great for a tablet, but sucks for the desktop. I know MS now knows it - Steve Sinofsky got the boot after all, and that ain't the usual reward for a successful product launch.

Apples and oranges. I only wonder if Apple had already considered and discarded the notion of ios on the desktop. It should give them some pause. MS should be, and probably is, in a contemplative, rethink mode. Serious reflection instead of blind reaching. Like they did after Vista....MS's Achilles heel is they will make big bets if they think they can corner something, but they suffer from a lord-of-the-flies management style that thins critical thinking staff.

Win 7 - stay there until you want to slowly move into Win 8. Just remember the upgrade price won't last.

I'd bet against against that prognostification.  Most folks will get their Win 8 upgrades with the purchase of a new PC,  and of course, nobody has a jones for Metro...


There's just isn't enough difference between 7 and 8, sans Metro...

John


I hear you Dmbaer and its silly. That is true only if one is using apps and not normal windows programs and not entirely because you can have two apps up at the same time on one monitor. Did you know that Win 8 comes with IE for the desktop and IE as an app? 
 
 

Here's one of the articles that prompted my earlier response.  I read this guy regularly (he's the editor of SD Times, one of the best software dev. trade papers out there) and I trust his judgement.  But as I said, all my opinion is based on what others have opined.
 
http://www.sdtimes.com/ZEICHICK_S_TAKE_WITH_WINDOWS_8_ONE_SIZE_MUST_FIT_ALL/By_Alan_Zeichick/About_MICROSOFT_and_WINDOWS8/37118

Windows 8 probably has some technical advances over Windows 7, but clearly the design was not intended to make a better tool. It represents the next step in the next phase of personal computers.

 The first stage of personal computer development was an attempt to make a functioning device, primarily for hobbyists and dreamers, who were happy to tinker with it endlessly to get it to do anything at all. The next phase was built on the hope that it could be a flexible tool to replace typewriters, calculators etc. The next step was to make a smart enough machine to replace the drudgery of filing, collating, writing orders, etc. and replace the mindless clerical chores that humans had been doing since writing was invented. It could and did replace many clerks and secretaries who were now freed to look for work in the janitorial sector.  

The future according to Microsoft, and Intel ("sponsors of tomorrow") is not to replace the office machines of the past. The goal is to replace the television, which has for the past half century been the predominant method of distracting the human mind and connecting it via a constant stream of more or less entertaining drivel, to the mind-control/marketing hype machine that is at the heart of modern "civilization."  Your digital television is already a "computing device," it is only a matter of time before your computer becomes primarily an entertainment appliance. The classic windows desktop is a transitional holdover, but there is no indication that it will not be replaced by an app player.

You will, at some point have to find your place in this sweep of human development, if for no other reason than that your computer-tool will stop working as the sponsors of the future will eventually make it incompatible with the present. You may have a few more years before that happens, but happen it will. So "upgrade" you must, unless you want to write a zillion lines of code, and fab your own chips. May as well do it for cheap.

John

Further as I stated you don't need to even see the start screen if you install Classic Shell. Heck I have to purposely go to the start screen by hitting the windows button on my keyboard. I never had much use for it before Windows 8. 

You clearly have some hands-on experience with W8 that I do not, so I'll defer to that.
 
However, my other reason for stating business would not readily embrace W8 is practical experience.  I work for a Fortune 250 company.  Big companies need a really compelling reason to upgrade, as always.  Believe it or not, my office computer was an XP machine until about 3 months ago.  I'll be long retired before that company upgrades again (and it will probably be to the a successor of W8).  Plus we have history suggesting to us that every other release of Windows should be skipped.
 
So, in response to the OP's question, I still would assert W7 will be supported for a very long time.

dmbaer

John

Further as I stated you don't need to even see the start screen if you install Classic Shell. Heck I have to purposely go to the start screen by hitting the windows button on my keyboard. I never had much use for it before Windows 8. 

You clearly have some hands-on experience with W8 that I do not, so I'll defer to that.
 
However, my other reason for stating business would not readily embrace W8 is practical experience.  I work for a Fortune 250 company.  Big companies need a really compelling reason to upgrade, as always.  Believe it or not, my office computer was an XP machine until about 3 months ago.  I'll be long retired before that company upgrades again (and it will probably be to the a successor of W8).  Plus we have history suggesting to us that every other release of Windows should be skipped.
 
So, in response to the OP's question, I still would assert W7 will be supported for a very long time.

I am of the mindset that business will do what business will do for their own reasons. I don't disagree with you on that point. But because we are in control of our own machines we can choose to update or even change the OS entirely. I don't have to ask anyones permission to upgrade. This offers us tremendous freedom. What is best for us is our own decision.

As to the notion that we can skip an OS here and there is one I did with Windows 7. I also say that a lot of us that had and still have Vista are very pleased with it. Its easy to make a remark that sounds clever but has no basis in fact or truth. Keep in mind that Vista and all the the OSs from MS since are of a type based on the foundation of Vista. It was a good idea then and its still a good now. Those that have not had a good experience with it really have no clue how really good it is. I did not skip Win 7 because I thought it was a bad OS but because I was very happy with Vista.  

People tout the greatness of Windows 7 and bash Vista without realizing that they are much the same thing. I've even heard some mistakenly say that Vista is just a bloated version of XP. Its statements like that that show a basic lack of knowledge about OSs. Yet these are people that others listen to and agree with, nodding agreement in a sea of total ignorance. How many people truly know anything about Windows at all outside of what others have told them? Being able to use it is not the same as understanding it. After all its meant to be very easy to use. 

Do we really expect the majority to have any clue about the things for example we have dealt with for many years just in being able to record audio or MIDI. How many even know what MIDI is? 

We as a small group in a tiny special niche of the vast computing public have had to educate ourselves on all sorts of things relating to computers that the average person never contemplates. 

What people forget is that Windows 7 and now Windows 8 could not have come to us without Vista coming first, anymore than XP coming to us without Windows NT. NT was a foundation that we are still are getting benefits from.

Before comments are made about an OS it would behoove those commenting to research the subject and getting a good opportunity to use said OS. Regurgitation of what some say without critical investigation may lead to erroneous conclusions. 

The case is clear that Windows 8 is a fine OS. It also seems odd that people feel its OK to offer comment on an OS and never used it. Strange indeed.







 

 

 

While PC shopping for the wife, I stopped in our local PC store.  The tech informed me they are getting a "ton of people" bringing in their W8 machines and asking to instal W7 instead.  Apparently, people don't like the learning curve of W8.  Hopefully this means W7 will be around for some time, because I don't have time for anymore learning curves on software.

Our entire police department is run on Win XP.  Every year I ask our techs if they are going to upgrade, they say "if it aint broke..."

As far as installing W8 overtop of W7, I did this from Vista to W7 without any problems.  Microsoft has a little compatibility scan you can do.  In my case, it worked out perfect.