No Windows 7 Drivers for AMD Ryzen

[crazyeyesreaper]

I can see at least 2: extra cost and simply being happy with the older Windows.

Pretty much anything you buy today can technically work with Windows 7 - both hardware and software.
W7 itself is a pretty good OS - stable, fast, fairly easy on resources. W10 is better, but it's not an upgrade worth few hundred EUR or USD...

This is an issue with Microsoft. They were a software company for most of the time and got seriously interested in hardware just few years ago. As a result we have to pay for their OS - something that should be a cheap addition to their other products.
And because we have to pay a lot for the OS, Microsoft has to convince us there is something to pay for, so they change the interface all the time... and that's why people prefer not to upgrade.
This whole strategy is deeply wrong. Apple solved this way better and that's why they're stealing customers.

On average you're right. Most people buy complete systems (usually laptops) that come with an OS. They can't do much with their PCs, so learning the new OS doesn't take them long.
But if you're building a PC yourself and you're a "poweruser", paying for a totally different OS and changing your whole workflow is just a huge inconvenience.

Imagine keyboard manufacturers rearranging the keys every few years.

Those still paying $100s + for an OS are just stupid. Multiple resources available in which to get cheap Win 10 keys. I don't think ive paid over $40 for an OS in the last 3-4 years.

 

[Static~Charge]

I wonder if Microsoft applied a little pressure here...

Why would they? Microsoft doesn't want people to use Windows 7 any more, either.

 

[Shihab]

Why would they? Microsoft doesn't want people to use Windows 7 any more, either.

Answer-your-own-question day?

 

[newtekie1]

I just watched a video of someone trying to install Win8.1 on a Kaby Lake chip, and it was an unstable mess. Yes, he got it working, but it would blue-screen and lock up.

The fact is, it takes time and resources to support these older OSes. And it seems both AMD and Intel have decided that the return on investment isn't there. Only a small fraction of users would even consider using anything older than Win10 with a brand new computer.(Note: I consider a new motherboard and processor essentially a new computer.)

The few business that are still running old programs that they can't get working on Win10, sorry, time to figure it out. You either update the program, or figure out how to use virtual machines.

I can see at least 2: extra cost and simply being happy with the older Windows.

Pretty much anything you buy today can technically work with Windows 7 - both hardware and software.
W7 itself is a pretty good OS - stable, fast, fairly easy on resources. W10 is better, but it's not an upgrade worth few hundred EUR or USD...

This is an issue with Microsoft. They were a software company for most of the time and got seriously interested in hardware just few years ago. As a result we have to pay for their OS - something that should be a cheap addition to their other products.
And because we have to pay a lot for the OS, Microsoft has to convince us there is something to pay for, so they change the interface all the time... and that's why people prefer not to upgrade.
This whole strategy is deeply wrong. Apple solved this way better and that's why they're stealing customers.

On average you're right. Most people buy complete systems (usually laptops) that come with an OS. They can't do much with their PCs, so learning the new OS doesn't take them long.
But if you're building a PC yourself and you're a "poweruser", paying for a totally different OS and changing your whole workflow is just a huge inconvenience.

Imagine keyboard manufacturers rearranging the keys every few years.

You have to remember, people who actually build their own computers are still a very small market. Like, so small the numbers don't even pop up on the radar compared to pre-built systems. And the cost of the OS on a pre-built system is tiny. It definitely isn't the $100 that it costs to buy the OEM OS by itself. Dell and Lenovo have both, at times, offers computers with No OS or Linux installed. The cost reduction was no where near the full retail cost of an OEM OS. I don't even think it was half the cost of an OEM OS. These big manufacturers are paying Microsof next to nothing for OS licenses(and in some case are paying nothing).

Then, if you look at those that do build their own systems. They buy an OEM license. Well, when you upgrade your motherboard, you can't legally re-use the license anyway. So you're buying a new OS as it is. Or at least you legally should be. But we know people that build their own computers kind of wiggle around the rules. So, they also know that you can still enter a Windows 7 key into the Windows 10 installer, and get your free upgrade to Windows 10. So there is no cost involved to move to Windows 10.

 

[kruk]

I just watched a video of someone trying to install Win8.1 on a Skylake chip, and it was an unstable mess. Yes, he got it working, but it would blue-screen and lock up.

Skylake should be fully supported on Win 8.1, therefore we can't really prove anything with it. Bluescreens and lockups could be due to hardware incompatibilites or overclocks (or maybe just bad IGP drivers). The only relevant test we can currently use to show older Windows might not work good with Ryzen, would be using Kaby Lake without IGP on Windows older than 10.

 

[newtekie1]

Skylake should be fully supported on Win 8.1, therefore we can't really prove anything with it. Bluescreens and lockups could be due to hardware incompatibilites or overclocks (or maybe just bad IGP drivers). The only relevant test we can currently use to show older Windows might not work good with Ryzen, would be using Kaby Lake without IGP on Windows older than 10.

