What is your preferred release version of Windows 10?

[legacyfan]

On 11/9/2022 at 6:19 AM, Jody Thornton said:

I'm now examining my post-Windows 8 options next year.  LTSC 2019 seems to be the most rpomising one with support until the end of the decade.

Now the question:  How to get it?

you could probably buy it from Microsoft for like 1000$ plus a product key would be needed 

Edited December 24, 2022 by legacyfan

[Jody Thornton]

30 minutes ago, legacyfan said:

you could probably buy it from Microsoft for like 1000$ plus a product key would be needed 

That's OK.  I obtained it.  I have a small form factor HP computer setup, ready to go in a year.  Once I have to deprecate Windows 8, I have a system to move to.

[cmccaff1]

Been a while since I posted here!
Sorry to bump the topic, but I find it very interesting.
It took a bit of trial and error, and a lot of consideration, but after giving it thought I decided to migrate to Windows 10 LTSC 2019. So far I can't say I have any complaints.

It is definitely a transition compared to XP and 7, which I became used to and was able to learn the ins and outs of, but I've had some experience working with Windows 10 before, and have figured out to a certain extent how everything works.
The only big interface modification I had to make was installing Classic Shell...I can live with everything else in terms of how it looks and sounds. I don't want to make it feel like XP or 7, because I honestly like the Win10 look. I've loved it in every single version I've tried. It is smooth, refined, and still feels refreshingly modern compared to every version of Windows that came before.

I definitely miss the performance of XP and 7, and wish everyone well who is still trying to keep those OSes alive. The big reason I went to 10 is because I'm no longer bottlenecked by the OS in terms of how many programs I'll be able to run.
I appreciate the LTSC versions in particular for being more focused on security and stability, and having less bloat than regular 10.

LTSC 2019 seems to be a good 'future-proof' option, with extended support up to January 2029.
Aside from the really old/esoteric stuff, a good number of the programs I used in XP and 7 still run fine in 10.
It also supports all the drivers on my 'daily driver' out of the box--I only had to update the card reader, ethernet and sound drivers.
(For what it's worth, LTSC 2019 seems to be the last LTSC/LTSB version that can be properly burned onto a classic single-layer DVD in both 32-bit and 64-bit releases; 32-bit LTSC 2021 can also be burned to single layer DVDs, but goes out of extended support before LTSC 2019 does, so the older release is the winner. Of course, I'm not counting any unofficial/modified versions that trim the excess.)

I might transition to IoT LTSC 2021 when LTSC 2019 goes out of support, but it'll be quite a few years before that even becomes an issue (and even then it would simply be a matter of buying a pack of dual-layer DVDs, if you're like me and you prefer the nostalgia factor of old-school optical media). Honestly, I think I could be happy with any version of Win10, once it is properly tweaked. Even when Windows 10 starts going out of support, the 'final' forms of each release, with all updates applied, from the early 2015 releases to the latest ones, should serve users admirably for years to come.
If you are careful with your option selection on an initial installation, many of the things people complain about are avoidable or can become non-factors.

I'm happily using Ungoogled Chromium and plan to stick with it as my main browser for the foreseeable future, but I am definitely open to trying other browsers out. Win10 gives you a lot of room to experiment, as almost everything you can find still targets it (though Firefox still supports Windows 7 for the moment, which is absolutely amazing).

Unless I find myself using a PC that is prohibitively ill-equipped to handle 10 (and even then, lite versions may be an option before I absolutely have to go back to XP or 7) I plan to stay on Windows 10 as long as I possibly can. It ain't perfect but it's close enough.

[Tripredacus]

On 12/24/2022 at 2:37 PM, legacyfan said:

you could probably buy it from Microsoft for like 1000$ plus a product key would be needed 

There are two main ways to obtain it that I am aware of. If you are talking about "just getting the OS" meaning it is installed onto a PC, then the license cost is less than $200 plus whatever the price of the computer you get it on. You do not get recovery media in this way and you also do not get the product key.

