Still free upgrade to Win 10

[Ole Anderson]

My 42 month old Dell laptop has been slow, one thing I wanted to do was to update from Windows 7 Professional to Windows 10, but software is over $100 and I understood that the free upgrade offer expired long ago. Yesterday I ran across this Microsoft link that worked at no cost. I am now running Windows 10 Pro. No key was required. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 Happy camper.

[Brian Tymchak]

Hmm, I wonder if you will be able to get updates without a license.

[Charlie Hinton]

I have recently been messing with the computers again switching over to SSDs and bringing some really old ones back into service.
From what I have been reading, Microsoft is still transferring the Win7 license to Win 10.
Additionally even on brand new hardware Win10 can be used indefinitely without activation and Microsoft does the updates to it.
All of my old computers were still on Vista so I loaded a clean install Win10 using the same Microsoft link in the post above.
Of course the continued support for inactivated Win10 could change at any time, even to the point of being rendered nonfunctional.

[Ole Anderson]

Hmm, I wonder if you will be able to get updates without a license. I presume as part of the install, it looks for a verified license on the computer before doing the download.

[Kev Williams]

I finally got my first taste of Win10 last week, courtesy of a friend who was having issues getting Engravelab to install. Pretty impressive. No more annoying little popups in the bottom right corner or 2x3"-ish error messages. Instead, they've been replaced with 10x20" stop-what-you're-doing-NOW splash screens, most of which pointed out in no uncertain terms that it wasn't connected online. I didn't WANT it online, I just wanted to load a program from a dvd. And to find one of his engraving files. And to locate the device manager to see what his USB things were. I'm glad it's his and not mine. It's the only reason I'm not still sweeping up pieces of broken computer off the basement floor...

So the fact Bill's still giving it away doesn't surprise me. You get what you pay for comes to mind... ;)

Maybe 10 is good for social media and gaming, but as a WORK computer, XP is the first and last decent Windows...

[Frank Pratt]

Maybe 10 is good for social media and gaming, but as a WORK computer, XP is the first and last decent Windows...

I loved XP, but I have to disagree with you on this one. I've been using 10 since it came out & I'd hate to have to go back to XP. I still have an old XP laptop that I can't upgrade because of 1 piece of software that won't run on newer OS's, even in compatibility mode. It's painful to use in comparison to 10.

[Jim Becker]

I loved XP, but I have to disagree with you on this one. I've been using 10 since it came out & I'd hate to have to go back to XP. I still have an old XP laptop that I can't upgrade because of 1 piece of software that won't run on newer OS's, even in compatibility mode. It's painful to use in comparison to 10.
I have to agree with you...Win10 has been significantly more stable and less problematic than WinXP and even Win7 ever was for me. While I only use Windows when forced to at this point (for CNC related), I'd never go back to the earlier versions and all the "hoop jumping" I had to do to keep them running reliably and efficiently.

[Frank Pratt]

I have to agree with you...Win10 has been significantly more stable and less problematic than WinXP and even Win7 ever was for me. While I only use Windows when forced to at this point (for CNC related), I'd never go back to the earlier versions and all the "hoop jumping" I had to do to keep them running reliably and efficiently.

I only use Windows. I dabbled just a bit in various Linux years ago, but I use some estimating software at work that is Windows only. So that is where I have dedicated my very limited brain capacity :confused:

[Myk Rian]

My 42 month old Dell laptop has been slow, one thing I wanted to do was to update from Windows 7 Professional to Windows 10, but software is over $100 and I understood that the free upgrade offer expired long ago. Yesterday I ran across this Microsoft link that worked at no cost. I am now running Windows 10 Pro. No key was required. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 Happy camper.
Windows 10 is a "downgrade" from 7 pro. There is a reason corporate computers use 7 pro.

[Frank Pratt]

Windows 10 is a "downgrade" from 7 pro. There is a reason corporate computers use 7 pro.

That reason is that there is a tremendous cost to an enterprise to change OS's, not because 7 is better than 10.

[Greg R Bradley]

Windows 10 is a "downgrade" from 7 pro. There is a reason corporate computers use 7 pro.I agree completely, HOWEVER Win10 has been through several major upgrades and they have solved most of the issues. If MS used the silliness of their Server OS naming, it would be called Win 10 Release 2 or even 3 by now. Even HP Workstations that were 99% Win7 a year ago are finally moving to Win10 as you can actually use it to get serious CAD work done.
Bottom line, as the most vocal about having never used Win8 and hating the only 2 Win10 installs, a new CAD workstation will almost certainly be Win10. I would have laughed at the thought 6 months ago. That will be one down and over 100 to go.

[Kev Williams]

My business is in our house, been working within these same four walls full time for 42 years. I'm using perfectly good 10+ year old software on several computers, some that even XP is too new for, so I have a Win98 computer for those. The machines in my signature below, all but 6 of 7 lasers are between 14 and 38 years old... the 6 new lasers connect via USB, but only my 2 newest fiber's software will run on win10. Of my 11 rotary tool engravers, all but 2 of them require LPT or serial port connections. Same with my old vinyl cutter. And the software for the 2 machines that will USB connect, not compatible with 10. Same issue in the my office, my old Quickbooks isn't compatible with 10, nor is my old HP Laserjet that just won't die...

To replace/upgrade just my software to be compatible with Win10 would run well into five figure$. To replace 10 or more working-perfectly and long ago paid-for machines would run the tab above six figure$... Uh, nope.

And for what it's worth, I have two XP computers that run all day all night, they only turn off if the power goes out- one has like 5 machines connected to it and just does 'server' duty, but it works fine if I need it-- the other has a couple of machines connected also and I use daily for graphics and engraving work. My other computers are all Win 7 Pro or Ultimate. Oh, almost forgot, and one useless Vista laptop. While the 7's will load programs faster than the XP's, RUNNING the programs and just basic button-click navigating is a different story. The XP's are MUCH faster and less finicky than any of my 7's. And I've never had a problem with XP that System Restore couldn't fix- or my IT-guy son :)

So, it really doesn't matter if Win10 is Vista revisited or the best thing since Pong, as a business tool it's utterly useless to me...

[Paul Brinkmeyer]

This is not to promote win 10,
I have a few older systems running for well over 10 - 20 years each too.
But my main art/laser computer was showing signs of age and I finally did buy all new tech, including win 10 home and fast electronic drive, but no other bells or whistles.
I decided to try and hook new computer to old machines,
So I added a card with 2 old style serial ports and run two 20 plus year old machines with the ports without any problems.
In one case, the engraver company said it would not work with the old software and I had to spend $900. plus to upgrade software to work on win 10.
I did install the old software, and it runs just fine, no upgrade fee at all.
But my accounting software did not like this at all, so I found details on how to run older windows drivers into win 10 and darn if it did not work. (thanks google)
Now I do not worry as much about my remaining xp machine any more.

