Windows 7 End of Life - What does that mean?

Windows 7 is being End-Of-Lifed (new verb, yes) on January 14th, 2020 - a whole 6 days from when I’m writing this. I’ve already been asked by customers what this really means to the end user a few times, so I figured it was about time to write something up.

Here’s my quick summary on what the End of Life / End of Support for Windows 7 really means to you - the user of a computer who just wants things to not change.

What does End of Life / End of Support even mean?

Simply put, Microsoft is stopping official, free support for Windows 7 starting on 1/14/2020.

As a user of Windows 7, this means the following things are no longer available to you for FREE:

  • No more Windows updates - including security and bug fixes
  • No more customer support via Microsoft’s 1-800 number and online official forums
  • Lack of support for existing software - We saw this with Windows XP where many software companies no longer provided support for users running outdated versions of Windows since OS-level problems may make their software behave incorrectly and Microsoft was not pushing fixes anymore

But one thing that needs to be made immediately clear, your Windows 7 computer will still work. Many customers have been concerned that everything would just stop working on January 14, and this is NOT the case. However, you should be heavily considering a plan to upgrade (as soon as possible).

What can be done to “fix” this?

Fortunately/Unfortunately, you can upgrade to Windows 10 to avoid being no longer supported by Microsoft. The best part, you can still do it for FREE too.

I’ll be covering how to upgrade to Windows 10 for free in 2020 in a follow-up blog post real soon, but do understand this is your best option.

Why should I even upgrade? Windows updates are buggy and cause crashes/etc.

While I can’t argue about the second half of that point - Windows updates have not had the best track record over the past year - You absolutely should be installing the regularly released Windows security updates.

Every month, for free, Microsoft releases a collection of security patches that fix known security issues in your computer. These patches ensure it’s safe for you to continue to browse the web, use public wifi, and a handful of other common computing tasks. It’s imperative you install the security updates for Windows - no exceptions. 

So, for that reason, you should absolutely upgrade to Windows 10 just for the sake of security updates.

Fine, I’ll upgrade. Can I make Windows 10 look more like Windows 7?

Amazingly enough, yes! There are a handful of tools out there that help bring back some of the Windows 7 look and feel to help people more easily adjust.

You can grab a copy of Open-Shell (a spin-off project of Classic Shell) at: https://github.com/Open-Shell/Open-Shell-Menu/releases

Can I learn more about this whole End of Life thing?

Absolutely! Microsoft has put together a handy page that explains even more details and has links to other relevant/helpful information at: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4467761/windows-what-happens-when-windows-7-support-ends

As always, thanks for making it this far. Feel free to ask comments below or get in touch with us directly via our official website: https://www.marptech.com/contact

end of life  upgrade  end of support  marptech  windows 7  windows 10  support 

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