Windows Vista laptop.....Obsolete?

[WotEver]

4 hours ago, The Happy Nomad said:

This three year old article suggests you can indeed upgrade direct to Win 10 from Vista.

 

https://www.windowscentral.com/how-upgrade-windows-vista-windows-10

 

(subject as you say to the spec.)

Only by doing a clean install.  You can't 'upgrade' from Vista to W10, only 'replace'.

[Guest]

??

7 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Only by doing a clean install.  You can't 'upgrade' from Vista to W10, only 'replace'.

Well if we want to be uber pedantic, yes of course. The article makes that abundantly clear.

 

The result of course is that you start with Vista and end up with Win 10.

 

Its an upgrade in the same sense as an 'upgrade' of a phone is, you replace one with another.

 

 

Edited April 18, 2020 by The Happy Nomad

[WotEver]

5 minutes ago, The Happy Nomad said:

??

Well if we want to be uber pedantic, yes of course.

 

The end result of course is that you start with Vista and end up with Win 10.

 

Its an upgrade in the same sense as an 'upgrade' of a phone is, you replace one with another.

No it isn't.  When I change my iPhone I'm able to restore everything exactly as it was before doing the upgrade.  When I upgraded Win8 to Win10, everything remained exactly as it was; all programmes still worked, all photos were still in place etc.  A wipe and clean install of Win10 will remove everything fro m the hard drive - every programme, every document, every photo.

[Guest]

Just now, WotEver said:

No it isn't.  When I change my iPhone I'm able to restore everything exactly as it was before doing the upgrade.  When I upgraded Win8 to Win10, everything remained exactly as it was; all programmes still worked, all photos were still in place etc.  A wipe and clean install of Win10 will remove everything fro m the hard drive - every programme, every document, every photo.

I will leave you to it matey, there is just no point what so ever in discussing it. (And it doesnt help the OP anyway).

 

The article repeatedly uses the word 'upgrade' and explains the process. 

 

Have a good evening.

[WotEver]

1 minute ago, The Happy Nomad said:

The article repeatedly uses the word 'upgrade' and explains the process. 

And the first thing it states in the procedure is that you have to save everything off the computer because it will all be lost when you install Win10.  I think this helps the OP enormously, because he's being made aware that he can't upgrade and keep everything without saving it off elsewhere before starting.

[restlessnomad]

2 hours ago, jenevers said:

Bl***y Hell! All these suggestions sound complicated to a tech dinosaur like me.?

maybe I’ll just have to take it to a tech shop and let them sort it out.

I’ll need them to get all my photos off it before I get rid.

Yes, get your photos first, then buy another laptop. You can buy a

1. new decent laptop for £500 which will work fine for next 5 years at least.

2. Second hand laptop for around £150.

3. Entry level chromebook for around £200/250.

 

Ignore all the talk of upgrade to win 10 or linux, they are not appropriate for you.

[jetzi]

If all you want is to save the photos and documents on the thing, by far the simplest way is to get a hard drive enclosure (like this one from Amazon for under a fiver - https://www.amazon.co.uk/DIGIFLEX-Drive-Caddy-Enclosure-Laptop/dp/B002UZO07C) , whip out the hard drive (should be as simple as unscrewing a panel, pulling it out and pushing it into the new enclosure). Voila, you have a "flash drive" that contains everything you had on your laptop. Flog the rest in an eBay auction and see what you can get - I guarantee you that someone will pay at least twenty or thirty quid for it.

 

If that still sounds too complicated, then yes a tech shop after the lockdown is over is probably your best bet! Good luck.

[pete.i]

2 hours ago, The Happy Nomad said:

??

Well if we want to be uber pedantic, yes of course. The article makes that abundantly clear.

 

The result of course is that you start with Vista and end up with Win 10.

 

Its an upgrade in the same sense as an 'upgrade' of a phone is, you replace one with another.

 

 

Also being "uber pedantic" whatever the hell that means, take note of item 17. The one that says "This selection must match the edition for which you BOUGHT the product key." You cannot upgrade from Vista to Win 10 without buying an activation key from Microsoft. To be fair though Windows 10 does work quite well without activation as long as you don't want the pretty stuff such as themes etc.

[Guest]

8 minutes ago, pete.i said:

Also being "uber pedantic" whatever the hell that means, take note of item 17. The one that says "This selection must match the edition for which you BOUGHT the product key." You cannot upgrade from Vista to Win 10 without buying an activation key from Microsoft. To be fair though Windows 10 does work quite well without activation as long as you don't want the pretty stuff such as themes etc.

