AMD Halts Support for Windows 8.1 with Consumer Radeon drivers

7 and 8.1 are great OS.

If you want to come with such a silly argument, why not say:
"IMO they should stop support for Windows in general. Same goes for nVidia. Time to move to a stable and serious OS like Debian, not keep living with unstable unprofessional OS like Windows."

 

7 still has a decent market share though, once it slips down to single digits then maybe look into that, but for as long as i can remember Nvidia has supported at least two operating systems systems.

Nvidia has a bigger driver team though.

 

The whole argument is pointless, the systems are still usable with the actual drivers. If you somehow own a high-end/enthusiast GPU going with the latest software is recommended (in this case W10). I see nothing wrong with AMDs move and most likely W7 drivers will work just fine on W8. I used a W7 driver (last available) for an nvidia card, and it works fine in W10 as the driver implementation hasn't changed much since Vista.

Offtopic: As someone pointed out already, we are supposedly advanced users which can disable all the annoyances (telemetry/cortana/p2p updates/lack of deferring updates/onedrive) through group policy or ShutUp10. FYI all software vendors collect data/feedback transparently or not.

 

Desktop Operating System Market Share July 2017

Really?Just words from someone?
Facts are facts,not rumors or misleading explanation.
Note: Vista has 6.0 version number,Win 7 has 6.1,Win 8 has 6.2,Win 8.1 has 6.3 and Win 10(as a Service) has 10.0 version number(expected to be 6.4,but M$ is M$,for marketing reason).

Spoiler

Spoiler

Oo and btw
Microsoft to Retire Windows 10 Version 1511 in October

Now that Windows 10 Creators Update has become available for everyone, Microsoft prepares to discontinue another old version, Version 1511,as per the company’s Windows as a Service approach.

 

What does that one driver have to do with the kernel? Do you really think they ported windows to phones on Onecore with "minor" kernel changes? How about the entire linux subsystem that interfaces between the kernel and user space? Or the upcoming Windows on ARM layer? Or the massive memory address changes they've made for both security/performance? Or any the thousands of other kernel changes they've spoke about over the course of hundreds of blog posts for both Windows Insiders, or even earlier with Sinofsky and Windows 7/8?

Again, it's like saying the Model T and 2017 Chevy Camaro have the same engine because they both have one or two similar components.

 

If you are using a DDR4-based platform or DX12 hardware, then yes, Windows 7 is in fact obsolete whether you like it or not. That doesn't mean it isn't still usable - I still recommend it to some people. If you want to keep using it, go ahead, why should I care?

If anyone here is salty, it's you. People like you are the ones whining about having support dropped for an OBSOLETED OS, despite that there should be no issues installing the drivers for W10 or W7.

So despite the facts shown to you, you still choose to ignore them, keep whining, and then claim I'm the salty one. The only thing I'm salty about is your arrogance.

Statements like that are completely useless. Explain to me, with proof, how I am wrong or ignorant.

 

Yeah, all 4 of em

 

Windows 8 and 8.1 were total aboninations. 7 and 10 are way better. I'm with AMD on this one.

 

Here's a link: Global surveillance disclosures (2013-present)

There are a ton of links and documents there.

 

That's it? That's your source? Did you even read it? Nowhere does it say Windows has anything to do with this. Sure, MS is involved, but that seems to be for Bing or MSN, when you consider MS is mentioned in association with other search engine companies. I'll do you a favor and dig deeper with the PRISM article (which Microsoft participates in). You'll find that isn't any more useful.

So what exactly have you proved to me? I've been well aware my data is being collected, even without using Bing. It wouldn't surprise me that some data is still being collected even when I disable the telemetry service. That's not what I'm asking proof of. These sources say nothing about MS themselves watching us individually. They don't explain in detail the amount of privacy breached for PCs running Windows. To my knowledge, they don't tell us in depth what's being watched.

 

The more data the OS (and programs) collect, the more data that can be intervened, stolen or whatnot and then used against the people.

There's tons of info in my link, check it out.

 

Ok? How is this different under 7 which also collects diagnostic/user data? Or 8? Or having a modern Intel/AMD processor both of which that have security blackboxes that can access all your user data and connect to the internet while the power to the machine is off? Or just simply owning a hard drive.

As for 10, there is an increasing number of features that require an always on internet connection and user data to be stored on Microsoft servers. You may not find that useful, but the vast majority of customers do. You can argue that there should be easier ways to turn those features off and I'll agree - but writing off the entire OS as "bad" because you don't find particular things useful doesn't really compute with the rest of us.

 

Well seeing as you haven't directly proven what data specifically is collected by the OS, how is this relevant? How often has this data collection backfired for innocent people? Caring about the potential risks is pointless. If security is really that important to you, stop using Windows, because it has had backdoor trackers for a long while.

I am not reading a page that long where almost the entirety (if not 100%) of the text has nothing to do with what incriminating data Windows collects, how it is collected, and what they do with it. Either you need to narrow down sections with specifics or that article is nothing more than a diversion.