Sorry, I meant Kaby Lake.

 

[kruk]

Sorry, I meant Kaby Lake.

Ah, you probably watched the test ran by JayzTwoCents? From a scientific point of view, that test was made really poorly. He has introduced a unknown variable (overclock) which could be the cause of all the problems he encountered.

 

[sumludus]

I don't believe this move can be equated to Intel's lack of support with Kaby Lake chips. Ryzen requires a new motherboard, which could also entail new RAM. It's a significant upgrade. But for people who invested in an i3 Skylake and are looking for a drop-in replacement with an i7 Kaby, the lack of windows 7 support doesn't make sense when the Windows license is tied to the motherboard and not the processor.

I would have been fine with Intel saying LGA 1151 would only support Windows 10 back in August 2015. It would have been a tight window between Windows 10 being launched and their own hardware coming to market, but at that point consumers were investing in a new platform rather than just a processor upgrade. And while I'm not against the 200 series chipset requiring Windows 10 either, the idea that someone with a 100 series chipset could preform a bios update, upgrade their processor, and all of a sudden their operating system is no longer supported doesn't seem right. There should be some grandfathering rules taking place when the rules are changed mid-cycle like this.

AMD is on the verge of releasing an entirely new platform, and it makes sense to use it in order to push the market forward, even if it is an anti-consumer practice. They decide where their resources are spent. Intel on the other hand probably needed to use resources in order to gimp their platform half way through its cycle in order to comply with Microsoft's request.

 

[eidairaman1]

I don't believe this move can be equated to Intel's lack of support with Kaby Lake chips. Ryzen requires a new motherboard, which could also entail new RAM. It's a significant upgrade. But for people who invested in an i3 Skylake and are looking for a drop-in replacement with an i7 Kaby, the lack of windows 7 support doesn't make sense when the Windows license is tied to the motherboard and not the processor.

I would have been fine with Intel saying LGA 1151 would only support Windows 10 back in August 2015. It would have been a tight window between Windows 10 being launched and their own hardware coming to market, but at that point consumers were investing in a new platform rather than just a processor upgrade. And while I'm not against the 200 series chipset requiring Windows 10 either, the idea that someone with a 100 series chipset could preform a bios update, upgrade their processor, and all of a sudden their operating system is no longer supported doesn't seem right. There should be some grandfathering rules taking place when the rules are changed mid-cycle like this.

AMD is on the verge of releasing an entirely new platform, and it makes sense to use it in order to push the market forward, even if it is an anti-consumer practice. They decide where their resources are spent. Intel on the other hand probably needed to use resources in order to gimp their platform half way through its cycle in order to comply with Microsoft's request.

I feel AMD wants a clean slate to code on because during Bulldozer they released a few patches on 7 which seemed to not do a whole lot on the core parking, access.

Eitherway I might jump to 10 and theme it for 7s looks.

 

[TheOne]

Disappointing, but not surprising.

This does make me wonder, how long did Intel and AMD continue support of Windows XP after the launch of Windows Vista, and after the launch of Windows 7 how long did they continue support of Vista.

 

[eidairaman1]

Disappointing, but not surprising.

This does make me wonder, how long did Intel and AMD continue support of Windows XP after the launch of Windows Vista, and after the launch of Windows 7 how long did they continue support of Vista.

You can google those questions to get your answer.

 

[semantics]

I do find it interesting people will blame Microsoft for not updating windows 7 with windows 10 features, but be quick to call windows 10 a useless OS iteration.

 

[rruff]

I wonder if Microsoft applied a little pressure here...

I bet they didn't need to. AMD is currently a wee company and drivers take a lot of manpower to get right. Maybe down the road they will reconsider if the Ryzen sales warrant it.

 

[Joss]

Linux works on both old and new hardware, and that's what I use as my main OS.
Windows is gaming only so, even if I disagree with the obvious "push W10" Microsoft tactics, I say screw you, you're only a partition on a disk to which I boot two or three times a week.

 

[TheOne]

You can google those questions to get your answer.

I probably will later, it would be interesting to see if this move is common or uncommon.

 

[bug]

After the hype, reality starts catching up. I hope this isn't a trend.

 

[Joss]

After the hype, reality starts catching up. I hope this isn't a trend.

If this, and the price leaks, and all the leaks, end up in a disappointment even close to FX times, someone will have a last laugh and it won't be me.

 

[notb]

I don't believe we can really blame Intel or AMD on this because its just time to move on. Windows 7 is old and even though we have all enjoyed it we need to move on to the newer OS's with new equipment. Its much more expensive and difficult to keep an ageing OS in the loop on new hardware and debug problems. Many business still use Windows 7, but even then its getting to the point they to need to move on since we have had now 2 OS revisions since then.

