Remember Folks W10 Support ends soon !

Rincewind said:
must admit - I stayed on Win 3.1 until WinXP until Win 7, then to Win 10, it was always my own hardware upgrades that drove the Win updates for me, old IT engineers adage - if it ain't broke, don't fix it - cant see me changing from Win 10 in any rush !
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The problem is that the older OS ARE broken, in a number of ways, and have a range of security vulnerabilities - these can be mitigated to some extent by avoiding the more dubious sites on the internet, but there's always the risk that an otherwise genuine site will serve up a malicious link via a 3rd party advert, or that you will click on a link in a phishing email.

There are obviously still vulnerabilities in Win 11, it's just that with each major release the OS gets locked down a bit more - an unfortunately MS also add a bit more lock in (and some crazy 'features' that no-one wants).

I'm was using Win XP for one of my work machines until 3-4 years ago, but that was maintenance work for an end-of-line product which had a Win XP PC built in which would (should) have only been on a secure internal LAN.

I now use a mix of Win 10 and 11 machines, my old PC is Win 10 and can't upgrade (replacement due, as it was originally a Win 7 machine!), while my personal and wok laptops are both Win 11.
 
A little update re ESU enrollment

It was sometime last week that the enrollment 'offer' appeared on my Win Update page.....I left it until this morning while I pondered the eventual move to W11 (my PC meets all the W11 requirements but I was happy to pay what I understood would work out approx £29 with VAT.
However, to my surprise when I clicked "Enroll" I found my ESU enrollment from free of charge ~ result.

So, I have until 13th October 2026 to get organised & ready to upgrade this box to W11 which will, I was assured by MS support, free of charge.

FWIW I was also reassured that the ESU updates should still come through if I revert to my preferred 'Local Account' login. Was advised to monitor and if I don't see any, to re-login to MS Account and check again.
 
Box Brownie said:
A little update re ESU enrollment

It was sometime last week that the enrollment 'offer' appeared on my Win Update page.....I left it until this morning while I pondered the eventual move to W11 (my PC meets all the W11 requirements but I was happy to pay what I understood would work out approx £29 with VAT.
However, to my surprise when I clicked "Enroll" I found my ESU enrollment from free of charge ~ result.

So, I have until 13th October 2026 to get organised & ready to upgrade this box to W11 which will, I was assured by MS support, free of charge.

FWIW I was also reassured that the ESU updates should still come through if I revert to my preferred 'Local Account' login. Was advised to monitor and if I don't see any, to re-login to MS Account and check again.
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From what I have read elsewhere, the ESU being free here is something to do with an EU regulation (or some such thing). It's still a paid-for service in the USA which made me smile :D seeing as MS is American.
 
Bristolian said:
From what I have read elsewhere, the ESU being free here is something to do with an EU regulation (or some such thing). It's still a paid-for service in the USA which made me smile :D seeing as MS is American.
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Hmmmm! that bears some possibility, as not the first time the EU have taken MS to task!
 
Box Brownie said:
Hmmmm! that bears some possibility, as not the first time the EU have taken MS to task!
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I was watching a YT video last night and the vlogger suggested that MS agreed to make the ESU free in the European Economic Area to prevent the EU from starting legal proceedings for contravention of Consumer Rights legislation. I guess they thought prevention would be better (i.e. cheaper) than cure :)

PS: I appreciate that not everything you hear or see on YT is true but this sounds plausible.
 
I am not a slave to Microsoft by any means. I use Google docs / Libreoffice rather than M365. I have some older laptops on Linux Mint rather than Windows (Linux Mint is an excellent and free operating system and can give an extended period of life to an older machine, albeit you can't run Photoshop etc on it, only free open source software like Darktable, RawTherapee, Gimp etc)

But I do think Windows 11 is actually a very decent operating system. I upgraded from Windows 10 a couple of years back and I've been very happy indeed.

I get that some people's pcs won't have the capability to update which would be a massive pain. But if your machine can handle it, my personal experience is that it's worth doing for sure. Doesn't take too long to adjust to the few cosmetic tweaks

If people do need to get a new machine for W11, and the old one is lying around redundant, I really would look at putting Linux Mint on your old machine. Can then be used / given away to someone to use for basic web browsing and word processing. My 84 year old mother in law has a machine with Linux Mint on it and finds it easy to use
 
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I keep saying it must be time for me to upgrade. My trusty Dell is still going strong though. Considering I bought it in 2011, it's done really well. I've probably jinxed it now. How do people feel about W11? Is it very intrusive, privacy wise?
 
