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Patch reliability is unclear, but widespread attacks make patching prudent. Go ahead and patch, but watch out for potential problems. |
i know everyone would be scared when I mention this topic, its unthinkable and unadvisable, So I was wondering, if its ok to stay with a windows version after EoL if I do the following:
*Never using any windows app, including Microsoft Edge
*Having thousands of tools to mantain stable the computer
That will depend on how you use your computer – if it’s offline, I don’t see a big problem, but if you use it for work, I’d find it far too risky.
As Patch Lady said recently,
The hands down must have feature is support. Seriously. When a build number is coming up to drop out of support you want to be on the next version. I would recommend downloading the ISO’s and saving them on flash drives or external hard drives so you can choose the build you want when you are ready.
That’s your risk assessment to make. Are you doing your online banking with it, for instance? Are you accessing emails, which may have attachments etc.? Will you be online shopping?
I wonder what Canadian Tech would say in answer to your question? I suspect the bottom line is that everybody in the know will advise against taking the risk, but then again an awful lot of people continued to use Win XP long after its EoL and have lived to tell the tale.
@canadian-tech often reminds us that all his user-base are home users, and that the machines undergo regular maintenance (i.e.), and all have security software current, etc.
Risk assessment is the key to making such a decision. I would also consider who will be using the machine – if anyone else was going to be using it, I’d be far more concerned than if it was just me.
Even worse….in a consumer setting you have no unified threat management firewall like I do at the office. You are browsing on the web where malicious banner ads are in rotation. If your browser of choice – Chrome no longer gets updates on that platform even worse.
The best device to randomly surf on the web is not a Windows device and especially not a windows device after it’s prime. Even Windows XP and 7 got service packs. Treat these feature releases like a service pack. Skip one or two. Jump in when you are ready by using the update now button — https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
Susan Bradley Patch Lady/Prudent patcher
There are a few options for staying with a Windows version after it is no longer supported by Microsoft. I will use Windows 7 as the example of the no-longer-supported version of Windows; but the following would apply to any unsupported version of Windows. I have listed some thoughts below in random order:
1. Disconnect the computer from the internet. If you do this, you will be very unlikely to ever have a security problem (i.e. a computer virus) by using your Windows 7 computer. In fact, the only way you will ever have a security issue is if you insert a disk or flash drive that is infected. If you have good anti-virus protection on your other computers, then you will not likely ever have a security issue on the Windows 7 computer.
I ran Windows 2000 on a couple of computers after it went out of support. Windows 2000 worked fine for what I needed; and the computers in question did not need to be connected to the internet. I rarely did Windows updates, because it wasn’t necessary to do Windows updates, since the computers weren’t connected to the internet. And if I needed to exchange files with someone at another site, I used a flash drive to copy the files back and forth between an internet-connected computer and the isolated Windows 2000 computers.
2. Set up a Windows 7 virtual machine on another computer. Doing this will allow you to keep using Windows 7 forever on any computer by making a copy of the virtual machine files, and then copying them to any machine you want which has the virtual machine software installed on it. This means that you can have a Linux computer, a MAC, or a Windows 10 computer, and you can run your Windows 7 virtual machine on that computer. This has the advantage of allowing you to get as new of a computer that you want, and run as old of a version of Windows that you want on that computer. To be safe, disconnect the virtual machine from internet access; and then work in the VM to your heart’s content. As long as you have enough memory installed in the computer, you probably won’t even notice that Windows is running in a virtual machine; it will feel like it is the main OS on the computer. “Enough memory” means that you will need to have enough both for the host OS (Linux, MAC, Windows 10) plus whatever you are running in the VM. 8 GB or more should be enough for any situation. Also, your host OS and your computer should both be 64-bit; if either one is 32-bit, then it will be a struggle to run a virtual machine on that computer.
I have Linux Mint as my primary (or host) OS; and I have installed a Windows 7 and a Windows 8.1 VM. I use Linux most of the time; but there are some situations where I must be running Windows in order to do certain things. (for example, I use Splashtop Remote Control software to do some remote support; Splashtop works only in Windows, not Linux.) To do these tasks, I open one of my Windows VMs, I perform those tasks, and then I close the VM. I can’t leave the VM open, because my computer has only 4 GB of RAM, which is not enough to work both in the VM and in Linux. I will soon upgrade to 12 GB of RAM; once I have done that, I should have no trouble running Linux plus two VMs all at the same time.
