wccftech Valve’s Steam Officially Ends Support For Windows 7 and Windows 8

[Sir Beregond]

6 minutes ago, pioneerisloud said:

Dude, you just dissed our entire hwbot team...........  

 

We've got team members buying 4870x2's right now.......

Yeah and I bought a 6850 and two GTX 560's last year and a GTX 275 lol. 

 

I get that modern top end stuff is called "enthusiast tier", but an enthusiast just means someone into a particular subject or activity, one of which can be running period accurate hardware/OS to run period appropriate games.

[LabRat]

1 hour ago, bonami2 said:

Guy old game can run fine with swap file on ssd.

 

Ran bf4 4k maxed with 4gb ram on my fx 8300 and 6800xt no issue.

This is a workaround I intend on testing out.
Since, i've booted 7x64 off a P1600X on my K8N-DL, I'm wondering if I could pop in a M10 16GB Optane for Page File alone, and use 10x86?

A Quad-Core (dual dual-core) K8 with 8+GB RAM, shouldn't have to be constrained by an x86 OS...
But, if that's a serviceable workaround, I'll try and go the ultra-low latency route on 2x2x1GB DDR, instead.

Semi-related:

Amusingly, my "Legendary" run, was made on that K8N-DL, Win7x64, and the Steam Dist. ver. of 3dMark.

AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100 video card benchmark result - AMD Opteron Processor 880,ASUSTek Computer INC. K8N-DL

WWW.3DMARK.COM

---

AMD Opteron Processor 880, AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100 x 1, 12288 MB, 64-bit Windows 7}

 

Edited January 4 by LabRat

[pio]

4 minutes ago, LabRat said:

This is a workaround I intend on testing out.
Since, i've booted 7x64 off a P1600X on my K8N-DL, I'm wondering if I could pop in a M10 16GB Optane for Page File alone, and use 10x86?

A Quad-Core (dual dual-core) K8 with 8+GB RAM, shouldn't have to be constrained by an x86 OS...
But, if that's a serviceable workaround, I'll try and go the ultra-low latency route on 2x2x1GB DDR, instead.

Semi-related:

Amusingly, my "Legendary" run, was made on that K8N-DL, Win7x64, and the Steam Dist. ver. of 3dMark.

AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100 video card benchmark result - AMD Opteron Processor 880,ASUSTek Computer INC. K8N-DL

WWW.3DMARK.COM

---

AMD Opteron Processor 880, AMD Radeon Pro WX 9100 x 1, 12288 MB, 64-bit Windows 7}

 

Wasn't that run one of the top hwbot runs for that hardware, giving you massive hwbot points IIRC?

Yup......can't run that anymore.  -_-

[LabRat]

Just now, pioneerisloud said:

Wasn't that run one of the top hwbot runs for that hardware, giving you massive hwbot points IIRC?

Yup......can't run that anymore.  -_-

IIRC, no.
I can remember I made that run after "accepting the challenge" that the MI25/WX9100 "doesn't work on legacy BIOS windows 7-back PCs".

 

All it took was a SLIGHTLY older driver release; I'd not tried RdN.ID drivers, though.

UL prefers the Steam-distributed version but, IIRC there is a standalone client. Who knows, tho? That too could suddenly change, and mess up all of HWBOT's 

research and preservation efforts. 

[schuck6566]

For the record, the late model P4's supported 64 bit AND NXbit which is what was needed for the 64bit installation of windows on INTEL cpu's. I have the 32 bit running on an older P4 (not sure what model) because I didn't see the sense in going 64 bit when the comp would only recognize 3Gb ram max. I'll double ck when I get a chance & see what's on it.

[pio]

4 minutes ago, schuck6566 said:

For the record, the late model P4's supported 64 bit AND NXbit which is what was needed for the 64bit installation of windows on INTEL cpu's. I have the 32 bit running on an older P4 (not sure what model) because I didn't see the sense in going 64 bit when the comp would only recognize 3Gb ram max. I'll double ck when I get a chance & see what's on it.