I don't find it so.

You need a Microsoft account but you can just set up a new email address if you have concerns in that area I guess
 
I decided to bite the bullet and update my pc to run 11 last week. My previous CPU/ mobo didn't support tpm and I didn't want to try and force an install which is evidently possible.
New Ryzen 5600/ mobo, psu and upgrade to 32gb ram didn't set me back as much as I thought it would and I was able to transfer my copy of W10 over to the new pc as a fresh install and from there update to W11 for free.

First impression is overall positive , it's not that different from 10 in basic use. One thing that irritated and made me laugh at the same time was after a few days I started getting a yellow warning in the security/ defender centre saying hardware security couldn't be started. From what I read it's a problem with tpm that a MS update had caused. Couldn't find a quick or permanent solution so have now dismissed the alert until I can find one. So I had to update the pc as my old pc didn't have tpm capability and my new one which does can't use it because of a problem on Microsoft's end.
Go figure...

Still glad I upgraded as the pc runs like a dream, faster and more powerful than my previous one. Now just waiting for my new gfx card to get here.
 
I can't remember if this is a Win 11 specific thing or also applied to Win 10, but one thing that annoys me a little is when you install something new it automatically sets it to hide in the taskbar. I like to have all of mine showing, so I have to manually go into Taskbar settings and click the rocker tab to always show it. If there's a solution to this I'd love to hear it!
 
Well, that didn't work out well. Decided this morning to sign up our old, rarely used, non-upgradeable Win10 box for the extra year. Discovered I do have an old MS account, though it uses an email account that's on my Mac, not the Win10 box. Thought I could use it anyway, so I signed in using it. Three things I've learned; MS is incredibly nosy and wants to know all sorts of stuff I don't want to tell them, the MS account is almost unusable if you don't have the email account right there, and I couldn't find anything anywhere that relates to extending security updates!

So I'm going to create a new MS account with an email address that is available there. But how do I find the security extension option? I've not been sent any reminders, AFAIK!

(Up until this morning I was thinking I'd just tough it out, after all, I won't be any less secure on Friday than I am now. But maybe an extra year is worth it...)
 
ChrisR said:
Well, that didn't work out well. Decided this morning to sign up our old, rarely used, non-upgradeable Win10 box for the extra year. Discovered I do have an old MS account, though it uses an email account that's on my Mac, not the Win10 box. Thought I could use it anyway, so I signed in using it. Three things I've learned; MS is incredibly nosy and wants to know all sorts of stuff I don't want to tell them, the MS account is almost unusable if you don't have the email account right there, and I couldn't find anything anywhere that relates to extending security updates!

So I'm going to create a new MS account with an email address that is available there. But how do I find the security extension option? I've not been sent any reminders, AFAIK!

(Up until this morning I was thinking I'd just tough it out, after all, I won't be any less secure on Friday than I am now. But maybe an extra year is worth it...)
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I hope this is of help.....

  1. ESU (Extended Security Updates) and the Enrollment of them is in the Windows Update on the PC

    'It' is not part of the MS Account and has no mention of or actions to take visible in the MS Account pages.


  2. However, the Enrollment is not visible unless you are logged-on to your PC using the MS Account i.e. it needs to "phone home" to know that your PC is visible to MS.
    I waited a some weeks to see the ESU Enrollment show in Win Updates but now W10 is End of Life (as at 13th October) I surmise that you would likely see the Enrollment offer fairly promptly? NB I was informed in a Chat with an MS 'chat person ~ not a Chat Bot' that they were progressively rolling out the ESU Enrollment Offers and that was why I did not see it immediately.

  3. As I mentioned in a previous post #42 I was fully expecting to pay but I was enrolled without paying a penny :)
I can only suggest that you logon the PC with the MS Account and check the your Windows Updates very so often.

FWIW I will in due course be reverting my PC to a Local Account login but the Chat person advised that is I did not see any updates, to switch back to the MS Account login and see whether the updates come through.