 

What people and what data? Ordinary PC users, gamers who number in the millions and would probably waste the time of anyone spying on them? Or specific intelligence operatives of foreign countries who may pose some sort of threat? Seriously dude, I think you've seen too many Snowden movies.

Whatever window telemetry may gather, browsing patterns, sites visited, pc usage or whatever, who the f cares. Seriously doubt that it is allowed or designed to go beyond the privacy rights of individuals due to huge legal repercussions this would involve. Trust me, any lawyers would salivate for cases like this if it were to go beyond the most superficial of data gathering.

 

I don't think the argument was ever that online activity is or isn't tracked, we all know that it is and you can't stop it unless you go offline.
Arguing online about it is just hilarious.

I think the point was that some people don't like to think of themselves as a nobody, but the reality is no one cares about your online activity.

 

AFAIK the best AMD has right now is FuryX, performance wise.

 

guess this gona turn into another window10 is spy on me topic? people need to stop, what MS doing is no different then what is being collected from people smartphones that is even more invasive and they dont tell what they really collection but any data/texting/phone call going in or out of them is be monitored by quite few agency and only time one is gona get flaged from this monitoring is if they doing something bad like planing bombing or other terrorist things, which why it all monitor it first place, atlest MS is tell you what they info they taking.

or better yet all you complainers should pull the internet cord out and get rid of your smart phones. I mean seriously this has been beaten to death to point there is no corpse left. it price to be payed for everything connected to internet/wifi and satellites.

which is my point it is tracked, reguarless and always will be so long as everything is connected to internet/wifi/satalites, only way to stop is like you said unplug. which if they really cared about it they would unpluged already so obviously they fine about all this happen cause they have not unplugged, they just wont admit it.


As to the topic

Honestly I think AMD is on right path everyone should be one Win 10 quality of drivers can only increase when only 1 MS OS is supported instead of supporting 3 different ones, Nvidia should do same thing. But I only believe this IF MS keep to there promise of Win10 being last release of Windows and everything becomes new build based off it like OSX been doing for years. this way everyone at somepoint is windows 10 just possible older build, which should not effect drivers anywhere as much have to support 3 completely different. OS

 

If all this data collection is of such importance, your dwelling needs to be far enough underground that even the heat signature from you and anything else is not reflected in any kind of thermal variance outside the norm for the entire surrounding area. Then a faraday cage needs to be constructed to keep electrical signals in and out. Avoid any people carrying cell phones as your voice will be picked up by them...the paranoia goes on ad infinitum. Data on people was collected far more surreptitiously before the internet was even a thought.

The only concern one should have is how much information one does not have access to because of algorithms designed to show us what it calculated we "actually" want to see and filters out all the rest. That is the concern people should have; not this mamby pamby spying crud.

 

I know that W8.1 and below also can be hacked, as well as Linux, which has had spyware available to the NSA for years and probably still have their own tools.

I'm just saying that somewhere you have to draw the line. People stopped caring about their own privacy for quite some time and being spied on has been so normalized that people just take it for granted nowadays and accuse others of tin-foil-hatters while saying "I have nothing to hide!" So typical
Some 1st world countries are sending people to trial just because of what they write in their Twitter accounts. This is a fact. So the "I have nothing to hide"... it's true... until you do have something to hide because your government turns out to be ruled by psychopaths (Obama and the Clintons investing money on ISIS to gain profit from Siria's gas; Trump and Putin doing their own equivalent elsewhere; governments like the UK, Turkey and Spain doing worse and worse fked up sh+t every day...)

Tin-foil-hatters, yes... but at the same time there are news everywhere of international spying and even governments actually spying on their own people, it's just disgusting and people don't seem to care. Society is slowly becoming a mixture of a "Brave New World" and "1984", and nobody cares.

Meanwhile, with W10 telemetry is used to study you so as to sell your information to advertising agencies, putting commercials on the OS and making it complicated for normal users to take them off. People don't really care that they're are being used as merchandise for advertising companies, even on an OS that they have payed for.

I haven't payed for Guru3D, so... I agree on an acceptable level of commercials. But the OS? No sir. I've payed for it. Don't use me as merchandise.

It's sad, really.

I'll probably end up installing WS2016 and re-adding the GUI and whatever stuff that's needed to make it a normal experience but without forced updates, without spyware (or at least I'm guessing less of it), etc.

Oh well... I've extended this far enough.
I'm just disappointed in general, especially by how most people's privacy is now worth nothing to them.

You may continue putting a tin foil hat on my head, living happy with your choices in life and thinking that everything is always going to be alright.

I'm not going to convince you about why we should fight to regain the privacy that people have given up "for free", and you are not going to convince me that giving up my rights for comfort's sake is acceptable, so, from my part, I'm not going to dig into more of this, especially taking into consideration that this is a huge off-topic and I'm pretty sure that mods won't be very happy about this.

I'll go back to discussing technical stuff if you don't mind. Too tired for these topics (and I just started my 3.5 week vacations, so I'd prefer to enjoy that best)