Free Windows 10

[Horus]

You may remember that some time back I told you that Microsoft would distance itself from the troubled Windows 8 operating system and announce a new version of Windows 10 thus avoiding any association with Windows 8 & the 8.1 upgrades. Well it looks as if they are giving it away for free to anyone who already has Win 7 & Win 8 system on their devices, take a look at your taskbar to see if there is a small Windows icon been installed on there, if so click on it for more information about reserving your free install from Microsoft. If there is nothing on the task bar it may be because you have the Microsoft Upgrades switched off in your PC settings. So it looks as if to save a bit of face and to get some faith back into the market they have decided to give it away providing your system is suitable for the upgrade, it will be available sometime around the end of July this year.

[Grandad]

Thanks for the tip H. The icon was there but as it was just white I had ignored it. I DO hope that 10 will take us back to something similar to XP although now Microsoft has got into the App habit I expect they are here to stay......roll on July 29 to see what the differences are.
Thanks again.....

[Horus]

Your welcome Grandad, Have you reserved your download?
I suspect that they will have learned their lesson with all the fancy stuff and it will be more user friendly, but it will still have lots of Microsoft tie -ins unfortunately thats the way these O/S are going. The only saving grace maybe that as everyone is going to be at a similar starting point O/S wise, then the manufacturers of peripherals such as printers, cameras etc will get their upgraded drivers out a bit quicker,although we are all likely to lose some stuff we have on now.

[LovelyLadyLux]

Hmmm - just looked now but I'm not seeing anything .....

[Horus]

Are your automatic updates 'turned on'?

[Grandad]

Yes I have booked the upgrade H and gave my email just to make sure they have me listed and tell me when the upgrade is ready to install.
Just to be on the safe side we should ensure that all our docs and pictures are backed up before installing. Better to be safe than sorry.

[Horus]

Always a good idea Grandad

[Kiya]

Thanks Horus , just reserved & like Grandad given my email also

Now my memories terrible.....what's is best/ easiest way to back up my documents & all pictures...................or could I just copy all onto my external hard drive ?

[Horus]

Copy them all onto your external hard drive Kiya, but everything should be saved for you when the new version is installed. However if it is on a seperate drive (which wont have the new O/S on it) then if it all goes wrong then that seperate external drive could always be accessed using another PC

[Kiya]

I aint got a separate PC.............all sounds complicated

[Horus]

No, what I meant was, should the upgrade fail for some reason and you were to lose your data on your PC's 'C' drive (the one that the operating system gets put onto) then you would still have all your data which would be accesible by any other PC that the external drive was plugged into. Alternatively once your own PC was sorted out again (assuming that something did go wrong with the update, which is very unlikely) then you would just access your external drive in the same way as you did before and all your old data would still be there on it. The reason is that when another Operating System (O/S) or an update is put onto your PC, it is put onto the main hard drive (your computers 'C' drive) and all other drives including external drives should remain unaffected by the upgrade.

[Kiya]

Ah got you now Thanks

[LovelyLadyLux]

I'm still looking but not seeing any icons yet. I'd definitely like to reserve and get the upgrade too.

[Horus]

LLL, I have tried to check out what may be happening in Canada but not having much luck finding out, however I cannot see that you will be any different to us in the UK. Maybe the update is being 'rolled out' in certain geographical area at any one time, but what you must do is to check that your PC is set to receive Automatic Updates otherwise you will not get the notification ( which shows up as a Windows Icon on your main screen Task Bar). It will be available for free for 1 year so there should be plenty of time, if I find any direct links to the site I will post them for you.

This is an extract from the Question & Answers section which asks:
" Can I still get Windows 10 if I have not had a notification"

Answer:
Not every device will see the notifications at the same time so there might just be a delay as we roll it out to all capable devices. Here are some other potential reasons that you would not see the upgrade notification if:

Your device isn't running Windows 7 SP1 or Windows 8.1 Update.
Need to check what version of Windows you are running? See here for instructions.
You are running an Enterprise version of Windows.
Windows automatic updates are not enabled on your device.
Your device may not meet the minimum system requirements.
Your device is not connected to the Internet.
Your device is eligible however, we are still working on updates that may improve your device’s experience, like getting a new driver.
If your device is eligible, you can still reserve your upgrade to Windows 10 even if you don’t see the notifications. Just open the Get Windows 10 App to get started.

[LovelyLadyLux]

Thanks Horus - appreciate it. I looked again and am not seeing anything so maybe it is a rollout thing. Definitely want to get it though

[Jayway]

Thankyou Horus. If my XP stops working I will take the comp to the man as I am incapable of doing it myself. Oh and the XP is still working fine -

[Grandad]

Oh and the XP is still working fine -

And I have no doubt mine would be too but I wouldn't take a chance Jay when it started giving me rude messages

Since I have had the new desktop (about 4 weeks) I had not yet linked up the backup drive. However, Horus's tip prompted me to do something about that and as I write, it is backing up from the new PC to a new partition, thus saving everything as it was when I last used the old PC.

Due to lack of HD memory on the old PC I used a Seagate HD as my working HD. I put all the working files and picture on to the new PC HD. I have plugged the Seagate in via usb but have not yet decided if I will need, or even want it in future. Belt and braces I suppose.

[Jayway]

Good Lawd Amighty ! (gone american in shock ) .. Grandad, how complicated you and the others lives are . . . I switch it on, I switch it off, if it disagrees with me, gets stuck or wont turn off, its plug out- huh. And as I have been pulling the plug for years, sometimes when I am in a hurry to go out, and nothing dire has happened to the comp ---- ummmmmmm - all those warnings, what a load of rubbish.

[Grandad]

Wait until you get a blue screen Jay, I don't think 'pulling the plug' will help.

But with us boys it is a challenge when we get those nasty messages.

As an aside, the new computer came with a minimum of useful software so, in order that I could open Word and Excel documents I downloaded a 30 day trial of Office 2013. I didn't like the latest Word and Excel but, happily, a search through some old discs revealed a 2003 copy of MS Office. That is all up and running and something I am familiar with AND I saved 70 quid.

[Horus]

Grandad, look for and download 'Open Office' it works and looks just like MS Word, but is free