MS Support for Vista Ending!

[JorgeA]

Hello,

I just came across the following page indicating that, as of April 10 of this year, "mainstream suppport" for consumer versions of Vista will end, and there is no extended support period. Business editions will enjoy extended support through April 11, 2017.

Vista is the OS on my main PC -- the one I use for my work and to do most of my Web surfing. A couple of questions:

1. Should I be concerned? Presumably, Windows Defender definitions would continue to come in, although other security updates and non-security fixes would not.
   
2. If the answer to 1 is Yes, then should I consider buying Vista Business (assuming that's even possible still)? If I did make that change, would I be losing any features from my Home Premium? I know that Business and Home Premium don't have the same feature sets, but I don't know if installing Business over Home Premium would remove Home Premium features that Business lacks.
   

Thanks in advance for any information on this.

--JorgeA

[Tripredacus]

This must be the link you mean!

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?c2=11732

Breakdowns of the different support policies are here:

http://support.microsoft.com/gp/lifepolicy

It would appear that Vista Home Premium is not covered under the extended support lifecycle:

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?p1=11712

But its still likely that you'd get new updates, as you'd know Ultimate, Business and HP all share updates. I can't imagine that they would make an update for Business and not let it work on HP. As far as the differences, I think that Business is just Home Premium without Media Center.

[jaclaz]

the following page

Vista is the OS on my main PC -- the one I use for my work and to do most of my Web surfing. A couple of questions:

WHICH page?

1. Should I be concerned? Presumably, Windows Defender definitions would continue to come in, although other security updates and non-security fixes would not.
   
2. If the answer to 1 is Yes, then should I consider buying Vista Business (assuming that's even possible still)? If I did make that change, would I be losing any features from my Home Premium? I know that Business and Home Premium don't have the same feature sets, but I don't know if installing Business over Home Premium would remove Home Premium features that Business lacks.
   

You should:

1. be terrified (not about the dropping support, rather by the futility of running Vista at all)
   
2. IF you are going to upgrade get a Windows 7 instead
   

As I personally see it, Vista is a bettered XP, only worse , while 7 is a bettered Vista, actually bettered .

Seriously, I also doubt that there will be any actual difference between the various editions when it comes to malware/security.

jaclaz

[ricktendo]

WOW! not even a sp3?

[cluberti]

Well, no, no SP3 - not needed. As to updates, you'll still get security updates, but no more free support options (all support becomes paid), and any bugs found in Vista after that point will not be fixed.

[JorgeA]

Sorry jaclaz, I forgot to insert the link to the page -- and now I can't get back in there for some reason. The pages are loading slow as molasses and then stop with a "the page you requested is not available" error from Microsoft.

The information Tripredacus described matches what I read.

Good to know that security updates look like they'll continue after April 10.

Thanks guys, for the information. This is reassuring.

--JorgeA

UPDATE: I was finally able to go back into the Microsoft site tonight. Yes, the pages that Tripredacus linked to are pretty much the ones that I'd seen (the only small difference is that I was looking at the page for Vista Home Premium 64-bit Edition instead of the 32-bit version.

Edited January 28, 2012 by JorgeA

[ND22]

I got Vista also, the business edition. End of support is for home, home premium and ultimate. Vista business and enterprise will be supported until 2017 according to this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Vista

or better still the table on this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Vista_editions

Edited February 8, 2012 by ND22

[UltimateSilence]

You were so underrated, Vista.

[JorgeA]

I got Vista also, the business edition. End of support is for home, home premium and ultimate. Vista business and enterprise will be supported until 2017 according to this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Vista

or better still the table on this page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Vista_editions

ND22,

Thanks, that table gives the information in a much neater package than Microsoft's own pages.

--JorgeA

[JorgeA]

You were so underrated, Vista.

Yup.

The other day I wrote in another thread that Vista offered (IMHO) the prettiest interface of any Windows version I've used. For example, the Windows 7 taskbar is flat whereas Vista's has a convex look. I recently heard someone describe Win7 as "Vista Lite."

--JorgeA

[vinifera]

well Win7's taskbar was in beggining simmiliar to vista's tho it had more gradient look (M1-M2 builds)

as for "lite", I agree here, AFAIK vista had frame rate issues with DWM, and honestly only with SP2 vista can be compared with Win7

for unknown reason it was slow to me, and quite unresponsive in some areas

not to mention that annoying copy and delete bug where they put calculating as priority more than doing the **** job itself ...

[vinifera]

*small update

someone edited

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?c2=11732

they prolonged the time now for all versions

[JorgeA]

*small update

someone edited

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?c2=11732

they prolonged the time now for all versions

vinifera,

"Small update" indeed -- this is the BEST news I've heard this year!!

"Mainstream support" is ending April 10, 2012, but "extended support" will now last five more years for ALL versions of Vista. Thanks for (finding and) reporting it!

--JorgeA

[UltimateSilence]

*small update

someone edited

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?c2=11732

they prolonged the time now for all versions

vinifera,

"Small update" indeed -- this is the BEST news I've heard this year!!

"Mainstream support" is ending April 10, 2012, but "extended support" will now last five more years for ALL versions of Vista. Thanks for (finding and) reporting it!

--JorgeA

I concur, JorgeA!

Long live Windows Vista.

Edited February 18, 2012 by UltimateSilence

[cluberti]

This was always the case, but apparently the lifecycle page didn't include the info. This is good - at least the page is now accurate .