Enterprise-wise the hardware compatibility argument is pretty weak. Typically you want a computer to work with an LCD, a keyboard, a mouse and a network. Inside you also need nothing beside the core elements (mobo, cpu, ram and storage).

So sure - maybe W10 offers huge improvements when working with high-end SSD, multiple GPUs and so on, but this has no implication on most professionals.

For most companies there is only 1 serious reason for updating their W7 to W10: you can't buy many new PCs with an old Windows and you don't want to have different OS versions. So you stop the typical PC replacement process, wait for a good moment and make a massive upgrade company-wide. It's much cheaper to replace many PCs at once than to upgrade older computers.

I find the arguments "is old" and "it's time to move on" as very weak. If something works well, it shouldn't be changed. Furthermore, even if there are better alternatives, but the cost of change is too big, the change should also not be forced.

W7 is an excellent OS for office use - very clean and easy to use. And people got used to it.
It could serve in companies for another decade. I'm almost sure we'll be able to install it on PCs from 2025 - just like XP works perfectly well on what we have today.

W10 is better in many ways... most of which are totally irrelevant when you simply want to open Excel, analyze some data or write some code.
Multiple desktops are a fantastic productivity tool known to Linux users for years, but I don't see accountants or salespeople use it. Honestly, last week I've shown a 50-year-old manager how to use alt+tab - someone who has used Windows for last 20+ years. He is an expert in his field and W10 will not improve his work in any way. I'm pretty sure, however, that for the first few weeks after the update he'll loose countless hours trying to do basic things, because the buttons moved or disappeared.

 

[newtekie1]

I find the arguments "is old" and "it's time to move on" as very weak. If something works well, it shouldn't be changed. Furthermore, even if there are better alternatives, but the cost of change is too big, the change should also not be forced.

W7 is an excellent OS for office use - very clean and easy to use. And people got used to it.
It could serve in companies for another decade. I'm almost sure we'll be able to install it on PCs from 2025 - just like XP works perfectly well on what we have today.

W10 is better in many ways... most of which are totally irrelevant when you simply want to open Excel, analyze some data or write some code.
Multiple desktops are a fantastic productivity tool known to Linux users for years, but I don't see accountants or salespeople use it. Honestly, last week I've shown a 50-year-old manager how to use alt+tab - someone who has used Windows for last 20+ years. He is an expert in his field and W10 will not improve his work in any way. I'm pretty sure, however, that for the first few weeks after the update he'll loose countless hours trying to do basic things, because the buttons moved or disappeared.

I don't agree with this at all. Setting up and supporting office computers for a living, I can tell you Win7 is not good for the business environment. Keeping it secure is becoming an issue, even for Microsoft which has acknowledged several security flaws that it says it simply won't fix. XP was the same way by the time it was EOLed. Every security patch that is released seems to just open up another security vulnerability.

If anything, the business environment is the worst place to keep using an old OS and the home environment is the "acceptable" place.

Also, to address the cost issue. We are talking about buying new hardware here. Which also means buying a new OS. There is no extra cost involved with going with Windows 10 over 7 at this point.

You can make the argument "what about if they are just upgrading the processor from Skylake to Kaby Lake". Ok, and I would ask you what business do you know is upgrading just the processor in a computer? Most buy the computer and leave it, never upgrading the processor. The computers might be lucky to see a RAM upgrade and maybe a storage upgrade. But in all my years of supporting business computers, I've never been asked to upgrade the processor on a computer.

Finally, the argument that Win 10 causes lost productivity because everything is moved. That is fixed in 30 seconds by installing ClassicShell, or Start8, or ClassicStart. At that point, the person who doesn't even know how to use Alt+Tab will have everything they need, right were it was in Windows 7. If my 62 year old grandma, who is not computer literate at all beyond Word/Excel and the Internet, can use Windows 10, with no help from me, the person that doesn't know how to use Alt+Tab can too.

 

[R-T-B]

That is a very narrow-minded viewpoint my friend. I'm just telling it how it is with enterprise environments. Plus, from a business standpoint, AMD just alienated an entire sector of their customer base. If support hasn't officially ended, it isn't "dead".

How many existing machines do you have on AM4, out of curiousity?

New machine? New OS. LTSB is even supported for 10 years.

 

[Ahhzz]

I don't agree with this at all. Setting up and supporting office computers for a living, I can tell you Win7 is not good for the business environment. Keeping it secure is becoming an issue, even for Microsoft which has acknowledged several security flaws that it says it simply won't fix. XP was the same way by the time it was EOLed. Every security patch that is released seems to just open up another security vulnerability.

If anything, the business environment is the worst place to keep using an old OS and the home environment is the "acceptable" place.

Also, to address the cost issue. We are talking about buying new hardware here. Which also means buying a new OS. There is no extra cost involved with going with Windows 10 over 7 at this point.

