Microsoft extends Windows 7 downgrade service to 2020

by Stevie Smith - Jul 13 2010, 04:25

Given the generally positive reviews garnered by Windows 7, we’re not exactly sure why you’d want to downgrade to Windows XP. However, should the desire to do so prove overwhelming, you’ll be pleased to hear that Microsoft is now willing to allow such downgrades until the early part of 2020.

Announced a day before Redmond-based Microsoft officially pulls the support rug from beneath Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2), the ability to downgrade Windows 7 enables (disgruntled/mad) users to shift to the aging XP platform without incurring any extra costs.

This is the second XP ‘downgrade extension’ granted by Microsoft, which had initially planned to abandon the option six months after Windows 7 launched in October 2009. The first such extension pushed downgrades into the spring of 2011.

It’s worth noting that only Windows XP Professional has been extended to January of 2020. According to Microsoft, Windows XP Ultimate will be officially dropped in January of 2015.

It’s highly unlikely that regular PC owners will be taking advantage of Microsoft’s downgrade extension, which leaves enterprise users as the main target demographic – a notion supported by Microsoft’s recent acknowledgement that around 74 percent of businesses still favour XP.

This is probably because enterprise computer networks function better on a single operating system and many such Windows customers chose to cling to XP rather than switch up to the roundly unpopular Windows Vista platform back in 2007.

Around the Web