I usually run my Windows 8.1 VM rather than my Windows 7 VM, because Windows 8.1 will be supported till Jan 2023, whereas Windows 7 will be supported till Jan 2020. I am trying to get to the point where I can do all Windows tasks in 8.1, thereby having the longest time available to have a Windows version that is connected to the internet. 8.1 is slower than 7; but once I upgrade the computer to 12 GB of RAM, the slowness issue will disappear.
If you don’t like the Windows 8.1 interface, consider installing Classic Shell in Windows 8.1. Once you have done that, you can configure Windows 8.1 to look and feel exactly like Windows 7.
Some advantages to going the VM route (as opposed to continuing to use the Windows 7 computer):
1. You can use new hardware, which isn’t as likely to break down as old hardware.
2. You don’t have to worry about any hardware incompatibilities with Windows 7, because Windows 7 will be interfacing with your VM software, not with the computer.
3. You won’t need to have an extra computer taking up space in your office.
Very good point! Some subtleties, though…
There are a few things – a very few – that don’t run properly (or as well) in a VM. Games or graphic software that requires the very latest GPU support may not be as functional in a VM… For example, VMware provides OpenGL 3.3 support in its VMs, while the very latest OpenGL standard (as of over a year ago) is 4.6. That could affect games or graphics software.
That being said, 99.9% of the stuff I actually DO run works just fine in a VMware VM, and if I had to rely only on that VM with no host hardware-based Windows OS I could probably find alternatives that make it 100%.
Virtualization tech certainly gives us good options.
-Noel
Oscar, you are correct. You do need a license for installing Windows in a VM.
I’m not certain if you are allowed to use the machine’s OEM license to install Windows in a VM on that same machine. The way I see it, if the VM is on that same machine, and if you are not using that OEM license for the host OS on that machine, then you aren’t violating the license agreement. But I don’t know if that’s how Microsoft sees it.
There is one case where you don’t need a license for the copy of Windows in the VM, and that is, if Windows 7 is your host OS. In that case, you can install “XP Mode”, which is a VM with a free copy of XP included. XP Mode is a free product from Microsoft.
If we go back to ancient times, when OS2 was the leading “OS of the future”, I believe OS2 would let you configure any installed program to run under any version of DOS that you wanted. I don’t know if that would be considered VMs, or if it was simply a different set of rules for that particular program (like Compatibility Mode in Windows 7/8/10). It would be really handy if Windows 10 would include free VMs of previous versions of Windows, but it doesn’t; you have to buy a separate license for each VM.
As for getting an install disk to install Windows in the VM: you can go to https://www.heidoc.net/joomla/technology-science/microsoft/67-microsoft-windows-and-office-iso-download-tool and download the “Microsoft Windows and Office ISO Download Tool”; you can then use that tool to get a clean copy of Windows 7 (or 8.1); then install that in the VM, using your OEM license key. If you have the Windows ISO file (what you’ll get at heidoc.net), you don’t even need to create a Windows install disk; you can create the VM with the ISO file. At least that’s the way it works with VMWare Workstation Player. Also, you input your license key at the beginning of the process, and five minutes later you have a fully-operational Windows VM!
It may not be that a computer operating system will just stop working after its “end of support” date, though it’s becoming less and less clear whether Microsoft will allow you to log in with your Microsoft account after a certain time. Loss of control of my own computing environment is one of the reasons I wouldn’t choose to use a Microsoft account.
Beyond that, you will find that any software system – especially one of the more modern ones that relies upon cloud-integrated Apps for many things – will become gradually more and more outdated over time. Maybe not so gradually, depending on what you need from it. A simple example is the Weather App. Nothing says Microsoft has to keep providing it data after the end of support date. In fact, they may retire old servers or just change protocols – because they can.
There was once a time that a computer operating system generally made your computer into a standalone computing appliance, but even going back as far as XP we see that the Internet was becoming more and more a part of everyday computer use. There are still folks who even to this day run XP. It can still pretty much do what it did 15 years ago, presuming the user has been careful what he/she does and runs. There are still dedicated XP systems in offices, for example, which do one or a few dedicated things. But as far as it being a general consumer computing appliance… That day has passed.
Presuming you will be allowed to log into it, the question may then be: When will you no longer need or want what it did?
