How long will Windows 7 still be available?

[QuarterBoreGunner]

Contemplating a new laptop and I keep hearing how Win 8 is a complete dogs breakfast of an OS, so how long should I expect to be able to purchase a new laptop with Win 7 OEM installed? 6 months? A year?

And yeah yeah get it out of your systems and go ahead and do the:

"Get a Mac! Get a Linux distro, I hear DOS is going to be popular!" posts if it makes you feel better.

[Hoshnasi]

Contemplating a new laptop and I keep hearing how Win 8 is a complete dogs breakfast of an OS, so how long should I expect to be able to purchase a new laptop with Win 7 OEM installed? 6 months? A year?

And yeah yeah get it out of your systems and go ahead and do the:

"Get a Mac! Get a Linux distro, I hear DOS is going to be popular!" posts if it makes you feel better.

I'd say Win7 will be available to purchase on retail computers for 1 to 2 years. Microsoft will support Win7 for years to come via patches, etc.

With that said. I tried Win 8 on that new surface device. Pretty nice for the tablet users...

Little background on my computer use. At work I use Windows and Solaris. At home I am all Mac. I try to remain unbiased as I can see the value and niche different OS fill.

[QuarterBoreGunner]

Thanks; this would be for a general purpose laptop, not dedicated to gaming, graphics, etc. My current Thinkpad is from '07 and XP is getting a little dated - and I'm pretty sure the clock is ticking on a major component dying.

[Hoshnasi]

Thanks; this would be for a general purpose laptop, not dedicated to gaming, graphics, etc. My current Thinkpad is from '07 and XP is getting a little dated - and I'm pretty sure the clock is ticking on a major component dying.

I really like Windows 7. I wouldn't worry about pulling the trigger.

Is a Mac on the list at all? The Macbook Air is a great general purpose highly portable laptop.

More options is good!

[Exile Machine]

I just upgraded the desktop systems here from Ubuntu 12.10 to Windows 8 (yes, I know, going from Linux to Microsoft is tantamount to blasphemy...) Talk about dog's breakfast OS, you should see what they did to Ubuntu in the last year or so... Bad enough to drive a 30 year Unix/Linux veteran into the arms of Redmond...

I don't have any complaints about Win 8, and I'm running desktop systems with no touch screen. You don't need to use all the tabletty-touchy features of Win 8 if you don't want to. The Desktop is quite servicable. Only drawback is that the printer manufacturers have not caught up with Win 8 yet so I'm operating on printer plan B until they do.

-Mark

[Milsurps]

This looks like the ticket for non touch screen Win 8 machines.

http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

In the mean time I'll stick with XP and Win7.

[QuarterBoreGunner]

Is a Mac on the list at all? The Macbook Air is a great general purpose highly portable laptop.

More options is good!

I am not a clever man.
I've used Windows since version 2.0 on an old amber screen Brother Portable (29 pounds! Put that in your Chrome messenger bags hipsters!) Computer back in the 80's

[soul]

I would advise not to consider any of the online reviews, most are click baits for fanbois to jump in and make the article popular.

Just try Windows 8 for some time, and you will realize it is just like Windows 7 but with additional benefits. The Windows 7 desktop is just a click away, what is changed is essentially the Start Menu replaced by Start Screen. Consider it as an exploded Start Menu, where you get live tiles, can group them and navigate quickly.

In reality more features of the OS are available quickly than Windows 7, through the start screen. Just left/right click on the screen corners and you will be surprised. The OS is also faster in all respects, comes with a free non-nagging antivirus and updated tools and utilities.

[hamsalad]

Extended Support for Win 7 is out to Jan 14, 2020.

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/default.aspx?LN=en-us&x=2&y=13&c2=14019

[sholling]

I'm with the OP and will be skipping Windows 8. I hate the moronic phone interface and just to make sure that I don't get stuck with Windows 8 (MS Bob 2013) I went ahead and bought a Windows 7 Professional license for the notebook that I plan to buy next summer. The idea of trying to shove a phone interface down the throats of non-touch screen desktop and laptop users ticks me off to no end.

[spetsnaz]

linux
windows 7/8

[glockman19]

Thanks; this would be for a general purpose laptop, not dedicated to gaming, graphics, etc. My current Thinkpad is from '07 and XP is getting a little dated - and I'm pretty sure the clock is ticking on a major component dying.

I just upgraded a Dell Inspirion 6400 with max memmory and a 7200RPM 500GB HD.
I asked about loading windows 7 and found that the chipset would not handle it and reloaded XP.

My New Laptop and Desktop both have Windows 7.

Windows 8 is apparently built targeting mobil devices and tablets with touch screens.

[MaHoTex]

This looks like the ticket for non touch screen Win 8 machines.

http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

In the mean time I'll stick with XP and Win7.

I use ClassicShell. It makes the transition really simple. You can use either the Win8 interface or pick between other common interfaces such as WinXP or Win7. The switch between interfaces is done on the fly and is simple. This way you are able to work in a familiar interface while tinkering with the new Win8 world.

[stilly]

I thought I read somewhere that you must have I-net access when using windows 8, is that true about it has to connect or somethign before it let's you log on?

As it is, I only have 1 computer on windows 7 and the rest are still all on windows XP...

[Jeepers]

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/products/lifecycle

Desktop operating systems Latest service pack End of mainstream support End of extended support

Windows 7 Service Pack 1 January 12, 2015 January 14, 2020

7 will be good untill 2020 go for it ... 8 will crap out like winblow ME and vista