The way to get the installation media is a bit different. Microsoft does not sell one-off media + COA for IOT Enterprise SKUs. You have to buy the "kit" from an Embedded Partner. The kit is the DVD9 Master and support documentation and I'm thinking that comes to somewhere in four figure territory. The product keys are a separate cost and come in minimum quantities in the tens of thousands.

[mina7601]

On 2/21/2023 at 8:15 AM, cmccaff1 said:

Been a while since I posted here!
Sorry to bump the topic, but I find it very interesting.
It took a bit of trial and error, and a lot of consideration, but after giving it thought I decided to migrate to Windows 10 LTSC 2019. So far I can't say I have any complaints.

It is definitely a transition compared to XP and 7, which I became used to and was able to learn the ins and outs of, but I've had some experience working with Windows 10 before, and have figured out to a certain extent how everything works.
The only big interface modification I had to make was installing Classic Shell...I can live with everything else in terms of how it looks and sounds. I don't want to make it feel like XP or 7, because I honestly like the Win10 look. I've loved it in every single version I've tried. It is smooth, refined, and still feels refreshingly modern compared to every version of Windows that came before.

I definitely miss the performance of XP and 7, and wish everyone well who is still trying to keep those OSes alive. The big reason I went to 10 is because I'm no longer bottlenecked by the OS in terms of how many programs I'll be able to run.
I appreciate the LTSC versions in particular for being more focused on security and stability, and having less bloat than regular 10.

LTSC 2019 seems to be a good 'future-proof' option, with extended support up to January 2029.
Aside from the really old/esoteric stuff, a good number of the programs I used in XP and 7 still run fine in 10.
It also supports all the drivers on my 'daily driver' out of the box--I only had to update the card reader, ethernet and sound drivers.
(For what it's worth, LTSC 2019 seems to be the last LTSC/LTSB version that can be properly burned onto a classic single-layer DVD in both 32-bit and 64-bit releases; 32-bit LTSC 2021 can also be burned to single layer DVDs, but goes out of extended support before LTSC 2019 does, so the older release is the winner. Of course, I'm not counting any unofficial/modified versions that trim the excess.)

I might transition to IoT LTSC 2021 when LTSC 2019 goes out of support, but it'll be quite a few years before that even becomes an issue (and even then it would simply be a matter of buying a pack of dual-layer DVDs, if you're like me and you prefer the nostalgia factor of old-school optical media). Honestly, I think I could be happy with any version of Win10, once it is properly tweaked. Even when Windows 10 starts going out of support, the 'final' forms of each release, with all updates applied, from the early 2015 releases to the latest ones, should serve users admirably for years to come.
If you are careful with your option selection on an initial installation, many of the things people complain about are avoidable or can become non-factors.

I'm happily using Ungoogled Chromium and plan to stick with it as my main browser for the foreseeable future, but I am definitely open to trying other browsers out. Win10 gives you a lot of room to experiment, as almost everything you can find still targets it (though Firefox still supports Windows 7 for the moment, which is absolutely amazing).

Unless I find myself using a PC that is prohibitively ill-equipped to handle 10 (and even then, lite versions may be an option before I absolutely have to go back to XP or 7) I plan to stay on Windows 10 as long as I possibly can. It ain't perfect but it's close enough.

Welcome back, @cmccaff1! I'm glad you like Windows 10. I started to like Windows 10 beginning version 1903.

[cmccaff1]

Just now, mina7601 said:

Welcome back, @cmccaff1! I'm glad you like Windows 10. I started to like Windows 10 beginning version 1903.