Though Microsoft would like you to believe that you have to stay right on the cutting edge to be viable, there may actually be some time when a computer running a particular OS could still be useful. It may even be that most of the facets of it you use aren’t being advanced in the newest systems (that’s pretty much been my situation, though even that is gradually changing as new versions of staple applications I use are starting to require Windows 10).
I don’t think we can assume that a computer system will become infected with a cesspool of malware the moment it stops getting updates, either. In general across the world infections are certainly reduced by keeping systems up to date, but it’s entirely possible for a particular system to be kept infection free through limitation of exposure to malware (e.g., through web browser augmentation with tools to keep it away from bad sites, by careful choices of what you run, etc.). If you have not been prone to getting malware in the past, it may be that your computing habits don’t expose you to as much risk as the world in general. I suspect malware writers are no longer writing new software to target older systems, now that those systems are not in the majority of usage. You could even make a debate that running the very newest system exposes you to the most risk.
Personally I like to think this way: If I buy a computer system and plan to use it for some time (say, 5 years), I’d like it to be MY choice to buy the next one, based on the merits of that new system – NOT because I’ve been pushed off the old one by some kind of contrived obsolescence. If I want to run it for just what it did at the time, it ought to keep doing it for as long as I choose to use it. Trouble is, we’re not in that world now.
No hard and fast points here, and certainly no recommendations – just things to think about.
-Noel
It may not be that a computer operating system will just stop working after its “end of support” date, though it’s becoming less and less clear whether Microsoft will allow you to log in with your Microsoft account after a certain time. Loss of control of my own computing environment is one of the reasons I wouldn’t choose to use a Microsoft account.
How is it becoming “less and less clear” whether a Microsoft Account might not suddenly stop working without notice on an unsupported version?
If it ever happened, would you truly have lost all access to your own Windows computing device?
If the only login account you have is a Microsoft account, not a local account, then I think it is a valid question as to whether or not you will continue to have access to a non-supported version of Windows.
In my opinion, you will probably continue to have access; but I’m not certain about it.
@b, do you know for sure whether or not someone with only a Microsoft account will still be able to access their non-supported version of Windows?
If the only login account you have is a Microsoft account, not a local account, then I think it is a valid question as to whether or not you will continue to have access to a non-supported version of Windows.
In my opinion, you will probably continue to have access; but I’m not certain about it.
@b, do you know for sure whether or not someone with only a Microsoft account will still be able to access their non-supported version of Windows?
A Windows computer always has a local administrator; you can’t disable or delete the last one.
Then there’s the disabled “built-in” Administrator account which can always be enabled by anyone who has physical access to the computer.
But like you, I don’t believe Microsoft would deny login access to a Microsoft account just because the version of Windows 10 had passed its end-of-support date. If they did wouldn’t we have heard the screams by now, as millions have been using end-of-service versions for years?
Actually, logging into Windows with a Microsoft account didn’t start till Windows 8.0, which quickly became Windows 8.1. So the only unsupported version of Windows which utilized a Microsoft account is Windows 8.0, which almost no one uses anymore. So I don’t believe that there are millions which have both been using end-of-service versions and a Microsoft account to log into Windows.
Actually, I thought it was clear that we were discussing Windows 10 here.
I was referring to versions 1507, 1511, 1607 which passed EOL but are apparently still used by 3.2% of Windows 10 users, thus more than 22 million. They can’t all be using local account logins, yet we haven’t heard of them getting locked out of Windows and being left with a brick of a computer.
(I should have said “for up to 16 months” instead of “for years”.)
I’m not up to a courtroom battle of lawyers, @b, so I’m going to drop out of the conversation at this point. I prefer a congenial, friendly discussion about tech issues, not a continual effort to find fault with what people post.
I’d really like to know – without having to find out in a pinch with my business or data at risk of being lost – whether if I were to chose to run an older Windows 10 with a Microsoft account, would I one day just not be able to log in? If that were to happen, what’s the recourse, technically? Would I continue to be able to use that system? Or would I be locked out of my own computer?
Do you think I could call Microsoft and they would be all, like, “Oh, sorry sir, let us help you get up and running again”?
It’s becoming less and less clear because Microsoft isn’t doing things the way they used to, so we don’t know what to expect. I for one am suspicious of this whole “Get a Microsoft account and integrate everything in it” push. It represents a complete loss of control. Why on EARTH would you want to send them your administrative account info?!?
