Windows 10 upgrade for Windows 7 and 8.1 free for first year

Microsoft has announced that Windows 10 will be a free upgrade for the first year, then it will become a standard retail OS if you choose not to upgrade from Windows 7 or 8/8.1.
Release date is said to be sometime mid to late 2015.
Technical Preview users have reported 10 as a substantially better integrated OS than 8.1 in its desktop's mouse/keyboard and tablet's touch/pen. Some notable feature enhancements include Spartan Browser, Microsoft Azure personal and enterprise cloud computing, and Microsoft Cortana (MS HAL-9000). Gamers might appreciate better Xbox integration.
Sounds like a great deal. I took advantage of the $40 8.0 Pro upgrade when it first came out and never regretted it, now I can finally ditch XP Pro after slowing finding solutions to legacy hardware and software.

 

deleted. I found the answer to my question.

 

Alan, I'll paste the answer to your deleted question for others since it wasn't clear to me initially either.
The upgrade is free and permanent for the first year. You'll have to pay retail if you choose not to upgrade during the first year free offer.
http://www.pcgamer.com/microsoft-windows-10-will-not-be-sold-as-a-subscription/

 

Well, here's the word from the horse's mouth:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/about
So, why am I waiting for the other shoe to drop? And, why would there be a 1.5% drop in MS shares after the announcement? Who, me, paranoid? ;-)

 

Thanks Michael. Although I love Windows 8.1 and don't have a compelling reason to upgrade, I am however looking forward to exploring Windows 10. I'm mostly interested in a unified experience across all platforms and there's a great chance that I might try a Windows phone in the future because of W10.

On another note, I've set up SyncBack software to synchronize my local storage drives to my MS OneDrive cloud storage and it is very convenient to instantly have a cloud copy of everything that I create/export available on all my other devices. I also still prefer MS Office over the cruder Google Docs and now with unlimited OneDrive cloud storage with a $9 monthly MS Office 365 subscription, I might be using less Google services in the future. The new CEO, Satya Nadella, seems to be doing a great job.

 

So, why am I waiting for the other shoe to drop? And, why would there be a 1.5% drop in MS shares after the announcement? Who, me, paranoid​

Actually, most of the tech stocks dipped at that time as there were bigger issues going on. A better picture is to look at the past year. MS share prices have gone up from $35 in Feb 2014, to $45 today. I wish I owned more.

 

In the past Microsoft made a lot of money from Windows OS licensing. That business model is changing and they are looking to be more of a service type provider. (ie, Xbox music pass, Xbox video pass, cloud service, etc). The free upgrade offer is an attempt to get more people up to date with it comes to the OS.
I installed the TP Windows 10 and have been using it for close to a month. All my software packages work (except for my paid virus service but that will change once Windows 10 is released officially). Photoshop, LR and ACDsee all work.

 

I bought an 8" Windows 8.1 tablet on sale for $100 (In Canada) over Christmas just for grins and not having any expectations - just had to have another toy to complement my Android tablets. It came with a magnetic carrying folder and Bluetooth keyboard.
Boy, did the tablet ever exceed my expectations by a very long mile!
It reminded me of the big fuss 10 years ago about building a $100 laptop for third-world countries, and now we can buy a full-fledged Windows 8.1 computer, retail, for that money. Adjusted for inflation, that's $85 in 2004 money; talk about great value.
The tablet has Bluetooth that I've used to connect a TomTom GPS for Offline Navigation, and a micro-USB port that can fan out for HDMI. As a desktop supplement, I use InputDirector KVM that controls all my computers with a single keyboard/mouse, and the tablet is grab-and-go that I can use to control my Nikon cameras, telescope mount, and read my car's OBD2 data without the weight and bulk of a laptop. Just amazing.
The downside to Windows is the low number of available apps but developers seem to be slowly making them available. Not a problem for me, though. Everything I need IS available, and what I can't get is available on Android.
Windows 10 is supposed to be nearly the same as Windows 8 in its resource requirement which is a lot less than any previous Windows versions. My little tablet runs snappy like a champ with just 1G RAM and plenty for my application, so I'm looking forward to the 10 upgrade not so much for the "features" as the extended product life I'll get to enjoy. Remember, Windows 7 End-of-Life has come.
By the way, Nokia released their "HERE" offline GPS app for free, available for iOS, Android and Windows. Best GPS app I've come across, and I've tried them all.
http://www.windowscentral.com/nokia-releases-here-maps-all-windows-81-hardware

 

Michael, if I may ask. What tablet did you get for $100 bucks? Keep in mind, since it is 8" there will be no desktop if you upgrade to Windows 10. It'll be Windows 10 but look more like Windows phone.

 

Ed, the tablet is linked in my comment above. It comes with a full version of Windows 8.1.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...e=vulcan_challenger_ii-_-34-734-009-_-Product
I can run it in its Charms mode like any touchscreen Android tablet, or in full Windows desktop mode like any Windows computer using a keyboard and mouse. In fact I've installed many desktop apps that I frequently use for portable applications unavailable on any other OS.

 

Oh, another nice thing about that cheap tablet running full Windows 8.1 is that I get full offline voice command that's built-in to Windows. Really handy when I run it in desktop mode and it gets difficult to touch the proper icons or buttons on a small screen.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-ca/windows-8/using-speech-recognition

 

Sorry Micheal, didn't check the link. I should have. Plus, I misspoke. In Windows 10 8 inches and above you can enable desktop mode. Devices smaller than 8 inches will run desktop applications but will not have the ability to go into desktop mode.

