Windows 7 and 8.1 Embedded Intel Skylake users will need to upgrade in 2017

[Batu69]

Firm brings policy into line with standard Windows 10

 

MICROSOFT HAS been jiggling the goalposts again, this time in terms of its support for Intel's Skylake processors running embedded versions of Windows 7 and 8.1.

 

The new policy brings embedded users into line with 'standard OS' users, for whom Skylake support will expire in mid-2017. That doesn't mean much to your average man in the street, but could have a knock-on effect on businesses.

 

A statement from Microsoft explained: "Through July 17, 2017, Skylake devices running Windows Embedded 7, 8 and 8.1 will be supported according to the lifecycle support policy for those products. During the 18-month support period, these systems should be upgraded to Windows 10 to continue receiving support after the period ends.

 

"After July 2017, the most critical security updates will be addressed for these configurations, and will be released if the update does not risk the reliability or compatibility of the Windows Embedded 7/8/8.1 platform on other devices."

 

Embedded runs on everything from tills to CAT scanners. This enforced upgrade policy is a significant deal, and the upgrade path to Windows 10 Embedded isn't as simple as that of the standard version.

 

Certainly a message on a life support machine asking if it should 'update now' or 'update tonight' will not go down well.

That said, things won't stop working, they'll just be unsupported, meaning that if a future update borks things after that date, Microsoft gets to do the big 'I told you so' dance.

 

The good news is that this policy doesn't apply to servers. These will continue to be supported for five years as mainstream followed by five years as extended. This means that you can buy a Skylake processor-based server with confidence.

 

The truth is that the whole thing is a bit of a mess. Microsoft is declaring end-of-life dates for chips that aren't even on general release yet, and then adding lots of caveats and explanations.

 

Given the messy rollout of Windows 10 so far, you would hope that the company would want to keep things simple. But nooooo.

 

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[humble3d]

None dare call it EXTORTION...  

[steven36]

10 hours ago, humble3d said:

None dare call it EXTORTION...  

It would would be different  if this was new news  but we knew this already for over a month.

 

All the bloggers done said  it was going  to be the same for home users .  just a official statement i guess . It would be infeasible to let pro windows 7 Intel Skylake get updates  then many would  buy new pro versions instead of Enterprise many small business  use pro instead .