An anecdote that sums up the new Microsoft, and which hammered the first nail home for me that they were no longer the Microsoft we once knew…
Back in 2014 I had a leftover “Media Center Upgrade” code that Microsoft had sent out to people like me who were pre-release testers of Windows 8.1, and who had graciously sent in reports. I had a fully licensed Win 8.1 Pro setup (I paid somewhere around $200 for a retail boxed disc; I’m a stickler about being fully and properly licensed). The MCE upgrade was being offered as an add-on option to Pro for under $20 as I recall. Not expensive, and I could have just bought it, but I figured what the heck – I should use that free upgrade code they had sent me about a year earlier.
The system accepted the code and downloaded the software and upgraded to MCE. Great!
THEN it informed me it was no longer activated!
No problem, I thought, I’ll just call Microsoft, tell them what happened, and they’ll work it out. They love me, and I have a legitimate store-bought license.
It was a call center in India from the sound of things. I had all the codes, the eMail they had sent me with the free upgrade offer, and even had the Win 8.1 disc in hand. Even though I know what I’m doing I had to grant them remote UI access to my machine, and after they poked around for a while they then had the gall to tell me that my system wasn’t licensed properly and that I would have to pay $99 to get it working again!
They KNEW they had me over a barrel. Sure, I could have spent a day restoring a System Image backup, but that would leave me with Win 8.1 Pro and I really did want MCE’s ability to play DVDs, so I gave them a credit card number and paid the hundred bucks.
That was the moment I knew Microsoft had turned predatory.
-Noel
Perhaps you didn’t notice this?
Just a reminder that this topic isn’t a blogpost, it’s a user/Lounger query, and this discussion isn’t really addressing the original question posed.
This discussion should really be in its own topic, and anything further to add should be in a newly-created topic.
A number of competing factors are in play when deciding whether to stay with an EOL operating system. One pair of such competing factors is safety vs. convenience: bring the risk down as low as possible without changing the OS, and then compare that to the way you would operate the PC “normally” if the OS were still in support.
For example, you might value the convenience of running as administrator so that you don’t have to deal constantly with passwords and such. However, the great majority of Windows security patches fix vulnerabilities that would be less of an issue, or no issue at all, if you ran as a standard user. This immediately decreases the risk differential between the supported and the unsupported OS, independently of any other security measures you might take. So then it becomes more of a question of deciding whether keeping your EOL OS is worth the relative inconvenience of a standard account.
There are many things you can do to limit the risks of using an older operating system, but as a bare minimum I would run it as a standard user and make sure to keep other applications running in that OS (especially browsers) as up to date as possible.
Do you have to use Windows for something?
-If yes, download a live USB of Ubuntu or Linux Mint, grab a thumb drive, and boot from the thumb drive when you need to do anything online. When you need Windows, unplug the thumb drive, and reboot like normal. Windows will come up. What you do at this point is up to you (in terms of using something online) but there’s risks. Software will continue to be updated and be compatible with your EOL Windows – namely browsers and AV. These are critical. Once these are no longer updated to work with your EOL Windows, I would not use Windows for anything online (at least not related to banking or personal identification).
-If no, do the same as above (re: live USB of Ubuntu or Mint), but double click on “Install” when the live USB desktop comes up. Install it over Windows, deleting/removing Windows in the process. Remove the thumb drive, reboot normally. Welcome to the world of Linux, which is easy and offers 99% of what you have with Windows, but more security and better updating you can actually rely on.
@oscarcp, saving emails downloaded via a Ubuntu USB drive onto your Windows drive should be doable. Assuming that you’re using a Linux email client (say, Thunderbird), you would need to go into the client’s setting to make sure that the email file is saved to the drive you want and not to the default folder on the Linux thumb drive.
Whether you can access and read those emails once you’re back in Windows, that’ll depend greatly on whether there is a Windows version of the Linux email client that you used to download the emails. I believe (but am not certain; would have to check) that Thunderbird email files can go back and forth between Linux and Windows.