I may have to try that one!
I'm honestly open to trying all the different builds of 10 on an experimental basis...I don't think you can go wrong with any of them, though I'm sure you will hit less bugs after a certain point (though new ones will be created that may not have been there earlier).
For now, I've settled on LTSC 2019, though I was briefly considering LTSB 2015. I am sure both will run fine on my hardware, but it's hard to argue with extended support until January 2029, and the few quirks/bugs I've found aren't an issue.
10 has a little bit of a learning curve connected to it, and the performance isn't quite what I was getting with XP and 7 (even with a fair number of tweaks), but 10's kernel absolutely blows anything before it out of the water. Aside from the many years of extended support that still remain, on capable hardware 10 smokes everything (though XP & 7 should run faster than 10 on older hardware).
I anticipate that when the time comes that we all have to look at using 11, spoofing the version string should get most 'incompatible' software running perfectly fine on 10.

I plan to keep using 10 until I can't use it anymore. I see there's a project called 'Tiny11' in the works, but I'm going to wait for that to get mature, and to see what else is available by then. 11 is still a baby--10 has gone from being a baby to a fairly mature OS by now. It's not perfect, but it's a hell of a lot better than it was in the early days. I think it will be remembered almost as fondly as XP and 7 when it's all said and done...history will paint it in a better light.

[mina7601]

2 hours ago, cmccaff1 said:

11 is still a baby

Windows 11 has been released on October 5, 2021 (officially October 4), though.

[cmccaff1]

9 minutes ago, mina7601 said:

Windows 11 has been released on October 5, 2021 (officially October 4), though.

That is true! Compared to 10, it would definitely be a baby, but I can imagine many 11 users are happy with it by this point. I'm just a bit reluctant to make the jump, not just because my PC falls a little bit short of the requirements but because it isn't very mature yet. I recall that Windows 10, over the first few years, still had its fair share of random crashes and major bugs.
By the time LTSC 2019 came out a lot of that had been ironed out, and though there are still some strange quirks and minor bugs it's a great and stable OS all the way around. With my '20 versions' rule (I'm still on Chromium 90--the latest is 110), I could still be quite comfortably on Windows 7, but 10 is more future proof (and LTSC brings it very close to 7, by allowing you to disable most 'extras' in the initial install and with all future updates being strictly security-based; its performance is also a bit closer to 7 than 'regular' 10, at least in my experiences).
By the time I have to even think about moving to 11, it'll probably be even more stable than 10 is now!

[mina7601]

On 2/22/2023 at 6:11 PM, cmccaff1 said:

I may have to try that one!

Your experience may differ, though. But it's good that you are open to trying all different builds of Windows 10 to experiment. I really liked Windows 10 beginning 1903, because of the light/dark mode (though, I still prefer the old mode Windows 10 version 1809 (and older) had, which is: dark Windows mode, and light apps mode, and it's possible to keep it like that in 1903 and later, thankfully), and the feature to change the cursor size and color.

[cmccaff1]

48 minutes ago, mina7601 said:

Your experience may differ, though. But it's good that you are open to trying all different builds of Windows 10 to experiment. I really liked Windows 10 beginning 1903, because of the light/dark mode (though, I still prefer the old mode Windows 10 version 1809 (and older) had, which is: dark Windows mode, and light apps mode, and it's possible to keep it like that in 1903 and later, thankfully), and the feature to change the cursor size and color.

I can't front--I ended up going back to 7 x64. It's really the '20 versions rule' that keeps me on 7, because at this point in time I'm not in a situation that really necessitates moving up to 10. I'm using Chromium 90 right now, well below the cutoff point (109) for pre-10 users. The idea is to take it version by version, staying 20 behind the newest, then when we get to the 130/110 milestone, I'll probably move up to Firefox (whatever is most recent, stay 20 versions behind that and keep moving up until/unless we hit a dead end; at that point I'll probably review the options that are available by then). I have a feeling 7 will probably be usable much as XP was for a long time to come, maybe to the end of the decade and some change.

My PC is old enough that it can run 7 and 10 with full driver support, so I'm taking advantage of that to stick with the older, faster 7. But I have no problem moving up to 10 in the future--if you've got at least a dual core and add Classic Shell (and make sure to turn off all the optional crap during the install process), it's actually not too bad.

