[CursedSilicon]

I remember when the Dolphin emulator dropped Windows 7 a few years ago. The absolute consternation, whining and even threats(!) against the developers was utterly sickening

Even as someone who enjoys "retro tech" far more than anything modern anymore, I'm hardly going to berate people to bend over backwards to keep supporting my ancient systems with modern software.

If someone wants to backport newer software as a hobby (such as Cameron Kaiser with TenFourFox, and the many downstream derivatives that spawned over the years) it's a welcome delight. But it should never be an "obligation"

[davkan]

Many (all?) of the people using windows 7 as their only OS at this point are zealots. It’s not surprising that some would respond that way. It’s largely a group of people who will never willingly change their habits and any removal of support is an assault. There were many valid reasons to not upgrade to 10 but the rational people have given up and upgraded or migrated to Linux/mac over the past decade.

[HeckFeck]

They are committed. I found this kernel extensions project: https://github.com/i486/VxKex

Perhaps that'd be the OpenRCT2 fanatics' salvation.

[poglet]

Why as their only OS? I assume many people connect their old PC to their TV and install a bunch of emulators. I suppose Linux could be an alternate solution for those machines.

[close04]

A PC like this that doesn’t support Windows 10 is so outdated that even a $50 investment would get you a massive improvement.

The only reasons to keep Windows 7 are for niche SW/HW that only work on it and have no replacement, or because you want it out of principle. Neither of these are reasons to expect everyone else to bend over backwards to accommodate you.

[cogman10]

Other than needing more RAM, all the hardware that works for Win 7 will work with Windows 10 and 11. Most software should as well.

Windows 7 drivers are compatible with windows 10 and 11 so there really isn't a reason you couldn't continue using basically any hardware after an upgrade.

[close04]

I was thinking of the odd XP era PC which could run W7 but just barely. Those would be truly outdated machines with no reason to be around a livingroom.

I have netbooks which ran XP ok but W10 is a pain to run on them, or tablets with more modern Atom CPUs which ran W10 ok at the beginning but by the latest update they became close to unusable.

[Sarkie]

"Only OS" is the caveat here.

[davkan]

Yeah, I’m not sure who else would be raging about dolphin dropping support. Not talking about people who keep an extra w7 box around for legacy software which Dolphin is not.

[redsocksfan45]

These sort of windows users have been drawing lines in the sand at every version of windows thusfar, when push comes to shove they always fold and accept the new thing they resisted for years, declaring that to be their new line in the sand. They come up with all manner of innane cope like "every other version of windows is good", but take a step back and its obvious they're getting slow boiled. The ones dying in a hill for Windows 7 now were once dying on a hill for 2000 or XP, refusing to use 7, and in a few years they'll be dying on a hill for windows 10 or 11.

These aren't serious people. Serious people have either gotten off windows, or have made peace with sleeping with microsoft. Those clinging to the past can't bring themselves to do either, and therefore must not be taken seriously.

[M95D]

> These aren't serious people. Serious people have either gotten off windows, or have made peace with sleeping with microsoft.

I am one of those people. I am serious, as are most of the other people resisting updates. It's just that most of them are not technically competent enough to switch to Linux or oppose sleeping with microsoft in an effective way. I think it's very ignorant of you to not consider them serius.

I fought to keep every version of the old OS since Win98, as each version since that was worse than the one before.

I'm using Win7 now, isolated from the internet without a DNS or a valid route out. Access is via filtering proxy server from Firefox only. Fortunately Firefox uses its own proxy settings, separated from the rest of the OS. This is how I fight sleeping with microsoft.

I am prepared for the future. I know I can't win the fight. I have a Win10 ready to go, for that time when most websites stop working with FF 115. Just in case that doesn't work, I have a Linux machine with Gentoo and Firefox that I can run via VNC and then I can go back to at least WinXP. I'm using it now for Discourse forums (Discourse devs, I hope you all rot in hell!).

I never understood how devs could accept this kind of crap on their machines. You of all people should know better and fight harder. Maybe you get indoctrinated by your education buzzwords like "engagement", "metrics", "telemetry" and you can't think straight anymore?