[glenn bradley]

Maybe 10 is good for social media and gaming, but as a WORK computer, XP is the first and last decent Windows...


I loved XP, but I have to disagree with you on this one. I've been using 10 since it came out & I'd hate to have to go back to XP. I still have an old XP laptop that I can't upgrade because of 1 piece of software that won't run on newer OS's, even in compatibility mode. It's painful to use in comparison to 10.

This is an argument that will go on and on. I have been in I.T. since Ethernet was still in the lab. Computers are tools for us. Windows 10 is a big pain for me and the network engineers that work for me. If you're in the profession it is not unusual to have several OS's and several flavors of those OS's on machines that you use as tools. Using only Windows 10 for my type of work is akin to working on your car with a Crescent wrench. But, as I said, it becomes an argumentum immortalem.

[Ronald Blue]

Interesting comments. However working for a company with thousands of computers using Windows 10 it has been very stable and reliable. Some do still have Win 7 but they will be gone by fall. We use them for data input and management as well as communication functions. The change over for all is coming because Win 7 support is being terminated soon but all new systems have been Windows 10 for at least a couple years. If your controlling machines with the system then I'm sure the older versions work well. However with all software updates that occur everything seems to work very well. If they felt something else was better we would be using it. They forced iPhones down our throats so they wouldn't hesitate to change if they felt it there was a benefit in doing so. Basically all the complaints that XP and Vista had are gone. Boot up and shut down are fast. It doesn't crash. There are those that think no one uses Windows any longer but they are certainly wrong.

[Osvaldo Cristo]

After resist for long time expecting for bug fixing from Microsoft, last year finally I went from my great Windows 7 Ultimate to Windows 10 in my home made (then) five years old workstation... despite the free offer for the upgrade
technically was dued, I had no diffcults to upgrade it straightly from their site... free of charge, of course!

Microsoft has all interest to turn everybody to the last Windows release so if you have a regular license from previous OS I think you will have no difficulties to get free upgrade. Why do not test? :confused:

[Osvaldo Cristo]

Windows 10 is a "downgrade" from 7 pro. There is a reason corporate computers use 7 pro.

I fully agree you when the Windows 10 was released and that was the main reason I stayed with Windows 7 Ultimate up to last year when finally I went to Windows 10 upgrade route despite I hated Microsoft to force the upgrade at its release!

I decided for the upgrade as a couple of applications I use extensively for image processing at home lost compatibility with previous Windows editions and I imagined after so long time released Microsoft would patch the original release to a more stable and comprehensive OS. My one year extensive use of it points Windows 10 is at least so stable and reliable than my (beloved) Windows XP 64-bit and Windows 7.

The upgrade was simple and direct with most of my applications migrated smoothly. I had to re-install a couple of them. My biggest loss was my XP Virtual Machine where in the Windows 7 I run a couple of applications with more sentimental than practical sense, including my fantastic MacSyma - but I was aware of that previously to the upgrade, so no surprise, actually.

[Kev Williams]

Just my opinion, but the Win7-XP virtual machine was nothing more than a plot by MS to convince the user that win7 was MUCH better than XP. This became glaringly clear to me after downloading Virtual box onto the same win7 computer, installed my XP Pro and started working. You simply won't find a faster working computer than an fresh installed XP virtual machine running in the background of an 8 core 32gig ram win7 64. In contrast, the built-in VM was like trying to stir coal tar with a toothpick. It's frustratingly slow pace just plain got old, and FAST, which is why I tried Vbox in the first place. But alas, I could never get the USB port sharing to cooperate in Vbox so I don't use it either.. a whole separate computer and a KVM switch is SO much easier...

[Scott Donley]

What, no love for ME :rolleyes:

[Kev Williams]

So they're giving away Win10, and now I'm getting email ads to buy Win10 at a 25% discount... lol

[Grant Wilkinson]

@Kev: I think you are limited to updating from win 7 or 8 if using the free media provided by MS. If you want a clean install, you need to pay for the media.

[Curt Harms]

@Kev: I think you are limited to updating from win 7 or 8 if using the free media provided by MS. If you want a clean install, you need to pay for the media.

I've downloaded a Win10 iso from Microsoft's site and burned it to a disk. It installed and ran without glitch or nag. I only ran it for a short time so can't say whether it would have gotten problematic over time or not. I use Windows about 15 minutes every 28 days so can't say if it's good or bad, does what I need it to do.

[Ole Anderson]

So I have been running Win 10 for a month now. Regretting it. I don't see any advantages and several disadvantages. Mainly it runs much slower, longer to boot up with a frustrating login sequence. Extra clicks to do the same operation. Next step, install an SSD drive.

[Grant Wilkinson]

That's interesting,Ole. I have two machines running windows 10 home and one running windows 7 home. The two running 10 were previously running 7. Both of the 10 machines run faster than the 7, and they running faster now than they did when they were running 7. I wonder if your results and mine vary because I did clean installs of 10 and you did an upgrade. I'm not arguing with your results. I'm just curious because the last machine that I need to move to 10 is my wife's. She has more applications and configurations that I have any desire to re-install, so my plan is to do an update, not a clean install. Time will tell, I guess.

[Frank Pratt]

So I have been running Win 10 for a month now. Regretting it. I don't see any advantages and several disadvantages. Mainly it runs much slower, longer to boot up with a frustrating login sequence. Extra clicks to do the same operation. Next step, install an SSD drive.

I agree with Grant, Ole. Something ain't right there. Of the 3 desktops & 1 laptop that I went from Windows 7 to 10 on, All were significantly faster running 10. If you really want to speed things up, go with an M2 PCIe drive. My current computer goes from POST to the desktop in 4 - 5 seconds. You'll probably need a new motherboard for that though.

[Curt Harms]

Just my opinion, but the Win7-XP virtual machine was nothing more than a plot by MS to convince the user that win7 was MUCH better than XP. This became glaringly clear to me after downloading Virtual box onto the same win7 computer, installed my XP Pro and started working. You simply won't find a faster working computer than an fresh installed XP virtual machine running in the background of an 8 core 32gig ram win7 64. In contrast, the built-in VM was like trying to stir coal tar with a toothpick. It's frustratingly slow pace just plain got old, and FAST, which is why I tried Vbox in the first place. But alas, I could never get the USB port sharing to cooperate in Vbox so I don't use it either.. a whole separate computer and a KVM switch is SO much easier...