You can make the argument "what about if they are just upgrading the processor from Skylake to Kaby Lake". Ok, and I would ask you what business do you know is upgrading just the processor in a computer? Most buy the computer and leave it, never upgrading the processor. The computers might be lucky to see a RAM upgrade and maybe a storage upgrade. But in all my years of supporting business computers, I've never been asked to upgrade the processor on a computer.

Finally, the argument that Win 10 causes lost productivity because everything is moved. That is fixed in 30 seconds by installing ClassicShell, or Start8, or ClassicStart. At that point, the person who doesn't even know how to use Alt+Tab will have everything they need, right were it was in Windows 7. If my 62 year old grandma, who is not computer literate at all beyond Word/Excel and the Internet, can use Windows 10, with no help from me, the person that doesn't know how to use Alt+Tab can too.

The problem with your EOL argument, is that the only reason Win7 is that insecure, is that M$ doesn't make any more money supporting an older OS, so they chose not to. Arguing that keeping it secure was becoming an issue, is like saying that you had to stop using that water because it was getting you wet. Guess what. You still need the water, and the next selection of water will get you wet eventually too. There is absolutely NO way you could possibly convince me that the small amount that Win10 is more secure, couldn't be built into a Windows 7 as well. And, I guarantee that one of the prime reasons they will move people to a different creature, is because it was too hard to make this one secure.

Their only hope as a business was to find a way to build in obsolescence in the OSs. And so they did.

I don't know why people get all up in arms, simply because people get cranky being forced to purchase a new OS every few years. The fact is, M$ is not in the business for the purpose of making peoples' lives easier, or better. They are in it to make money, and they will do everything they can legally, and quasi-legally, to do so. And as past lawsuits have shown, even illegally. Getting all righteous because people don't like being forced to change from something that, for a great deal of people, works just fine, is really kind of a dick move.

People don't like change. People really don't like forced change. Stack on top of that, the only reason they have to change, is because Company X isn't making enough money, and people get a little pissed off.

 

[Boatvan]

How many existing machines do you have on AM4, out of curiousity?

New machine? New OS. LTSB is even supported for 10 years.

Perhaps I should clarify: I work in a public school. We don't have the luxury of getting new systems frequently. So to answer your question, if I understand it correctly, I have 0 machines that use this socket. That's not my point. My point is this is a concerning possible trend of vendors forcing businesses and schools to upgrade quicker than anticipated. As I stated before, I'm not a stubborn old schooler: we are slowly moving toward Windows 10. But if this catches on, I might be in trouble. You are correct in the way of most new systems should have w10. Just know it is hard to change what people are used to using so rapidly. This is a polarizing issue. I assume we are at an impasse of opinion.

 

[Melvis]

This makes no sense what so ever, they get best performance from W7 and W10 and W7 is 5 times more used them W10 and yet they dont want to supply drivers for Ryzen? ummm thats basically getting the biggest gun you can find and shooting yourself in the foot. W7 is far from dead, so much proof of that it isnt even funny. I believe it when I see it.

 

[OldSchool Tech]

IMHO this is a big mistake. The only reason to move to a new operating system is if it is proven to be better than the old one. Windows 7 had no problem taking the reigns from XP but the same cannot be said about windows 10. Why? The security problem in windows 7? When did we ever just rely on MS to provide that? Surfing around the internet without malwarebytes for one is suicide. The best techs know where to find the best security and thats how windows 7 can still be very secured. Full-Control computing is another reason. With windows 7 I am given all the options which cannot say with windows 10! How can that be any improvement? Monitoring you say? With windows 7 and the help of gadgets I can be aware temps, cpu and gpu temps and throttle, fan rpm on both, ram consumption, vram consumption and this is a necessity for enthusiasts. This is real-time monitoring which is displayed everytime i return to desktop. Does windows 10 have that? I'm sorry but the argument just to move on is weak and baseless and windows 7 is still the true enthusiast platform.

 

[R-T-B]

I assume we are at an impasse of opinion.

No, not entirely.

I see your point, and your complaint, and it's reasonable. Of course, AMD may beg to differ, and I'm sure they've done a cost-anaylsis that says you aren't "worth it" to support, and maybe they are even correct from an economic point of view. Doesn't make it any less irritating I imagine... heh. My sympathies (I mean this seriously).

This makes no sense what so ever, they get best performance from W7 and W10 and W7 is 5 times more used them W10 and yet they dont want to supply drivers for Ryzen? ummm thats basically getting the biggest gun you can find and shooting yourself in the foot. W7 is far from dead, so much proof of that it isnt even funny. I believe it when I see it.

In new pc builds it essentially is. I don't think you can even buy it outside of second-hand channels now.

Also, it's been known for a long time that 10 outperforms 7 overall, if only slightly.