[mina7601]

On 2/25/2023 at 11:26 PM, cmccaff1 said:

I can't front--I ended up going back to 7 x64. It's really the '20 versions rule' that keeps me on 7, because at this point in time I'm not in a situation that really necessitates moving up to 10. I'm using Chromium 90 right now, well below the cutoff point (109) for pre-10 users. The idea is to take it version by version, staying 20 behind the newest, then when we get to the 130/110 milestone, I'll probably move up to Firefox (whatever is most recent, stay 20 versions behind that and keep moving up until/unless we hit a dead end; at that point I'll probably review the options that are available by then). I have a feeling 7 will probably be usable much as XP was for a long time to come, maybe to the end of the decade and some change.

My PC is old enough that it can run 7 and 10 with full driver support, so I'm taking advantage of that to stick with the older, faster 7. But I have no problem moving up to 10 in the future--if you've got at least a dual core and add Classic Shell (and make sure to turn off all the optional crap during the install process), it's actually not too bad.

Yeah, I saw that you wrote you recently shifted to Windows 7 on another topic, welcome to Windows 7, mate!

[AstroSkipper]

On 2/25/2023 at 10:26 PM, cmccaff1 said:

I can't front--I ended up going back to 7 x64. It's really the '20 versions rule' that keeps me on 7, because at this point in time I'm not in a situation that really necessitates moving up to 10. I'm using Chromium 90 right now, well below the cutoff point (109) for pre-10 users. The idea is to take it version by version, staying 20 behind the newest, then when we get to the 130/110 milestone, I'll probably move up to Firefox (whatever is most recent, stay 20 versions behind that and keep moving up until/unless we hit a dead end; at that point I'll probably review the options that are available by then). I have a feeling 7 will probably be usable much as XP was for a long time to come, maybe to the end of the decade and some change.

My PC is old enough that it can run 7 and 10 with full driver support, so I'm taking advantage of that to stick with the older, faster 7. But I have no problem moving up to 10 in the future--if you've got at least a dual core and add Classic Shell (and make sure to turn off all the optional crap during the install process), it's actually not too bad.

I administrate an older notebook which was originally delivered with Windows 7 Professional 64 Bit. After I had upgraded the hardware (SSD and RAM), I installed Windows 10 Professional independently and completely on a second partition. I use the boot manager BOOT-US to select the desired OS when starting the notebook. I can absolutely understand why Windows 7 is your favourite. I am already having a crisis  when you can only log into your own operating system with an account.  I don't like Windows 10 and up.

[cmccaff1]

2 hours ago, AstroSkipper said:

I can absolutely understand why Windows 7 is your favourite. I am already having a crisis  when you can only log into your own operating system with an account.  I don't like Windows 10 and up.

I appreciate that, brother. For me, Windows XP was the finest hour for Microsoft in terms of designing a stable, reliable, fully-featured OS. I think 7 did regress from it in certain respects, but managed to improve upon it in other areas (such as out-of-the-box download speeds, and a far more powerful kernel). I think 7 got better over the years, and is now in all respects a worthy successor to the old, legendary XP.

I'm not really on the 10 'hate train'--having used it quite a bit myself, I can appreciate the good things about it, and while it is by no means a flawless OS (actually, I think that it was an even more significant regression from 7 compared to 7 from XP, with less advantages outweighing the drawbacks), when you figure out how to deal with its various quirks it's actually not too bad. I find that to get decent performance in 10, you need a more modern dual-core or any triple/quad-core or better you can find. 7, on the other hand, can run fine even on a higher-clocked single core and flies with two or more cores.