I wonder how 98 & XP work on new hardware? New chipsets and features (I don't think NvME was even around in the early 2000s) may not be supported. Or do you have enough spare machines/parts to last 'til your lasers/engravers are replaced? It certainly makes $en$e to run your machines as long as possible. I was able to get VBox to recognize flash drives on USB ports running on an Ubuntu host once I got guest extensions(?) configured but never tried anything beyond that. Win 7/10 guests on an Ubuntu host seemed to work pretty well for the limited tinkering I did.

[Barry McFadden]

So I have been running Win 10 for a month now. Regretting it. I don't see any advantages and several disadvantages. Mainly it runs much slower, longer to boot up with a frustrating login sequence. Extra clicks to do the same operation. Next step, install an SSD drive.

I was running XP and decided to get a new computer with Win 10. It boots up and is ready to use in about 30 seconds... I don't know what login sequence you're talking about as mine dosen't require any login....

[Jim Becker]

So I have been running Win 10 for a month now. Regretting it. I don't see any advantages and several disadvantages. Mainly it runs much slower, longer to boot up with a frustrating login sequence. Extra clicks to do the same operation. Next step, install an SSD drive.
My experience was the opposite...in multiple iterations. Win10 performs substantially better than Win7 did. Did you do a "clean" install or an upgrade?

You will, however, see a big improvement with the SSD, regardless of OS...they breath new life into computers, especially with the extent of constant drive access there is with modern OS. So many computers only seem slow because of drive access, not the processor which is often just "loafing" along. RAM also matters...the more RAM, the less "swapping" to the drive, too. 4GB is marginal these days. 8GB is what I consider the "new minimum" for great performance with most normal applications and uses outside of merely browsing the Internet.

[Kev Williams]

I wonder how 98 & XP work on new hardware? New chipsets and features (I don't think NvME was even around in the early 2000s) may not be supported. Or do you have enough spare machines/parts to last 'til your lasers/engravers are replaced? It certainly makes $en$e to run your machines as long as possible...
I have an unlimited supply of XP computers available, many of my customers keep asking if I'll take theirs! 98's are a different story, but the old HP Pavillion I'm running now shows no signs of going belly-up. I did have to change out the power supply about 3 years ago, I didn't even install it, it's just sitting next to it, easier to change out if there's a next time. And, the computer it replaced, I still have it, it's perfectly ok and has every program on it the HP does. The only reason I changed was processor speed, 133 to 200mhz...
This my old crew-
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the HP 98, the circa '02 e-machine XP, and Dell Optiplex 760 XP, which was originally a Vista machine..
The 98 is strictly to run circa 1992 and 1995 Casmate Graphics software, it's graphics vector-tracing program is still the best I've ever used. It only gets used about twice a week so it's usually off-

The e-machine has 5 machines connected to it, strictly a 'print server', never runs programs. It has 3 hard drives, I just use those for random backup. Always on or hibernated

The Dell is connected to 2 of my machines, and runs Corel and Gravostyle to drive my LS100 laser, and is always on or hibernated.

This is the machine I'm using now, my T5400 Precicsion running 7 Pro 64, it's connected to 2 machines, and is the 'main' computer around here
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-- I'm constantly amazed at how slow this thing is, it should be anything but!

I also have 2 more Optiplex's, one in the office, one in the garage shop, both running 7 Pro 32.

And then there's 2 HP small factors running XP, an HP laptop running Vista, and Chinese Hasee laptop running 7 Ultimate 32.

The only newer-than-7 computer I have is a win 8 that I upgraded to 8.1, which was followed by a catastrophic HD failure shortly afterward.

No more 8's, never going to have a 10. :)

[Ole Anderson]

I believe part of my slow running experience with Win 10 was that I only had 4 gig of ram. I just upped it to 8 gigs (cost under $33) and now it runs more to my expectations. Still might add an SSD drive. Looking at this hybrid: https://www.amazon.com/Laptop-Solid-State-Hybrid-Inspiron/dp/B0768QTLNJ/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1548441774&sr=8-4&keywords=dell+laptop+hard+drive+solid+state#custom erReviews

[Mike Henderson]

I believe part of my slow running experience with Win 10 was that I only had 4 gig of ram. I just upped it to 8 gigs (cost under $33) and now it runs more to my expectations. Still might add an SSD drive. Looking at this hybrid: https://www.amazon.com/Laptop-Solid-State-Hybrid-Inspiron/dp/B0768QTLNJ/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1548441774&sr=8-4&keywords=dell+laptop+hard+drive+solid+state#custom erReviews

Spring for an SSD. The prices have come down quite a bit and the improvement in performance is amazing.

Here's a Crucial 1TB SSD (https://www.amazon.com/Crucial-MX500-NAND-SATA-Internal/dp/B077SF8KMG/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=SJVJX0XWUT2Y&keywords=1tb+ssd&qid=1560220768&s=gateway&sprefix=1tb+ssd%2Caps%2C494&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1) for a modest amount.

No matter which way you go, you'll need cloning software. Macrium Reflect Free is very good but then you'll need to expand the main part of the drive. Easeus Partition Master Free will do that and it's easy to use.

Mike

I like the Samsung SSDs but they're a bit more expensive. If you look at the minimum write life on modern SSDs, it's way beyond any normal usage. I have a 4tb SSD in my computer and the minimum (guaranteed) write life is something like 2,400TB of write. There's absolutely no way I could ever get to that limit.

[Jim Becker]

I believe part of my slow running experience with Win 10 was that I only had 4 gig of ram. I just upped it to 8 gigs (cost under $33) and now it runs more to my expectations. Still might add an SSD drive.
8gb RAM is the "new base", IMHO. But adding that SSD will be eye-opening to you! One of my machines is a 2010 iMac...when I added the SSD a number of years ago (yea...they were more money then)...it made it run better than new and it still feels like a "fast" computer despite being an old i3. Today's operating systems do a lot of interchange with the primary storage medium for a variety of things and the read/write for an SSR is "lightyears" faster than a spinning hard drive.

[Derek Meyer]

I second the recommendation of Samsung SSD drives. I've been using them for years, both at home and at work, and never had any issues. They just work, and work well.

I would not recommend a hybrid drive. It sounds like a good idea, but in reality they don't work as well as they should. It is just way better and easier to go with a true SSD.

[Lee DeRaud]

Spring for an SSD. The prices have come down quite a bit and the improvement in performance is amazing.

Here's a Crucial 1TB SSD (https://www.amazon.com/Crucial-MX500-NAND-SATA-Internal/dp/B077SF8KMG/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?crid=SJVJX0XWUT2Y&keywords=1tb+ssd&qid=1560220768&s=gateway&sprefix=1tb+ssd%2Caps%2C494&sr=8-1-spons&psc=1) for a modest amount.