Bear in mind, though, that it may not be possible to do this repeatedly: that is, you may be able to download Thunderbird emails onto the Linux thumb drive tonight and then copy them over to Thunderbird for Windows, but not to do the same thing again next week because you will already have a folder with email contents there. This is likeliest to work well only if you’re copying the files to an empty email folder; once you have content existing in the target folder (in this case, in the Windows EOL email client), then unless you want to create a new subfolder every time, merging email files is a chancy business and especially so when done across operating systems. And you’d have to create the empty subfolder in the Windows email client before you booted into Linux to get new email.
If you don’t have the same email client software on both OSes, it might also be possible to convert, for example, Thunderbird files to Outlook .PST files and vice versa, but even if it is, it’s not something that I’d recommend doing on a regular basis. Better to stick to a single email format.
Bottom line: it can probably be done, but some methods to accomplish it are risky and others are cumbersome. Take your pick. 🙂
Another solution would be to use webmail, where the emails are stored on the email service’s server. That way you could check for email via Linux and not have to deal with where to put it afterward.
Cybertooth #214027 :
Thanks! I think the best approach for me would be to use the Mac for all email (as set up, received and replied messages are stringed together, so this retains the whole thread.) Those messages (unless I delete them, or either my ISP or my AV watchdogs trashes them or puts them in the “Junk” folder) will still be in the ISP’s server allowing me to download it with the Windows client in my Win 7 Pro, SP1 x64 PC. In fact, they will still be there for several days (as I have it set up now, for when I go away for several days) after first received at that server, or until I delete it from there.) Probably all that will fall away, some day, when too many limitations (such as the ISP no longer delivering mail to Win 7 PCs — because of why not?), or the PCs death of old age makes the Win 7 option no longer viable.
Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).
MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV
What MIGHT be possible with Thunderbird is if you create the live Linux thumb drive WITH persistance, i.e., a storage space on the thumb drive. That would allow a Thunderbird profile to be created. You could them copy it to the HDD and enable it as a second profile in Thunderbird. I have never done that, but when I was copying profiles from my Windows Thunderbird to my Linux laptops, when I launched TB, the profile files under the uniquely named profile folder were identical. Thunderbird is truly cross-platform vis-a-vis the Profiles as it Firefox.
The TAILS linux distro can be created with persistance. However, connecting to your regular email server defeats the intent of the OS – anonymous browsing. @MrJimPhelps also posted in the Linux section here about tools to create live media for other distros with persistance.
You need to search on the TB help files to learn where the profiles are under each OS and then copy them to a thumb drive to transfer to the second machine.
Frankly, I think it is more trouble than it is worth. Going online to get the emails with your client and then viewing them offline sounds far easier. Write the responses and send them offline. They will sit in the outbox until you connect. Then connect to send them and go back offline.
The other alternative is to just pick up an old laptop and put an OS on it that is supported and then use that for browsing and downloading files. I routinely download Windows programs with my Linux laptop and copy them to the Windows machine.
I think you need to clearly judge the risk of being online in an EOL machine if your ONLY online activity is securely connecting to the email servers. Just keep a good AV and Malwarebytes Premium as long as they are available for the EOL machine. Seems low risk to me, unless you are being specifically targeted.
It depends: if you want the versions containing the developers’ most up-to-date vision for the OS, there’s a new version out every six months that stops getting updates within a couple of years. But if you want a more stable version with longer support, you can opt for an LTS release that historically has received updates for five years. New LTS versions are released every other year; one just came out this spring (18.04).
b wrote:
anonymous wrote:
… resulting customer satisfaction failure in a large portion of their user base.
Citation?
Aw, shucks. You’ve caught me out with your courtroom skills. No I am not going to bother with a list of government funded studies. I instead will continue to rely on simple observation and conclusion. If you would like to investigate more yourself, please view the front page of this website askwoody.com for multiple instances. There you will also find links to other sources discussing the same and similar issues. You could also follow up with Microsoft’s own answers forum.
If you are attempting to point out that one part per thousand is inconsequential, I would reply that one-thousandth of 1 billion is a large number. And if you are one of that million, it is your whole world.
I’ve been on Mint 18.2 for about two years. (18.2 is two versions prior to the current version, 19.0.) I am never forced to take any upgrade or update. There is an icon at the bottom of the screen which lets me know when updates are available; I then choose if or when to install them. NOTHING has ever installed on its own; I haven’t even been prompted to install updates, except for the icon letting me know that they are available. And I can blacklist an update, preventing it from showing up in the list of available updates. (I blacklisted Firefox for a short time when Firefox Quantum was first released.)