NB On a side note my Dell Ultrabook came with W11 and after activating W11 whilst on the MS Account I set that to a Local Account.....but I read an article a few days ago that MS are acting to stop users have a a Local Account............................and that article was highly critical of & about MS for doing this. It named a particular KB update that introduced that change!!!!!! :headbang:
 
Just enrolled for the ESU, was really easy for me, just went to settings / update and security and the enrollment was there. It did not want any info, just enrolled then clicked next and got the message that I was enrolled in the ESU.
 
How ironic to end of life W10 (and with it many computers) on international e-waste day.
 
Box Brownie said:
I hope this is of help.....

  1. ESU (Extended Security Updates) and the Enrollment of them is in the Windows Update on the PC

    'It' is not part of the MS Account and has no mention of or actions to take visible in the MS Account pages.


  2. However, the Enrollment is not visible unless you are logged-on to your PC using the MS Account i.e. it needs to "phone home" to know that your PC is visible to MS.
    I waited a some weeks to see the ESU Enrollment show in Win Updates but now W10 is End of Life (as at 13th October) I surmise that you would likely see the Enrollment offer fairly promptly? NB I was informed in a Chat with an MS 'chat person ~ not a Chat Bot' that they were progressively rolling out the ESU Enrollment Offers and that was why I did not see it immediately.

  3. As I mentioned in a previous post #42 I was fully expecting to pay but I was enrolled without paying a penny :)
I can only suggest that you logon the PC with the MS Account and check the your Windows Updates very so often....
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Thank you very much Jonathan, your advice worked a treat, I am now enrolled, and I also did not have to pay!
 
My previous experiences of end-of-life computers were in the Apple system. I used a 2014 MBP for several years after it was no longer eligible for updates, and likewise my version 1 iPhone SE. So my question is, are Win10 users (particularly those who keep up their Internet Security subscriptions and practice safe sex web browsing) particularly likely to get into difficulties once their monthly updates stop?

Maybe another way of asking this is whether there is evidence of the hackers particularly targeting Win10 users at this point? (Now that I write it down, it seems very likely that the answer would be "yes"!)
 
ChrisR said:
My previous experiences of end-of-life computers were in the Apple system. I used a 2014 MBP for several years after it was no longer eligible for updates, and likewise my version 1 iPhone SE. So my question is, are Win10 users (particularly those who keep up their Internet Security subscriptions and practice safe sex web browsing) particularly likely to get into difficulties once their monthly updates stop?

Maybe another way of asking this is whether there is evidence of the hackers particularly targeting Win10 users at this point? (Now that I write it down, it seems very likely that the answer would be "yes"!)
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If you are in Europe then Win 10 will actually continue providing updates for another year, you can also get this extra support if you use OneDrive to backup your PC, or you can pay to have the additional years support.
As far as I am aware, Windows Defender (the built in anti-virus) will continue to provide virus definition updates past this date, as that is separate from Win 10 specific support (and is common with Win 11).
I wouldn't be surprised to see an increase in attacks on Win 10 machines once the deadline passes (and again when the extended support runs out a year later), but that is obviously dependant on discovery of previously unknown flaws in Win 10 (which probably exist, but Win 10 has been around long enough that the easy to find flaws have been found and fixed or blocked).
It will also depend on how many take the deadline as a push to switch to Win 11 or alternatives - if the Win 10 share drops significantly it becomes less appealing to try to discover flaws, as the number of potential victims is fewer.
 
ChrisR said:
Thank you very much Jonathan, your advice worked a treat, I am now enrolled, and I also did not have to pay!
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Pleased to know that it worked for you too...... including it being FoC :)

Though, me not Jonathan :cautious: :thinking: ;)

PS in regard to @Faldrax post re: security exploits potentially on the increase for W10. When on ESU it will be interesting to see what MS new "security updates" they release during the next 12 months....by way of countering any discovered exploits.

Having said that, IIRC some/many(?) exploits are executed by poor decisions of the PC user caused by clicking on spurious links in (phishing?) emails.....though some KB docs do occasionally talk of, to me, obscure flaws in the OS that are only accessed by a specific set of conditions.

PPS talking of W11, an article I saw mentioned that MS will now be concentrating their efforts on W11 and developing the upcoming W12.
 