I like the Samsung SSDs but they're a bit more expensive. If you look at the minimum write life on modern SSDs, it's way beyond any normal usage. I have a 4tb SSD in my computer and the minimum (guaranteed) write life is something like 2,400TB of write. There's absolutely no way I could ever get to that limit.I've got the previous model (850) Samsung to this one: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B078DPCY3T/ref=twister_B07P5VF5TL?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1 … running like a champ for three years now. Back then 1TB SSD was $300+ and Crucial SSDs were 15%-20% more than a similar Samsung, looks like that situation has flip-flopped.

[Kev Williams]

so, what are the downsides to an external SSD?

[Mike Henderson]

so, what are the downsides to an external SSD?

Well, you could boot from an external drive but you'd be limited by the speed of the USB port (assuming you hook the drive up via USB). Otherwise, you'd still be booting from your slow HDD and you could store data on your external SSD. The real advantage of an SSD is for the operating system.

It's pretty easy to clone an existing drive and install an SSD in its place. I'd highly recommend going that route.

If you're hesitant about doing the swap yourself, there are people who will come to your place and do it for a reasonable fee.

Mike

[Jim Becker]

so, what are the downsides to an external SSD?

The technical downside is quite simple...the speed of the connection to the computer will limit the performance of the SSD. Ideally, you'd want Thunderbolt III/USB-C for best performance. But many existing computers have neither of these. USB-2 and/or USB-3 are very slow compared to the fast connections you generally get with an internally attached drive.

[Lee DeRaud]

The technical downside is quite simple...the speed of the connection to the computer will limit the performance of the SSD. Ideally, you'd want Thunderbolt III/USB-C for best performance. But many existing computers have neither of these. USB-2 and/or USB-3 are very slow compared to the fast connections you generally get with an internally attached drive.eSATA maybe?
There's this: https://www.amazon.com/Vantec-SATA-eSATA-Enclosure-NST-266SU3-BK/dp/B014LQOG58 to hold the drive,
plus this: https://www.amazon.com/StarTech-PEXESAT32-Express-eSATA-Controller/dp/B003GSGMPU to connect it.

(They had an even simpler interface card, just an I/O bracket with SATA cable sockets on the inside and eSATA cable sockets on the outside. But I doubt that one is hot-swappable.)

[Grant Wilkinson]

@Kev: Check your motherboard. You may have an external (esata) set of jacks on your PC. If you do, there are no downsides to using an external SSD compared to an internal SSD.

[Frank Pratt]

A PCIe SSD will be significantly faster than USB 3 or SATA. I don't know if there are any external PCIe drives though.

[Kev Williams]

No esata jacks, just three 1394's and a couple of 'display' jacks on the back of the video card, which is getting replaced as soon as my new GTX-750 ti shows up...

Just opened it up, inside I have bay space beneath the DVD (didn't think about that ;) ) and 2 open sata jacks so I should be okay for an internal install--

I've been looking at 1/2tb SSD,s and just got noticing my 1tb hard drive is storing just south of 600gbs already?! There's only 42 folders and 62 'items' on the whole drive-- All photos and video's are on 2 other drives, and all of my work/job folders for are on a separate 80g drive (on this machine)-- I need to search the drive to see what's eating all the space?

So I guess I should spring for a full tb drive...

Thanks btw everyone for the suggestions! http://www.engraver1.com/gifs/thumbsup.gif

[Jim Becker]

eSATA maybe?
There's this: https://www.amazon.com/Vantec-SATA-eSATA-Enclosure-NST-266SU3-BK/dp/B014LQOG58 to hold the drive,
plus this: https://www.amazon.com/StarTech-PEXESAT32-Express-eSATA-Controller/dp/B003GSGMPU to connect it.

(They had an even simpler interface card, just an I/O bracket with SATA cable sockets on the inside and eSATA cable sockets on the outside. But I doubt that one is hot-swappable.)

When there is ability to add the fast interface, something external can perform better. These days, however, I suspect that the majority of folks don't have machines that you can do this because of the major movement toward portable devices.

[Lee DeRaud]

If your motherboard has the correct connector for it, this widget is slightly more expensive than a standard SATA SSD, but much faster:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07K1J3C23/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
(Good chance if the computer/motherboard is less than 2-3 years old.)

[Kev Williams]

If your motherboard has the correct connector for it, this widget is slightly more expensive than a standard SATA SSD, but much faster:

It doesn't but for $13 I can add this adapter-- workable?

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[Mike Henderson]

It doesn't but for $13 I can add this adapter-- workable?

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I have a PCIe in one of my computers as the only SSD in that unit (the only drive in the unit). Regular SATA (6 Gbps) in my other computers. While the PCIe is probably faster, I can't tell the difference for the applications that I use (i7 processor in two of them). I would only go for that PCIe if you're doing some application that's really I/O bound.

Of course, if your computer presently uses a PCIe SSD as your only SSD, I'd certainly replace it with a larger PCIe.

Mike

[Lee DeRaud]

I've been looking at 1/2tb SSD,s and just got noticing my 1tb hard drive is storing just south of 600gbs already?! There's only 42 folders and 62 'items' on the whole drive-- All photos and video's are on 2 other drives, and all of my work/job folders for are on a separate 80g drive (on this machine)-- I need to search the drive to see what's eating all the space?Running a 'Pro' edition of Win7/Win10 with 'File History' turned on? I went through the same kabuki dance with GF's machine: 1TB drive showed only 150GB free (so 850GB used), but the visible folders only totaled about 450GB. My other Win7 machines had all used 'Home Premium', which lacked that feature.

[Kev Williams]

I found the problem- back around tax time I was suddenly missing most of my previous return records! So I thought I'd try Ccleaner's 'recuva' program- which worked wonderfully btw- but what I didn't realize was that I gave it over 300 gigs of data to search thru, which ended up on my C-drive! Now I'm down to 386 used, which I could probably whittle down, but I think a 1tb drive would be worth the extra money to be sure :)

FWIW I received my Nvidia GeForce GTX 750 ti video card yesterday, got it installed-- it replaced the factory Quadro FX 580 card... my gawd, it's like a bolt of lightning hit this computer!. I had no clue how badly the FX 580 was slowing everything down! Changing text in complex DXF's I receive used to take around 4 seconds, same procedure is done in less than a second- Alt-tabbing from Gravostyle to Corel was a 3 to 4 second wait, it's less than a second now. Changing to the next 8 mgpxl pic in photo viewer used to take 1-2 seconds, now I can get to the next pic nearly as fast as I can push the mouse button. Everything is instant now!