I’m not sure how you can say that that is not much different than Windows 10, because with Windows 10, I have to do all manner of things to prevent upgrades and updates from occurring, including edit the Group Policy. (That’s the only way to get my choices to stick.) And I have to be constantly vigilant, lest my upgrade and update settings have somehow changed without my knowledge or consent.
Mint is based on Ubuntu, so this is a valid response to your post.
Indeed, the support cycles have changed over time–thanks for clarifying that. It used to be 18 months and maybe a little longer (not quite two years as I’d written) for regular releases; see for example the release and EOL dates for Ubuntu 9.04 and 12.10 here. And LTS versions for desktop used to be supported for 3 years and now it’s 5 years.
When I first started dabbling with Linux in 2012, I used a regular release and the cycle was longer than the current 9 months. But I wasn’t keen on revamping the system twice a year, so I decided that when I made the switch to Linux it would be to LTS. Now I’m on Kubuntu 16.04 LTS which is supported until 2021.
The closest you will get to the old Windows paradign of a stable OS is the LTS version, not the non-LTS releases. The OS stays stable, yet the various programs do get security updates and even version updates if you wish. You can also update the LibreOffice to the bleeding edge version if YOU wish. Most of the Windows 7 and 8.x individual users would not be ill served with an LTS release.
If you just have to have the newest release, get the next LTS when it comes out. Save your Browser and Email profiles and data to a USB HDD or large thumb drive, blast the new LTS or even a different distro (assuming the same or similar programs that you use) to the machine and copy your profiles and data to the new install. Setting up a new install takes me about 2 hours.
Just a reminder that this topic isn’t a blogpost, it’s a user/Lounger query, and this discussion isn’t really addressing the original question posed.
This discussion should really be in its own topic, and anything further to add should be in a newly-created topic.
We are dancing around the words viable – safe – unsupported – &c.
If you are asking will the machine power up, test, and present the same desktop for use the day after End of Life as it did the day before; then the prediction is yes. This is based on the history of every other system that reached End of Life until now. It will continue to execute the same commands as programmed. It will continue to fall further and further behind development of new content available. And it will not receive any new repair to cope with changing threats or cumulative errors. An extreme simile would be an Amish buggy in Elon Musk’s new Hyperloop. So, keep your buggy in your own driveway and it will not be damaged by other operators on the superhighway.
You should always have at the very least a local administrator account on every computer, and make sure you know the password to that account. In this way, no matter what happens you can access Windows on that computer.
Of course you can still use it. Just don’t winge if you pick up a virus!
Zaphyrus,
At home, I ran 1607 for a few weeks unsupported before jumping to 1703 because I didn’t have time to do it when I needed the computer. Everything was fine and it wasn’t much different than when not patching according to Woody’s schedule in terms of risk. At work we have some 1511 and 1607 off network and they work fine, but I wouldn’t advise to do that if you connect to the net or are in a network with other connected devices.
For the kind of scenario you describe, I think you can stop worrying. You could download the ISO of 1709 and 1803 and if anything doesn’t go well for you, you just install one of those on top of your past date 1703. Unless a new worm type of vulnerability is discovered (which is uncommon), you should be ok running 1703 for a while.
You should probably not use a Microsoft account if you are that worried, so it makes things simpler too.
Don’t use any of Microsoft products. Use Firefox for a browser or Chrome, use Thunderbird or a webmail for your mails, use a third-party antivirus. Those will be patched and work. Then, your risk for your type of scenario won’t be that bad for the few weeks you wait for a stable version if need be, but isn’t 1709 already stable anyway if you can’t wait to be supported? Canadian Tech supports many customers on an unpatched Windows 7 (so unsupported in the way you describe). Yes, I don’t think it is something I would recommend to anyone with sensitive information to be stolen or lost, but for the scenario you describe, I don’t think you have to worry too much. Your computer will still work and your risk won’t be much greater in the beginning if you use third-party software to face the net and you don’t download random things.
I am sure that when 1703 is out, Woody will tell you were to go from there, just follow him. He, like me, is still on 1703. I trust his judgment and you should too. And I will probaly update when he updates to maybe the same version as him, although to go on 1803, I will research how to really disable web searches first, because that forced “feature” hurts my convictions deeply.
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