Well, I've been cut off in my prime, so to speak. :D I was reading a scary article about what happens when you no longer update. Will it happen? Only time will tell, I suppose.
 
Box Brownie said:
Pleased to know that it worked for you too...... including it being FoC :)

Though, me not Jonathan :cautious: :thinking: ;)

PS in regard to @Faldrax post re: security exploits potentially on the increase for W10. When on ESU it will be interesting to see what MS new "security updates" they release during the next 12 months....by way of countering any discovered exploits.

Having said that, IIRC some/many(?) exploits are executed by poor decisions of the PC user caused by clicking on spurious links in (phishing?) emails.....though some KB docs do occasionally talk of, to me, obscure flaws in the OS that are only accessed by a specific set of conditions.

PPS talking of W11, an article I saw mentioned that MS will now be concentrating their efforts on W11 and developing the upcoming W12.
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It's crazy how many people still click on dubious links despite being told repeatedly not to.
In the previous company I worked for the IT department would send out a test phishing email every 2-3 months - they were easy to spot - but we still had something like a 30-40% click rate on them despite regular 'How to Spot Phishing' training and emails.
 
Faldrax said:
It's crazy how many people still click on dubious links despite being told repeatedly not to.
In the previous company I worked for the IT department would send out a test phishing email every 2-3 months - they were easy to spot - but we still had something like a 30-40% click rate on them despite regular 'How to Spot Phishing' training and emails.
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Hence the scammers using 'social engineering' to trap the unwary :(
 
ChrisR said:
My previous experiences of end-of-life computers were in the Apple system. I used a 2014 MBP for several years after it was no longer eligible for updates, and likewise my version 1 iPhone SE. So my question is, are Win10 users (particularly those who keep up their Internet Security subscriptions and practice safe sex web browsing) particularly likely to get into difficulties once their monthly updates stop?

Maybe another way of asking this is whether there is evidence of the hackers particularly targeting Win10 users at this point? (Now that I write it down, it seems very likely that the answer would be "yes"!)
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In theory, there could be a significant vulnerability discovered in Windows 10 after support ends which hackers would rush to exploit since Windows 10 users would be unable to protect themselves from it. In reality though it's unlikely and if it did happen, Microsoft may well release a patch for it (they've done it before after end of support) or there may be a workaround you can implement. The longer a Windows 10 system is running, the more the security risk increases is but W10 has a reasonably secure design (compared to XP which had major security issues with its design), I wouldn't expect hackers to change their behaviour for Windows 10 particularly given home users. Bear in mind there's plenty of systems out there that are not patched and up to date which hackers have already been targeting but there's much bigger targets to aim for. When VMware's ESXi products were out of support there were some dangerous vulnerabilities - these servers are highly desirable since getting control of one can get significant access to a company's resources and a shocking amount of these out of date servers were online, ripe for hacking.

The real risk to home users remains the same as it does for a fully patched W11 system where users accidentally install malware, scammers tricking users into getting remote control to the PC or pages tricking users into running damaging Powershell scripts which has been common with fake capchas:

cybersecuritynews.com

Fake Captcha Malware Attacking Windows Users To execute PowerShell Commands

A malware campaign is targeting Windows users via fake CAPTCHA prompts that trick victims into executing malicious PowerShell scripts.
cybersecuritynews.com cybersecuritynews.com

The main problem with W10 going end of support is that gradually companies are going to stop supporting it as well which can lead to varying levels of annoyance.

I have two Windows 10 machines left, one a gaming laptop that I really only use to run cycling software which I'll keep running on W10 for now and my main desktop. I was going to keep going with the desktop on W10 for now as well but it developed a 3D performance problem which I suspect is due to a failing SSD since there was no problem on a fresh install on a new SSD so I moved to it and went with W11.
 
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The security risk will be higher in w10 and the risk will increase over time.

But things will also gradually stop working as well; eg. Programs will release new versions and not all will be backwards compatible (at some stage lightroom for example, or Chrome). This will start off as a negligible issue but increase over time. Bigger companies like Adobe will likely support for longer

If the cost of a new pc is prohibitive for some I can see why an attempt to eek out more life from the old machine is worthwhile. Otherwise I'd view it as bringing forward expenditure on a new pc by a couple of years and an opportunity to spec out a machine that is quicker and faster etc (I use pc specialist )
 
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