I like windows 7, I always have. And I've always hated windows 8 with a passion, it irritates me every time I have to use it on my wife's laptop.

A few days ago I did a fresh install of windows 7 on my laptop (on a new SSD, replacing the five year old installation on the old HDD), so the question I have is 'should I take the free upgrade to Windows 10?'
I'm told a lot of the annoyances from windows 8 are gone, yet setting as I find windows 7 pretty much perfect, should I risk it? It was bad enough finding the correct drivers for windows 7 on Sony's website, and the site is plastered with warnings about not upgrading to 10 as they haven't tested it on that hardware.

So what do you all think?

I'm on sh1tty Windows 8 and even I'm not likely to take 10 because of the mandatory updates. I'm sorry, but I've been perfectly safe without them for over a decade, and I'm not gonna sit wondering if MS are gonna balls up my computer every few months like my friends.

If that doesn't bother you, you have 30 days from installation of 10 to revert back, apparently. Worth Googling, I assume it uses a chunk of drive space to hold your old installation.

Of course the main problem is that this is supposedly the final Windows in the sense that everything else will just be an almost incremental update. If they persist with mandatory installs they'd better be testing the living fcuk out of them...

Win 10 pro doesn't have auto updates and it looks like MS may be back-tracking slightly on the mandatory updates in home.
clickety.
As said you can roll back for 30 days following installation if you don't like it.

MS are apparently carrying on with the insider program following release so there will be plenty of guinea pigs testing new builds before they roll out to the majority of users.

It would be pro as if be upgrading from 7 ultimate.

Thanks for that, the updates are my main concern with 10. It seems idiotic that they'd switch off restore... but then everything so far suggests they're determined to ram 10 down home users' throats.

I'm going to take a recovery image of 7 before I do the upgrade. I've got plenty of time on my hands to sort things out if it all goes t1ts up.

You only get a month though, don't you? After the grace period, it will nullify your COA key for the older version of Windows and tie it to a Windows 10 install.

Or have they back-tracked on that too?

Realistically if it hasn't gone horribly wrong on your kit within a month its unlikely to.

There's no pie option

I'm taking the free upgrade from win 8 add I've been using the tech preview and like it. Never had a problem with win 8 though.

I like 8.1. On my surface I've got the metro/charm/modern UI setup so it is effectively my start menu and it all works rather well - to the point where the return of the actual start menu in 10 is unwelcome.

My windows install at home is set to get the 10 update automatically but my Surface is domain joined so that will be a volume license install I'm assuming.

NT #old skool

Further to the link above...

Workaround arrives to stop forced Windows 10 updates | TechRadar
http://www.techradar.com/news/software/ ... es-1300335

So you can right-click and roll back, but does that just mean 10 will re-install it next time there's an update?

I still have 95, NT4, 98, ME, 2000 and XP somewhere in the loft. Most haven't seen the light of day in a decade and a half

All of my machines are on 8, I'll try 10 on my laptop, but I won't be updating the others until I see whether it is an improvement or not.

I thought 8 was much better than 7, it was certainly faster on all of my hardware and in multi-monitor use it is head and shoulders above Windows 7.

My biggest worry is that they have crippled OneDrive back to the crappy Windows 7 version, so Windows 8 to 10 will be a huge step backwards - with Windows 8 you can see all of the files on your one drive and open remote files or set them to be available offline. In Windows 10, like Windows 7 and OS X, you can only see the offline files in Explorer... Not a problem if you have a terrabyte drive or bigger, but a big problem if you only have a small(ish) SSD.

My current OneDrive volume is around 400GB, my tablet only has 256GB SSD and my laptop has 500GB, so it might just fit on the laptop, but a lot will be invisible on the tablet, unless I go through the web browser. Why would I use a [lifted] web browser to look at files in a directory?

So I'll be sticking with 8.1 on my Surface, at least for a while.