Indeed. I don't think anyone has suggested the key would be available for free for the full version. They did however for a while offer free upgrades from previous versions but from memory it was time limited and also from memory it didn't go as far back as Vista when they were available. But my memory may be faulty on that and Vista may indeed have been included.

 

 

Edited April 18, 2020 by The Happy Nomad

[WotEver]

I was wrong

Edited April 18, 2020 by WotEver

[David Mack]

2 minutes ago, WotEver said:

My recollection was that the free upgrade was only ever for Win8.  Not even Win7 was included, let alone Vista.

I upgraded a legal copy of Windows 7 to W10 for free, when support for W7 ended. Found the instructions online.

[jetzi]

56 minutes ago, The Happy Nomad said:

I don't think anyone has suggested the key would be available for free for the full version.

I suggested it, and I'll suggest it again.

 

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/you-can-still-upgrade-to-windows-10-for-free-heres-how/

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

I suggested it, and I'll suggest it again.

 

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/you-can-still-upgrade-to-windows-10-for-free-heres-how/

I cant see that includes Vista?

26 minutes ago, David Mack said:

I upgraded a legal copy of Windows 7 to W10 for free, when support for W7 ended. Found the instructions online.

I have a recollection of being able to do the same, but Win 10 at the time was getting lambasted for being such a poor upgrade I never bothered.

[jetzi]

Perhaps not Vista, I found that with 5 second Google. Microsoft doesn't make it difficult to obtain Windows 10 for free though (the "unactivated" version is almost fully-featured). They've actually said outright they'd rather someone pirate a copy of Windows 10 than use a free alternative like Linux.

 

Why?

Microsoft doesn't make Windows money by selling upgrades. They make money because every time a new computer is sold, the purchaser pays a "Windows tax" that is built into the cost of almost every PC. You pay this tax even if you format the PC immediately and install Ubuntu. IIRC they even managed (during the 90s antitrust years) to lobby it into law that manufacturers had to sell computers with an OS installed.

 

The most important thing for Microsoft is that Windows remains the default, go-to OS for manufacturers, and that a majority of consumers expect that it be installed on their new PC. If they went to great pains to squeeze every penny out of those who have already paid for Windows multiple times in their lifetime (50 odd quid for an OEM license * how many PCs you've ever bought?) there is a chance that that could hurt their business model. Considering that PCs get replaced so frequently their priority is that they corner the OEM market.

 

Edit to add: Don't do anything illegal. Pay for your software, it's the right thing to do.

Edited April 18, 2020 by ivan&alice

[WotEver]

50 minutes ago, David Mack said:

I upgraded a legal copy of Windows 7 to W10 for free, when support for W7 ended. Found the instructions online.

Yup, you're right.  My bad

[bizzard]

There was also a patch, 8.1 between 8 and 10

[Tom and Bex]

6 hours ago, The Happy Nomad said:

My favourite MS of all time though is XP. Always found it stable and reliable.

Still running XP in my old laptop. Working well?

 

Use it for running car diagnostic software and workshop manual. Also use for Water Explorer's Navygator software for recording trips when we go boating, and occasional web browsing using Firefox. Sure there's some other obscure software I use on it as well, and seem to remember using it for completing BCN Challenge log last year!

 

Why upgrade for the sake of it when what you have still does the job well? What benefit would I gain from upgrading to a newer machine other than a whole lot of hassle?

[bizzard]

I believe many companies and ATM machines are on XP, but they have to pay M/S heavily for security updates.

[Guest]

7 minutes ago, Tom and Bex said:

Still running XP in my old laptop. Working well?

 

Use it for running car diagnostic software and workshop manual. Also use for Water Explorer's Navygator software for recording trips when we go boating, and occasional web browsing using Firefox. Sure there's some other obscure software I use on it as well, and seem to remember using it for completing BCN Challenge log last year!

 

Why upgrade for the sake of it when what you have still does the job well? What benefit would I gain from upgrading to a newer machine other than a whole lot of hassle?

You will probably get away with it. And if you dont store any personal information on it, fair play to you.

 

I presume if you tried to use it for anything like on line banking the banks web site just wouldnt allow access?

[restlessnomad]

40 minutes ago, Tom and Bex said:

Still running XP in my old laptop. Working well?