 

Thanks, Ed. I wasn't aware of that. Good to know!
Funny part is, Windows 8.1 retails for $119 at the Microsoft store in Canada but I (or anyone) can buy such a tablet with 8.1 for less.
I've read that Microsoft is essentially giving away 8.1 to the low cost tablet OEM with certain performance restrictions; RAM might be one of them. I guess they're trying to gain market share.

 

The main reason MS can afford to do this is that hardly anyone ever upgrades Windows. Most people get or buy a windows license with a new computer and stay with that version. Unfortunately for Microsoft this has led to things like people staying with XP after support has ended and there being 4 major versions of Windows in the support pipeline and in the wild at once. Generally they want everyone to be on 10 now so that developers will actually write programs towards the newer API's instead of targeting Windows 7 or Vista or XP for compatibility. So Microsoft give up the tiny bit of revenue from upgrades and gets as many people as possible on the same page.
If you don't take the upgrade offer you'll essentially be stuck on the extended-support track with all the institutional users.

 

Seems like every other Windows OS is a flop.
98 = Great
2000 = wonky
XP = Amazing
Vista = Sad
7 = Superb
8 = Annoying
10 = ???

 

I'm so afraid of Microsoft after the disaster with Vista and the constant crashing of Windows 7 that I'm reluctant to make a move even if it's free !

 

I wonder what compatibility issues Window 10 will have with existing software, like photoshop, or other software and external hardware. I recall that there were issues with printers, scanners, and other devices when moving from XP to Windows 7.
Another thought, will upgrading require a disk formatting that removes existing programs you might be using?

 

"I recall that there were issues with printers, scanners, and other devices when moving from XP to Windows 7."​

My experience with Windows 7 was very pleasant. It's been relatively trouble free, and backward compatible with all of my legacy software and devices dating back to my Windows 95 Pentium 1 doodads. The only device I haven't tried on my Win7 PCs is an old Minolta film scanner with SCSI interface - my minitower lacks a slot for my old SCSI card, and customer reports indicate SCSI-to-USB converters perform erratically so I haven't bothered. I keep an older Pentium III for use with that scanner.
The Lenovo laptop we bought in mid-2012 was equipped with Windows 7 and eligible for a very inexpensive upgrade to Windows 8 (under $20), which I stupidly declined. I didn't even try Windows 8 on a couple of store PCs until after the cheap upgrade offer had expired. Too bad because I found Windows 8 surprisingly easy to adapt to after a couple of hints from the store clerk, even though it might have been somewhat less useful on my laptop which lacks a touch screen. The low end laptops comparable to my Lenovo seemed to operate a bit quicker with Windows 8 compared with my Win7 OS.

 

My experiences echo those of Lex: windows 7 is a pretty decent, stable and quick system, with very few, if any, compatibility issues (SCSI, by the way, works fine, even though manufactureres of SCSI devices don't provide much support. I believe most of the anything-to-USB adapters are bogus devices that do absolutely nothing).<br>I don't know what to expect from Win 10. But going by Jeff B's list it appears that every other version was not so good. Which is why it is a good thing, promising, that they skipped version 9. ;-)<br>With a free upgrade (and life cycle support) not much reason not to give it at least a try. All it takes to be 'safe' is another HD on which to clone the old Win system we have, and install the upgrade over that. If it works, it works. If not all we have to do is plug in the old disk and we have our old system running again.

 

"I wonder what compatibility issues Window 10 will have with existing software, like photoshop, or other software and external hardware."​

Microsoft will release an upgrade adviser which is a small download that will check your system for compatibility issues. It generally works pretty well and there are often workarounds for alleged incompatible programs or hardware.

"Another thought, will upgrading require a disk formatting that removes existing programs you might be using?"​

I believe an upgrade from Windows 7 or 8 will not require reinstallation of programs. The exception being if the upgrade involves 64bit/32bit swap in either direction, then it becomes a fresh install.

 

My experience also echos that of Lex. W7 was great, W8 is even better

I'm so afraid of Microsoft after the disaster with Vista and the constant crashing of Windows 7​

Yes Harry, Vista was a bit of a hiccup. And if Windows 7 is constantly crashing on you, it isn't because of W7.

I wonder what compatibility issues Window 10 will have with existing software, like photoshop, or other software and external hardware. I recall that there were issues with printers, scanners, and other devices when moving from XP to Windows 7.​

Marc, I'm guessing that if it works on Windows 7, it will more than likely work on W10. It's usually because of manufactures like Epson that wont update drivers for newer the newer os. With that being said, my 12 year old epson flatbed that I use to scan docs with, works just fine on Windows 8. I'm sure glad I jumped ship from Apple years ago. I couldn't imagine buying software over and over or having scanners no longer supported all the while having to consider an iMac as a workstation.

 

Yes, driver issues (eg, Nikon film scanner) can be a pain and work arounds are now available. I'm sure there will be
feedback during the year of free upgrade. In the mean time a number of the Windows 7 program editions are going to be
supported until 2020.

 

Windows 7 mainstream support ended january this year. There will only be security updates until 2020.