Other than changing a video card once with another one I had handy, which fried the motherboard about 3 minutes later, I've never messed with display drivers...
To quote the pilot when he finds out Mad Max's shotgun was never loaded... "Awl this toyme..." http://www.engraver1.com/gifs/banghead.gif

A shiny new SSD is really looking good now :D

[Jim Becker]

Kev, computing has gotten to the point technologically that the central processing unit isn't the major bottleneck like it was "back in the day". Input/Output is where that's at these days. Everything is visual/graphics oriented and there is a lot of data that gets shifted in RAM and to/from local storage. So improving video processing/output as well as file/data input/output can really kick things up a notch even with a slightly "mature" computer. 'Glad you are seeing that performance increase with the changes you made so far!

[Lee DeRaud]

So improving video processing/output as well as file/data input/output can really kick things up a notch even with a slightly "mature" computer.And now you have me reconsidering my decision to live with the integrated video on the machine I built up over the weekend. It's an i7-8700 with 32GB of RAM: no gaming, no 3D. I wasn't sure how much the low-end Nvidea board I had in my old machine would matter...the only reason I had it in the old machine was because the integrated video on a 2nd-gen i7 topped out at 1080P and I needed something to drive the 1440P 32" monitor.

So far the thing feels stupidly fast.

[Frank Pratt]

I don't do 3D or gaming, but I found that I need at least a mid level graphics card for stable performance. I use a 30" & 2 19" monitors, & even though the lower end cards are supposed to handle that, they don't do well at it.

[Jim Becker]

Kinda depends upon what you do with your computer, Lee. Some things are going to greatly benefit from a more capable video co-processing system; some will not, at least in a clearly noticeable way. But I get the monitor thing and am very thankful my Mid-2012 Macbook Pro 13" Retina can drive this 27" monitor at 2560 x 1440 with no issue as I do a lot of graphics things that benefit from the detail of more pixels. (It's a Core i5 which isn't stellar, but rarely do I see it slow much other than when Windoz in the VM is getting updated...more RAM would help, but I can't add any to this machine)

[Lee DeRaud]

Kinda depends upon what you do with your computer, Lee. Some things are going to greatly benefit from a more capable video co-processing system; some will not, at least in a clearly noticeable way.The two main apps for this machine are Photoshop and CorelDraw, both of which seem more sensitive to RAM size and disk speed. I've got a couple of obscure photo processing apps and PS plugins that could use the GPU for computations, but on the old machine, they ran about as fast on the CPU as on the Nvidia...and the new one's CPU is much faster.

Unless I decide I really want a gamer-class ($$$) GPU, I think I'm good to go for now. I'd probably bump the RAM to 64GB first.

[Kev Williams]

OK, so I ordered up the Crucial SSD that Mike Henderson suggested a page & a half ago from Amazon yesterday, just showed up--

So I go to the Crucial website for install info... This drive is intended to fit in laptops, and try as I might, I can't find any info on their website about installing this drive in a desktop-- not hard I know, but the cloning instructions for a laptop require a sata to usb converter which of course I don't have...

Since this drive will just sit in an unused drive bay within the machine and I have SATA cables ready to connect to it, my stupid question is, I don't need a sata/usb converter to clone my old drive, correct? Just run the cloning software, then switch the boot drives around in BIOS and I should be good to go--?

[Lee DeRaud]

Since this drive will just sit in an unused drive bay within the machine and I have SATA cables ready to connect to it, my stupid question is, I don't need a sata/usb converter to clone my old drive, correct? Just run the cloning software, then switch the boot drives around in BIOS and I should be good to go--?Yup, that's how I recall doing it. The cloning software shouldn't care how the new blank drive is connected..

[Mike Henderson]

OK, so I ordered up the Crucial SSD that Mike Henderson suggested a page & a half ago from Amazon yesterday, just showed up--

So I go to the Crucial website for install info... This drive is intended to fit in laptops, and try as I might, I can't find any info on their website about installing this drive in a desktop-- not hard I know, but the cloning instructions for a laptop require a sata to usb converter which of course I don't have...

Since this drive will just sit in an unused drive bay within the machine and I have SATA cables ready to connect to it, my stupid question is, I don't need a sata/usb converter to clone my old drive, correct? Just run the cloning software, then switch the boot drives around in BIOS and I should be good to go--?

Just a note - the clone software that Crucial provides is junk. Download the Macrium Reflect, or get the Easeus Clone software. Macrium works well but you may have to adjust the partitions and the Easeus partition master free will do that for you.

Mike

[Grant Wilkinson]

As Mike recommended, I use the free version of Macrium to clone. It works very well and is easy to understand. Make sure that Macium turns TRIM on. I think it will by default when it sees the receiving drive is an SSD, but if not, turn it on. Once you finish the clone, change your BIOS to boot from the new SSD to check everything out. Once happy, backup the new ssd and then you can do whatever you like with the old drive.

[Barry McFadden]

As Mike recommended, I use the free version of Macrium to clone. It works very well and is easy to understand. Make sure that Macium turns TRIM on. I think it will by default when it sees the receiving drive is an SSD, but if not, turn it on. Once you finish the clone, change your BIOS to boot from the new SSD to check everything out. Once happy, backup the new ssd and then you can do whatever you like with the old drive.

Why not just plug the SSD into the main board in the position the old drive was and boot from it and plug the original drive in as the secondary?

[Kev Williams]

So-

-- I opened computer, found a power plug to use, stole a SATA cable from an old computer, plugged in the drive, then booted up-
-- Once booted, no sign of the new drive. Oh yeah, Dell... I forgot....
-- Went into BIOS and yup, the SATA1 port was turned off. Turned it on and rebooted...
-- Computer wouldn't boot. Hardware problem. Arrgghh...
-- Disconnected the drive, still no boot...
-- Checked the BIOS, SATA0 is the first boot, ok, so... ?
-- Traced the cables. Duh, SATA0 is my 80gig spare drive. SATA3 is the Master...
-- Checked the boot order again, SATA3 is at the very bottom...so, WHY did BIOS move the Master to the bottom of the boot order when the new drive wasn't even initialized yet?
-- Moved SATA3 up to the top. Computer boots up, yay! But still no sign of the new drive.
-- I downloaded the Acronis earlier, so I run it.
-- Asks me which drives are being copied to which, I respond, it says 'initializing drive', then a few seconds later "estimating time remaining"...
-- I go upstairs figuring it'll take till I wake up (it's 2am at the time) to move 300gb over so I watch a little TV with the wife.
-- Commercial break, I go see how much longer for kicks. --42 minutes remaining-- Really? not HOURS? And about 1/2 hour later, it was finished-
-- Changed the boot order, computer fired up, and sure enough my C drive is now the SSD and the old C drive is now the F drive. And they are, virtually identical!
-- So, what's wrong with Acronis? Cloning the old drive was probably the least dramatic computer maintenance project I've ever done! :D

First thing I noticed- it actually took just as long if not longer to boot up..? But I'm sure part of that was due to having the old drive become the F drive, plus an additional 'system reserved' drive automatically added to go with the SSD, and all the messing up of my network drives that all that caused ;) -- And Gravostyle7 still takes close to a minute to load. But I'm sure some time was cut down, never timed it before. A lot of other slow nonsense I've been dealing is now pretty much gone which is great. I'm sure I'll find more to like about it as I go...