 

Use it for running car diagnostic software and workshop manual. Also use for Water Explorer's Navygator software for recording trips when we go boating, and occasional web browsing using Firefox. Sure there's some other obscure software I use on it as well, and seem to remember using it for completing BCN Challenge log last year!

 

Why upgrade for the sake of it when what you have still does the job well? What benefit would I gain from upgrading to a newer machine other than a whole lot of hassle?

windows xp is a fine OS but microsoft has stopped supporting it for security vulnerabilities (unless you are big client like a national govt), so you are putting yourself(and possibly others) at risk every time you are online.

Edited April 18, 2020 by restlessnomad

[Tom and Bex]

22 minutes ago, restlessnomad said:

windows xp is a fine OS but microsoft has stopped supporting it for security vulnerabilities (unless you are big client like a national govt), so you are putting yourself(and possibly others) at risk every time you are online.

I know it was stopped being supported since time ago. Can't see the risk though, no sensitive information on it, and not used for banking etc. One big advantage for occasional use is the fact it DOESN'T keep nagging for updates every time you turn it on, that then take an age on the slow connection wer have. In fact it works quite well, boots up as quickly as a windows machine can, and then just works!

 

As an aside, some of our computers at work still run XP? Probably comes under the government exemption though!

[jenevers]

3 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

If all you want is to save the photos and documents on the thing, by far the simplest way is to get a hard drive enclosure (like this one from Amazon for under a fiver - https://www.amazon.co.uk/DIGIFLEX-Drive-Caddy-Enclosure-Laptop/dp/B002UZO07C) , whip out the hard drive (should be as simple as unscrewing a panel, pulling it out and pushing it into the new enclosure). Voila, you have a "flash drive" that contains everything you had on your laptop. Flog the rest in an eBay auction and see what you can get - I guarantee you that someone will pay at least twenty or thirty quid for it.

 

If that still sounds too complicated, then yes a tech shop after the lockdown is over is probably your best bet! Good luck.

Sounds good to me. I’ll order one?

[restlessnomad]

10 hours ago, Tom and Bex said:

I know it was stopped being supported since time ago. Can't see the risk though, no sensitive information on it, and not used for banking etc. One big advantage for occasional use is the fact it DOESN'T keep nagging for updates every time you turn it on, that then take an age on the slow connection wer have. In fact it works quite well, boots up as quickly as a windows machine can, and then just works!

 

As an aside, some of our computers at work still run XP? Probably comes under the government exemption though!

even though you don't have sensitive data, your machine might be one of those compromised ones that are used to attack other machines. The likelihood of it is small but if police knocks on your door, you will have to feign ignorance on the matter(especially if you are old)

[robtheplod]

Those that like the fact XP doesn't update all the time is part of the problem!  XP has scores of vulnerabilities and shouldn't be used on any device that can see the internet....

[Tony Brooks]

1 hour ago, restlessnomad said:

even though you don't have sensitive data, your machine might be one of those compromised ones that are used to attack other machines. The likelihood of it is small but if police knocks on your door, you will have to feign ignorance on the matter(especially if you are old)

 

When I was running XP long after support stopped I used a paid for "protection" program that was a lot more than just an anti-virus. This product always reviewed as more reliable that the Microsoft product that still had updates. I felt perfectly safe, even more so than with Vista that encouraged the loss of data. If my protection software had not turned out to be Russian in origin I would still be running XP. The way Microsoft kept issuing new versions of Windoze that may or may not run my specialist software and which demanded ever increasing hardware performance. Then MS started pushing their "pay us every year"  software products. As far as I am concerned that showed the future MS wise. I don't feel easy with this need to ever buy newer and newer hardware so I invested a little time in swapping to Linux Mint (other versions available and may be better suited of a recent MS user).

 

It is true a lot of those inhabiting of the Linux forums the Linux forums delight in advising that you go back to the 1980s and using the command line without explaining what the gobbledygook they advise actual means and does but by and large that is no longer required for day to day routine use. In fact I suspect there are enough Linux users here who could give easier to understand advice on the Mint and Ubuantu versions.

 

I am wring this on an old second hand Lenovo laptop with a spinning hard drive.  My wife has an older one with a solid state drive and its on my desktop that must be 7 years old with a spinner and SSD and all are perfectly fast enough and do not feel slow, however I don't do much in the way of video processing.

 

Now with lockdown is an ideal time to dip a toe into learning Linux.  If you get what is known as a live version on a CD or pendrive you don't even have to install it to try it but it will run slowly without a lot of features. You can download the ISO images to put on  a pendrive or CD yourself.