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Reminder: Windows Vista support ends this year - gHacks Tech News
Martin Brinkmann
Byon January 1, 2017 inWindows - Last Update:January 1, 2017
Support for Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system will end on April
11, 2017; Microsoft won't publish public security patches anymore for
Windows Vista after the Patch Tuesday in April 2017.
Windows Vista is currently in the so-called extended support phase.
Microsoft divides the support period of its operating systems into
mainstream and extended support phases.
Mainstream support refers to the first five years of product
availability. The product may receive new features and updates in that
period of time next to security updates.
When a product enters extended support phase after five years, only
security updates are provided for it at this point in time. While
Microsoft may push out other updates to the operating system, it is not
mandatory anymore.
When extended support ends, only paying (Enterprise) customers may get
another support extension. It marks the end of support for all Home users.
Reminder: Windows Vista support ends this year
windows vista end of support
Windows Vista's mainstream support ended on April 10, 2012. This is
usually not a big issue for users who run Vista on devices considering
that security updates are provided for another five years.
Feature updates may be welcome at times, but security updates are more
important than that usually.
The end of extended support for Vista puts an end to public security
releases for the operating system.
Users who run Windows Vista on devices have to make a decision when that
happens:
1. Stick with Windows Vista even though security updates are not
provided anymore. This leaves security vulnerabilities unpatched which
may increase the chance of being attacked successfully.
2. Upgrade to a new version of Windows. Microsoft excluded Windows Vista
from the free upgrade offer to Windows 10, and Vista keys are not
accepted during the upgrade to Windows 10 (Windows 7 and 8.1 users can
upgrade for free still). If the device is capable enough, you could grab
a cheap key on eBay or another marketplace and use it instead.
3. Switch to a different operating system entirely, e.g. a Linux
distribution.
When support for XP ended three years ago, many users decided to keep on
using the operating system. It seems likely that part of Vista's smaller
user base will make the same decision and keep on using Vista.
Vista has a low market share of around 1% of the market. The operating
system never managed to grab a sizeable share of the market. Windows XP,
an operating system for which support ended three years ago, has still a
market share of 9% just to highlight the difference in popularity.
The next Microsoft operating system to run out of support is Windows 7.
This happens in 2020 though, which means that three years of security
updates are still happening.
Now You: What is your suggestion for users still running Vista?
Summary
Article Name
Reminder: Windows Vista support ends this year
Description
Support for Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system will end on April
11, 2017; Microsoft won't publish public security patches anymore for
Windows Vista after the Patch Tuesday in April 2017.
Author
Martin Brinkmann
Publisher
Ghacks Technology News
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About Martin Brinkmann
Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks
Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and
knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand.You can
follow Martin on Facebook, Twitter or Google+
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