My advice to anyone who wants to be more future-proofed (because let's face it, eventually 7 is going to end up exactly where XP is now), and absolutely must be using Windows 10 at this point in time, is to choose an Enterprise release (LTSB or LTSC). These versions are a lot more stable, and while each seems to have its share of quirks and bugs, the overall experience is going to be much closer to the XP/7 days. Most of the fluff in 'regular' 10 has been removed, or can be easily turned off during the initial installation. The only updates these versions seem to get are security and stability-related, so your odds of an update ruining your OS and forcing you to do a reinstall are far less. I recommend LTSC 2019, which will get extended updates until January 2029...after that, IoT LTSC 2021 will get updates until January 2032. (Quick note if you burn to/install from disc media: LTSC 2019 will fit on a single-layer DVD & IoT 2021 needs a dual-layer).

[AstroSkipper]

10 hours ago, cmccaff1 said:

I appreciate that, brother. For me, Windows XP was the finest hour for Microsoft in terms of designing a stable, reliable, fully-featured OS. I think 7 did regress from it in certain respects, but managed to improve upon it in other areas (such as out-of-the-box download speeds, and a far more powerful kernel). I think 7 got better over the years, and is now in all respects a worthy successor to the old, legendary XP.

I'm not really on the 10 'hate train'--having used it quite a bit myself, I can appreciate the good things about it, and while it is by no means a flawless OS (actually, I think that it was an even more significant regression from 7 compared to 7 from XP, with less advantages outweighing the drawbacks), when you figure out how to deal with its various quirks it's actually not too bad. I find that to get decent performance in 10, you need a more modern dual-core or any triple/quad-core or better you can find. 7, on the other hand, can run fine even on a higher-clocked single core and flies with two or more cores.

My advice to anyone who wants to be more future-proofed (because let's face it, eventually 7 is going to end up exactly where XP is now), and absolutely must be using Windows 10 at this point in time, is to choose an Enterprise release (LTSB or LTSC). These versions are a lot more stable, and while each seems to have its share of quirks and bugs, the overall experience is going to be much closer to the XP/7 days. Most of the fluff in 'regular' 10 has been removed, or can be easily turned off during the initial installation. The only updates these versions seem to get are security and stability-related, so your odds of an update ruining your OS and forcing you to do a reinstall are far less. I recommend LTSC 2019, which will get extended updates until January 2029...after that, IoT LTSC 2021 will get updates until January 2032. (Quick note if you burn to/install from disc media: LTSC 2019 will fit on a single-layer DVD & IoT 2021 needs a dual-layer).

Thank you for your opinion and thoughts! First of all, I have to mention that I am a die-hard Windows XP fan, and it is still my main operating system for more than 20 years. It has the most important things I need. Working with Windows XP always fills me with joy. I feel free, not monitored, not controlled and not incapacitated.  But if I had to switch to another Windows OS, it would be Windows 7. I completely agree with you,   Windows 7 was or is a worthy successor to Windows XP. As for Windows 10, I try to avoid using it whenever I can. In this OS, an administrator is no longer really the boss.  Microsoft no longer considers users capable of making their own decisions. And all in the name of security.  I don't feel free in this OS, but controlled, bullied and monitored, no matter what hacks and modifications have been made. 

That's one of the main reasons why I don't like Windows 10 and up. 

Greetings, AstroSkipper 

Edited March 2, 2023 by AstroSkipper

[legacyfan]

10 hours ago, AstroSkipper said:

Thank you for your opinion and thoughts! First of all, I have to mention that I am a die-hard Windows XP fan, and it is still my main operating system for more than 20 years. It has the most important things I need. Working with Windows XP always fills me with joy. I feel free, not monitored, not controlled and not incapacitated.  But if I had to switch to another Windows OS, it would be Windows 7. I completely agree with you,   Windows 7 was or is a worthy successor to Windows XP. As for Windows 10, I try to avoid using it whenever I can. In this OS, an administrator is no longer really the boss.  Microsoft no longer considers users capable of making their own decisions. And all in the name of security.  I don't feel free in this OS, but controlled, bullied and monitored, no matter what hacks and modifications have been made. 

That's one of the main reasons why I don't like Windows 10 and up. 

Greetings, AstroSkipper 

for me version 1709 is my favorite version of windows 10 (before the telemetry started)