The old Master drive isn't moving. I'm just going to remove everything but Windows and my email and graphics programs. It's a 1tb drive and I'm going to copy all the photos from my 9 year old backup drive onto it, plus all my work files that I keep on an old slow 80gig drive. And I have a 6tb drive that auto backs up all my work files every night, so I have nothing to back up :)

Many thanks to all for the suggestions and assistance http://www.engraver1.com/gifs/bow.gif, my hotrod is now probably faster than my XP's! -- and apologies for the major thread hijack! http://www.engraver1.com/gifs/pirate.gif

[Leo Graywacz]

Windows 10 is a "downgrade" from 7 pro. There is a reason corporate computers use 7 pro.

Plus the unannounced upgrades that can take minutes to hours when you need the computer to do your job. All the "reporting" back to microsoft of things the computer shouldn't be relaying to the mothership.

I'll stick with Win 7 for as long as I can thank you very much.

[Mike Henderson]

-- So, what's wrong with Acronis? Cloning the old drive was probably the least dramatic computer maintenance project I've ever done! :D



I've tried to use the Crucial supplied Acronis software to clone to new Crucial SSDs and have had many problems. If you read the reviews on Amazon for Crucial SSDs you'll see many negative comments about the Acronis software for cloning a new drive.

I'm glad you didn't have any problems. Maybe Crucial finally got after Acronis and forced them to provide a version of the software that works. I hope so.

Mike

[Grant Wilkinson]

@Barry: I don't understand your question, Barry. There is no need to change which ports the drives are plugged into.Kev didn't go it that way and all seems well.

[Barry McFadden]

@Barry: I don't understand your question, Barry. There is no need to change which ports the drives are plugged into.Kev didn't go it that way and all seems well.

Just a suggestion.... When I changed my pc to an SSD I cloned it from the old drive then took the side cover off the pc and looked at the motherboard. There are 4 SATA connections for hard drives color coded. My main drive was plugged into the red one, the others were empty. So I just unplugged the old drive and plugged it into the yellow connector and plugged the new SSD the red one. Now when I boot up it recognizes whatever is plugged into the red connector as the main drive which is the SSD and the old drive as the secondary drive.... no need to switch anything in the BIOS.... I realize there are other ways to set the new drive as the main but for me this seemed like the easiest way to do it.

[Kev Williams]

I never even heard of SATA until about 3 years ago, very cool improvement. You can turn any SATA port on or off in BIOS, and changing the boot drive order is simple matter of using the arrow keys to scroll to the drive/port, and using the U or D key to move it up or down the boot order list. For me that was the easy way, didn't have to move or re-move anything inside other than plugging in the new drive...

[Curt Harms]

I never even heard of SATA until about 3 years ago, very cool improvement. You can turn any SATA port on or off in BIOS, and changing the boot drive order is simple matter of using the arrow keys to scroll to the drive/port, and using the U or D key to move it up or down the boot order list. For me that was the easy way, didn't have to move or re-move anything inside other than plugging in the new drive...

Welcome to the 21st century:D. Next up is NVMe. It seems difficult to compare throughputs of different technologies but:

7200 RPM Hard Drive – average read/write speed of 80-160MB/second

SATA 3 SSD – read/write speed up to 550MB/second

NVME SSD – read/write speed up to 3500MB/second

https://www.online-tech-tips.com/computer-tips/sata-3-vs-m-2-vs-nvme-overview-and-comparison/

The trick of course is to have a place to plug an NVMe drive.

[Frank Pratt]

Welcome to the 21st century:D. Next up is NVMe. It seems difficult to compare throughputs of different technologies but:

7200 RPM Hard Drive – average read/write speed of 80-160MB/second

SATA 3 SSD – read/write speed up to 550MB/second

NVME SSD – read/write speed up to 3500MB/second

https://www.online-tech-tips.com/computer-tips/sata-3-vs-m-2-vs-nvme-overview-and-comparison/

The trick of course is to have a place to plug an NVMe drive.

NVMe is a protocol that connects an M2 drive to PCIe, as opposed to SATA. An M2 is that skinny little form factor that is about the size of a stick of gum and can be either SATA or PCIe. One that connects directly to a special PCIe socket on the motherboard uses NVMe protocol.

And yes, they are screaming fast. I have a couple of computers with them & they will go from POST to the logon screen in 4-5 seconds. A SATA boot drive on the same computer will probably take at least 30 seconds to do the same thing.

[Kev Williams]

For all the high-speed and other nonsense, there's not a single computer built since Aug. 23rd 2001 that will run my favorite graphics/vectorizing program. And half the computers built since 2004 won't run 12 of my machines without a problematic adapter cable... :)

[Grant Wilkinson]

I have to ask, Kev. What's the program?

[Frank Pratt]

For all the high-speed and other nonsense, there's not a single computer built since Aug. 23rd 2001 that will run my favorite graphics/vectorizing program. And half the computers built since 2004 won't run 12 of my machines without a problematic adapter cable... :)

Can you not load a new computer with the older OS?

[Mike Henderson]

I have to ask, Kev. What's the program?

And have they put out an updated version of the program that runs on modern operating systems?

Mike

[Kev Williams]

In my signature; CasMate. I have 3 versions, the original of which is a DOS program I bought in 1992--to operate they have security dongle that must be plugged into an LPT port with access to DOS memory. No such port exists on any OS newer than ME, and as even dumb old me knows, ME and older aren't actually OS's. Compared to Corel and AI and similar, CasMate is a simple and no nonsense program designed to create vector toolpaths for vinyl cutting, sign printing and rotary tool engraving. It's vector trace program works faster and better than any others I've used, and the main reason I need it. CasMate sold out LONG ago, forget who to, no upgrades :)


Can you not load a new computer with the older OS?
Short version, MS has always gone out of their way to render older computers and OS's completely and utterly useless and incompatible with newer stuff. I'd love to give Gates a tour of my home based shop and explain to him why I need working win98 and XP computers to run my business...

[Lee DeRaud]

In my signature; CasMate. I have 3 versions, the original of which is a DOS program I bought in 1992--to operate they have security dongle that must be plugged into an LPT port with access to DOS memory. No such port exists on any OS newer than ME...LPT PCI adapter and a 32-bit copy of Win7?
https://www.amazon.com/Port-Express-Profile-Parallel-Adapter/dp/B001Q7X0Z8
Works with MACH3, which is about as low-level access to a parallel port as it gets.

