Windows 10 End of Support: Should Developers Be Concerned?
While I enjoy developing and writing on my MacBook, I have a couple of Windows boxes at home. One is a pretty old system running Windows 10, but is fine for developing code on. So I was slightly concerned when one day a few months ago it presented me with a screen that basically declared its own redundancy:
In fact my old PC is not actually capable of running Windows 11; among other things, it doesn’t have a “Trusted Platform Module.” I suppose it was slightly reminiscent of the end of the second Terminator film, with our heroic robot placing itself before the mercy of Sarah Connor before stating that “I cannot self-terminate”.
A number of interesting things are going on here. First, Microsoft is trying to keep you on the conveyer belt but is compelled to tell you that your machine has somehow finished. It was forced to treat Windows 11 as discontinuous from Windows 10 because of design limitations. The definition of ‘PC’ has always been a very wide range of processors, memory, storage and other peripheries. Marshalling these into one simplified inexpensive user experience helped spread the use of home computing, and made Bill Gates extremely rich.
Even as Microsoft inevitably became a service company, they still needed to persuade the end user that Microsoft was still a mighty technology company. But they don’t really know what is in your box; Microsoft doesn’t control the computing landscape anymore and is uncertain of the future. They are not malign, they are just trying to cope.
Despite the warnings, your Windows machine is probably fine. It’s just that Windows 11 has a few requirements that some older machines might not manage. If you want to, you can get around that. There are just a couple of instruction sets required and you can hack the registry — and voila, Windows 11 will work. I talked about this when writing about how the terminal Warp was released for Windows and how it had to deal with machines not running SSE 4.2, one of the processor instruction sets that Windows 11 requires. Of course, Warp is a good reason why which system you are running on is less important these days — it runs everywhere.
But… Linux?
I note that some people have said, “Now is the time to ditch Windows for Linux”. This is a slightly odd statement; you will almost certainly be able to install Linux on your old box, and could have done so at any time. Fervour for Linux is usually a “developer-coded” renunciation of Windows. Of course, you can now run Linux on Windows, so a lot of this is moot. But Linux isn’t a sports team that requires your loyalty. You can enjoy the commodity of a Windows box as well as the freedom of Linux.
You can safely get into Linux while waiting till you find a good deal on a new Windows 11 (or Windows 12) box later if you still want to. You can install Ubuntu and even get into its new Unity UI. I always found the Linux Mint distribution fairly straightforward. For example, you’ll find a panel, a Start menu, a system tray, and clickable icons — all on top of a very user-friendly operating system. But of course, now I’m using the word “distribution,” an entire complication that Windows made unnecessary. Testing Linux Mint is easy: Download it, stick it on some installable media, and give it a try. Our own Jack Wallen goes through other similarly friendly Linux builds here.
The more computing systems and platforms you learn about, the more you’ll appreciate the others — and realise they all have specific strengths and weaknesses.
The lesson you should learn is that Microsoft might be trying to change its business model, but CEO Satya Nadella is still stuck with an old ecosystem that has to be closed down slowly. The more computing systems and platforms you learn about, the more you’ll appreciate the others — and realise they all have specific strengths and weaknesses. Most of these differences are much smaller than they used to be. In reality, most of our digital life (work and home) is run by services that can be used on more or less any platform. You can run a web browser on a fridge these days. I do value the fact that when I bought my Legion PC, it came with Windows installed. I’m free to install something else, but at least I start off with more than just a brick.
You can also pay for limited updates to keep your Windows 10 secure and updated with Extended Security Updates, but this is the weakest solution. It is designed for education establishments (for whom they are cheap) and for low-tech businesses that are trapped in the Windows well and who don’t think they have the time or money to climb out. I can’t imagine there will be enough eyes on these updates, and I wouldn’t be surprised if these were targeted by bad actors.
Finally, you can ignore the warnings. If your old Windows box is sitting at home, used by only you, not connected to any other devices and not on a shared network—and you turn it off when you don’t use it—the chances are it doesn’t present any particular security risk. I would only suggest that you keep some Windows installation media handy, so if it does get hit by a virus, you can just rebuild it. But that’s a lot of “ifs.”
Conclusion
So Windows users with old machines running Windows 10 do have the options of hack, buy, change, pay up, or ignore. While that should tell you that Windows solutions are, by definition, limited, so are quite a few other consumer items. A Windows PC remains relatively cheap and still more or less maintains itself. They are bad in most other ways, but that may not matter to you. Yes, your Windows PC may connect back to Microsoft HQ and yes, AI will be pushed relentlessly. However, I may love my MacBook, but I didn’t love paying for it — let alone attempting to upgrade or fix my previous one.
Try to see “computing” as more than just computers. Pay less attention to the end user device. When I bought a ZX81 as a kid, it was the only thing describable as a computer anywhere in my home. Now we live in a world of services, containers, scripts, functions, clouds and bot farms. So a computer’s lifetime won’t be so limited.