After researching it a tad more, yes 775 CPU's seem to support the missing instruction that K8's are missing.  Makes sense, since K8 came before 775 did, K8 was released as the "first" 64bit CPU ever.  Intel answered with the P4 for 775 (and Pentium D to TRY to compete with the Athlon64 x2's).  And then later smoked the K8's with the Core 2 Duo.  So yes, makes sense that Intel started that instruction set earlier than AMD did.

Socket 423 and 478 P4's however will not run it.  Granted those weren't 64bit CPU's anyway.

That was a one off issue, yes.  But the point still stands, you can't game on Windows 10 with vintage hardware.  Windows 10 requires a quad core just to get the CPU usage below 100% at idle. -_-  I can knock my Ryzen 5800x down to dual core without HT, just 2 threads, and it sits at 100% CPU usage 24/7.  Enable my 5800x into a quad thread CPU, and CPU usage is magically at 0% idle.

[LabRat]

15 minutes ago, schuck6566 said:

For the record, the late model P4's supported 64 bit AND NXbit which is what was needed for the 64bit installation of windows on INTEL cpu's. I have the 32 bit running on an older P4 (not sure what model) because I didn't see the sense in going 64 bit when the comp would only recognize 3Gb ram max. I'll double ck when I get a chance & see what's on it.

Correct:

 

While it'll run like molasses in January 

Yes.

The earliest EM64T+NX Intel CPUs, will run x64 Win 8.1-Onwards. 

 

They support CMPXCHG16B / CompareExchange128.
 
(Note: Similar 'instruction support lag' occurred with K7 v. P3-P4, too. Makes some sense, when you realize Intel is usually a major contributor towards standardizing new instructions, etc.)

 

 

  

8 minutes ago, pioneerisloud said:

Socket 423 and 478 P4's however will not run it.  Granted those weren't 64bit CPU's anyway.

There were Socket 478 CPUs 'backported' from Prescott 775s. EM64T on 478, isn't terribly uncommon. I'm not 100% sure on NXbit feature support, though.

XD-Bit on Socket 478 - A Possibility? \ VOGONS

WWW.VOGONS.ORG

I *had* 0 interest in a 478 build.
But, now I feel I need to find an EM64T Prescott s478 and try 8.1x64, 10x64, and 11x64 on it. 

 

Edited January 4 by LabRat
post merge

[LabRat]

19 minutes ago, pioneerisloud said:

Socket 423 and 478 P4's however will not run it.  Granted those weren't 64bit CPU's anyway.

There were Socket 478 CPUs 'backported' from Prescott 775s. EM64T on 478, isn't terribly uncommon. I'm not 100% sure on NXbit feature support, though.

XD-Bit on Socket 478 - A Possibility? \ VOGONS

WWW.VOGONS.ORG

I *had* 0 interest in a 478 build.
But, now I feel I need to find an EM64T Prescott s478 and try 8.1x64, 10x64, and 11x64 on it. 

 

  

19 minutes ago, pioneerisloud said:

That was a one off issue, yes.  But the point still stands, you can't game on Windows 10 with vintage hardware.  Windows 10 requires a quad core just to get the CPU usage below 100% at idle. -_-  I can knock my Ryzen 5800x down to dual core without HT, just 2 threads, and it sits at 100% CPU usage 24/7.  Enable my 5800x into a quad thread CPU, and CPU usage is magically at 0% idle.

A slight exaggeration, but not untrue. I've had some luck w/ Embedded/IoT/PoS Windows version for reducing "overhead"

Regardless, in context of the topic
P4/PD is inferior in performance to A64X2/Opteron. (Barring XOC. Which, is very cool for retro builds; ballsy)

Edited January 4 by LabRat

[pio]

Just now, LabRat said:

I *had* 0 interest in a 478 build.
But, now I feel I need to find an EM64T Prescott s478 and try 8.1x64, 10x64, and 11x64 on it. 