[Grant Wilkinson]

@Barry: Tks, Barry. I see where you are coming from. In my case, my "old ssd" was plugged into sata 3. I had sata 0 to 6 ports on my mobo. If I had moved it to sata 2, for example and plugged the new ssd into sata 3, where the old ssd came from, my computer would have booted into the old ssd as its port (sata 2) was higher in the default boot order than the new one. Instead, I don't worry about which numbered sata port anything is plugged into. I set the boot order in the BIOS.

@Kev: I searched on casmate and found that there is a current version for sale out of Australia. I don't know if that is of any interest to you, but since you said that there had not been any updates for some time, I thought that I would pass it along. Your issue seems not to be a Windows issue as much as it is a hardware issue. You need a parallel port and newer pcs no longer have them. As has been said, you can buy a pci card that will give you a parallel port, then load any operating system you want on the the PC, either resident or in a virtual machine.

[Kev Williams]

Lee, that's good to know, would those cards work in a win 8 or 10? I'm assuming so, and that would at least let me connect my old machines to them. I've used a few USB to serial cables, but I found them unreliable, which sucks to find that out while engraving someone else's parts. While these ports may run my machines, they won't run CasMate. Pretty much all XP's and most win7's have parallel ports and these dongles won't work in them. I don't fully understand or remember all the reasons but best I recollect, they run an extremely long unique number sequence into some memory address, where a set of math functions unique to each dongle is performed on the numbers, and the answer gets read back to the dongle. Wrong or no answer, no worky. As I understand it (or don't ;) ) parallel ports in XP and newer don't have access to motherboard memory, or something to that effect, so the dongle and motherboard are invisible to each other... I guess :) -doesn't work, that's all I know for absolute certain!

I have seen so-called XP-capable Casmate's for sale every so often, but they were spendy enough to keep me away.

If I wasn't so close to (semi) retirement I'd take a look into the Austrailian version. And, I have two backup 98's collecting dust but ready to go if need be! :D

[Lee DeRaud]

Lee, that's good to know, would those cards work in a win 8 or 10?The cards will...problem is, I'm not sure there are bit-level bidirectional drivers for 64-bit versions of Windows. So it depends on exactly how low-level any given interface works. (That was always a sticking point with MACH3: if you used a parallel-port interface, you were stuck with a 32-bit OS. Caveat: last time I looked at that stuff was about 2014.)

In any case, at $22 it's easy enough to try, even without taking advantage of Amazon's liberal return policies.

[Jim Becker]

Kev, direct memory access was very common "long ago"...but is a tough row to hoe in current generation OS because it's a huge, huge, HUGE security issue.

[Chuck Wintle]

My 42 month old Dell laptop has been slow, one thing I wanted to do was to update from Windows 7 Professional to Windows 10, but software is over $100 and I understood that the free upgrade offer expired long ago. Yesterday I ran across this Microsoft link that worked at no cost. I am now running Windows 10 Pro. No key was required. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 Happy camper.

it tells me to purchase a license so it seem to be not free.

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

It's been awhile since this thread was active, but with Win 7 no longer being supported, I had several extended family members reach out to me in a panic. I decided it's time to bite the bullet and upgrade my Win 7 Pro engraving computer just to get it over with.

The Windows 10 free upgrade (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10?) does still work. Since I had multiple computers to upgrade, I launched the Win10 Installation Media upgrade tool to create a USB drive that I could boot from. That USB drive worked flawlessly for the laptops and my desktop computer.

I fully expected problems with my engraving computer since I have several old WinXP programs on it. I used Macruim Reflect to create a clone of my current Win 7 drive just in case things went horribly wrong. While I could have done a clean Win10 install, I didn't want to have to re-install all the software and configure/personalize them, so I figured I would sacrifice some hard drive space with an upgrade. After the Win10 Pro install was finished, I was very surprised to discover the upgrade did not gobble up drive space!

For those of you hesitating to upgrade because of all your personalized settings and engraving files, I was pleasantly surprised to discover all of my software and settings, print drivers and network settings remained intact! I was able to open Corel X6 and do a test engrave, open my 2004 Quickbooks, Office 2010, and all my other software without any problems.

It did take up about 5 hours of my day working on the upgrade for my engraving computer, but that also included uninstalling all the xbox, games and other unwanted software that was installed with Win 10.

[Curt Harms]

If your motherboard has the correct connector for it, this widget is slightly more expensive than a standard SATA SSD, but much faster:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07K1J3C23/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
(Good chance if the computer/motherboard is less than 2-3 years old.)

I have a newish PC with NvME drive. For common desktop usage I don't notice any speed advantage over a SATA III SSD. Perhaps in a Server/Storage role the speed increase would be noticeable.

[Mike Henderson]

I have a newish PC with NvME drive. For common desktop usage I don't notice any speed advantage over a SATA III SSD. Perhaps in a Server/Storage role the speed increase would be noticeable.

That's been my experience, also. I replaced a laptop with a SATA SSD drive with one with an NVMe drive and if it's faster, it's not by much. By that, I mean faster booting and faster loading of programs. The programs I use are fairly simple, such as photo editing, word processing, spreadsheet, etc. Maybe something that was heavily disk oriented would see an improvement.

And it's an i7 processor for the new laptop.

I helped a friend and installed a SATA SSD drive in her Pentium computer to replace a mechanical drive. That made a BIG difference.

Mike

[Curt Harms]

That's been my experience, also. I replaced a laptop with a SATA SSD drive with one with an NVMe drive and if it's faster, it's not by much. By that, I mean faster booting and faster loading of programs. The programs I use are fairly simple, such as photo editing, word processing, spreadsheet, etc. Maybe something that was heavily disk oriented would see an improvement.

And it's an i7 processor for the new laptop.

I helped a friend and installed a SATA SSD drive in her Pentium computer to replace a mechanical drive. That made a BIG difference.

Mike

That's what I've heard/read/experienced. "Spinning Rust" HDD --> SATA SSD big improvement assuming the rest of the machine is limited by HDD input/output. An older machine that was pretty low end when purchased I'm not sure how much difference there'd be.

[Don Coffman]

Yes, updates happen regularly. And there is an option to create a "install thumb/flash drive" which I also did as a recovery option if needed later.

[Myk Rian]

Yes, updates happen regularly. And there is an option to create a "install thumb/flash drive" which I also did as a recovery option if needed later.

That's what I did with both x86 and 64bit.

[Derek Meyer]

If you find yourself doing Windows 10 upgrades frequently, it's a good idea to always download the Windows 10 Media Creation Tool from Microsoft. You can use this to create a USB thumb drive for install (both clean install and upgrades), and it will use the latest Windows image when it creates the install media, which will save you a lot of download time when you go to install the Windows updates on your newly updated machine. There's nothing worse than upgrading your Windows 7 machine to Windows 10, only to find out that you installed version 1803, and now have to update to 1809, then 1903, then 1909....

Derek

[Kev Williams]

There's nothing worse than upgrading your Windows 7 machine to Windows 10...

Derek
yeah, taken out of context, but as written above, that's the most perfectly honest statement I've heard or read in a LONG time...

>edit< ;)
(a little tongue-in-cheek added)

[Frank Pratt]

yeah, taken out of context, but as written above, that's the most perfectly honest statement I've heard or read in a LONG time...

>edit< ;)
(a little tongue-in-cheek added)

But that's your opinion and is in the vast minority.

[Lee DeRaud]

yeah, taken out of context, but as written above, that's the most perfectly honest statement I've heard or read in a LONG time...

>edit< ;)
(a little tongue-in-cheek added)I've been around long enough to recall hearing the same thing said about upgrading Apple DOS from 3.2 to 3.3.

That said, I'm not sure I'd bother installing Win10 on a machine built to Win7 specs: in computer years, it's likely older than I am.

[Tom Stenzel]

I'm glad this thread started. I downloaded the windows.iso and have it handy in case my wife's or daughter's win 10 laptops go belly up. Even if becomes out of date at least they can get started again.

My own laptop runs win 8.1, the AMD processor is none to swoft and uses a lot of power not doing much. Even if I can still do it for free I'm not sure if updating it is worthwhile. I *might* try it and if I don't like the result revert it back to windows 8.1.

I'm in an updating mood. The desktop computer is 64 bit but I had installed a 32 bit version of linux on it (Debian Jessie). I just updated it to 64 bit Linux Mint Tessa (Mate desktop of course) and everything went without a hiccup.

-Tom

[Kev Williams]

Can't believe I'm even considering this, but because I have an HP Win8 desktop with a dead hard drive that (a) in HP's infinite wisdom, instead of supplying a recovery DVD they put the recovery program on the hard drive http://www.engraver1.com/gifs/banghead.gif - and (b) in Microsoft's infinite quest to obsolete perfectly good 5 year old equipment, made it nearly impossible to install win7 on a win8 computer so I'm not going to try--I'm likely to break down and put an SSD in the HP and put Win10 on it. My HP Win10 laptop- originally Win8- is so excruciatingly slow I can't imagine doing TurboTax on the thing. I don't know if it has a problem or what, but the desktop DID at least work reasonably decent with Win8(.1)... I'm curious if 10 will turn it into quicksand. I'm also curious if I can actually still upgrade for free. Guess I should order that SSD ;)

[Lee DeRaud]

My own laptop runs win 8.1, the AMD processor is none to swoft and uses a lot of power not doing much. Even if I can still do it for free I'm not sure if updating it is worthwhile. I *might* try it and if I don't like the result revert it back to windows 8.1. I'm sort of at peace with the idea that there are still people out there who think Win7 is better than Win10. (In fact, one of them lives with me, but that case has more to do with a couple of much-loved apps that she's never upgraded from their XP-era versions.)

That said, is there really anybody who thinks Win8 is better than Win10?!? Win8 is kind of the Windows ME of this century, lacking only the Paperclip Dude.

[Scott Donley]

Win8 is kind of the Windows ME of this century, lacking only the Paperclip Dude. Hey, I liked ME, It was problem free for me, even networked.

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

(In fact, one of them lives with me, but that case has more to do with a couple of much-loved apps that she's never upgraded from their XP-era versions.)

I use quite a few favorite of my favorite apps that were designed for XP on both Win 7 and Win 10. So far, the only program I cannot use was the old Photograv 2.1 version. I was never able to get it to work on Win 7 and have not tried on Win 10. (I didn't spend much time on it because I kept my old Win XP machine for any time I need to use Photograv.)

The biggest problem I have with still running my old Eudora 7.1.0.9 program, is it can't handle today's character coding such as "smart quotes" and other characters. For example, it will display an apostrophe as ’.

Those much-loved apps may still work on Win 10. All my other old apps work exactly as they did on Win XP.

[Lee DeRaud]

Those much-loved apps may still work on Win 10. All my other old apps work exactly as they did on Win XP.Most of mine, too. I think I'm finally winning the battle to convince her to get a new machine (or have me build one)...it helped that I discovered it would only add about $150 to simply buy the current versions of her "must-have" apps.

[Mike Chance in Iowa]

Hopefully the "must-have" apps still do what she wants them to do. I stay with my old Eudora email because I don't like the new ones. They don't have all the features I actually use in my Eudora. The other reason for keeping some old apps is the new ones require yearly subscriptions without much more benefit.

[Tom Stenzel]

Can't believe I'm even considering this, but because I have an HP Win8 desktop with a dead hard drive that (a) in HP's infinite wisdom, instead of supplying a recovery DVD they put the recovery program on the hard drive http://www.engraver1.com/gifs/banghead.gif *****

Ken, HP expected you to make your own recovery disks with a utility. I did with my Toshiba. If you're really desperate for Windows 8 I have it on DVDs. The downside is that they're 8.0. After the install you'll be faced with a gig or two of updates, then another 2 gig or so update to 8.1, then more updates. It took 3 days for my laptop to chew through it all.

If you need drivers and utilities unique to your machine you'll have to find them on the HP site. Hopefully.

Which raises an interesting problem. My daughter's laptop started with 8.0, updated to 8.1 and then got the update to WIN 10 while it was free. But if she has to "refresh" the computer the recovery partition on the hard drive will send her back to Win 8.0. Can she then ever get windows 10 back again? That's why I grabbed the WIN.ISO, so hopefully her free update stays that way.

-Tom

[Kev Williams]

Tom, sounds like the laptop is able to boot to either OS? Go to MSCONFIG and check the BOOT tab to see if both OS's are listed, if so make sure win10 is the default--

[Ole Anderson]

I used the link in the first post, it worked on a 5 YO Dell XPS that must have had the "future Win 10 upgrade" marker in it's system yet even though they only gave you a year to redeem it. Upgrade to Win 10 went smooth. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

[Chuck Wintle]

My 42 month old Dell laptop has been slow, one thing I wanted to do was to update from Windows 7 Professional to Windows 10, but software is over $100 and I understood that the free upgrade offer expired long ago. Yesterday I ran across this Microsoft link that worked at no cost. I am now running Windows 10 Pro. No key was required. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 Happy camper.

Why would you want such a flawed os? :D

[Ole Anderson]

Why would you want such a flawed os? :D

Hmm, Mac user? Linux user? DOS 3.0 user? Which one could it be?