Do it!!!!!!!!  You knew that was coming though.  

[UltraMega]

4 hours ago, pioneerisloud said:

After researching it a tad more, yes 775 CPU's seem to support the missing instruction that K8's are missing.  Makes sense, since K8 came before 775 did, K8 was released as the "first" 64bit CPU ever.  Intel answered with the P4 for 775 (and Pentium D to TRY to compete with the Athlon64 x2's).  And then later smoked the K8's with the Core 2 Duo.  So yes, makes sense that Intel started that instruction set earlier than AMD did.

Socket 423 and 478 P4's however will not run it.  Granted those weren't 64bit CPU's anyway.

That was a one off issue, yes.  But the point still stands, you can't game on Windows 10 with vintage hardware.  Windows 10 requires a quad core just to get the CPU usage below 100% at idle. -_-  I can knock my Ryzen 5800x down to dual core without HT, just 2 threads, and it sits at 100% CPU usage 24/7.  Enable my 5800x into a quad thread CPU, and CPU usage is magically at 0% idle.

 

Windows 10 ran fine on my mom's old core 2 Due E6600. Even played games on it. 

 

Windows 10 will do a lot more with the cpu when it's idle than windows 7 will tho. 

 

I'm not saying performance is the same, but it's not that bad. Win7 and 10 are pretty similar, or at least the earlier versions of 10. Windows really hasn't gotten that much more taxing on hardware in and of itself since Vista. Retro gaming aside, I wouldn't be surprised if 10 runs better than 7 and Vista for a lot of things. 

 

Edit: actually performance is virtually the same, at least for games that don't have compatibility issues. 

 

 

 

So I guess if I have a point, it's that almost all of the games someone would want to play on Steam on windows 7 would also work fine on 10. I'm sure there are a few exceptions, but they should be rare. 

 

Since we're talking about software here I think it's a lot more important that people can still play the older games vs use vintage hardware, as you put it. Sure running two 4870s is neat, but hardly required just to play these older games. 

Edited January 4 by UltraMega

[bonami2]

5 hours ago, pioneerisloud said:

TY.  I wasn't sure if the cutoff was Socket 939 or if AM2 K8's were included.  I know K10's work, which I said.

 

............didn't I say that like 10 times?  Yes, a K8 can install Win10 x86.  But its not going to play games on Steam in 10 x86.  The CPU is stuck at 100% the whole time because of the Windows 10 overhead required.  But yet 2 weeks ago, my K8 build was happily playing my Steam games on Windows 7 x64.

You're also negating every OTHER CPU that's older than K8, that can run and play games on Windows 7 just fine, but can't run Windows 10.  I never said this was a problem for people with modern hardware, this is a problem for vintage / retro enthusiasts.

 

 

The overhead is probably not the issue.

 

Defender is probably pegging the cpu. I disable that junk with winaero on older hardware. 

 

Had issue at school 20y ago with antivirus doing the same crap on windows xp.

 

It was planned obsolescence.

[Slaughtahouse]

Maybe I am misunderstanding the entire discussion here but my understanding is that Steam will still run on Windows 7. It just won’t receive security updates and support.

 

If you’re a retro enthusiast, I don’t think it matters if you have the latest and greatest version of Steam. Games and Steam will still operate.

 

I think it’s very reasonable to drop support given Microsoft already dropped support a year ago.

[Sir Beregond]

1 hour ago, Slaughtahouse said:

Maybe I am misunderstanding the entire discussion here but my understanding is that Steam will still run on Windows 7. It just won’t receive security updates and support.

 

If you’re a retro enthusiast, I don’t think it matters if you have the latest and greatest version of Steam. Games and Steam will still operate.

 

I think it’s very reasonable to drop support given Microsoft already dropped support a year ago.

Are old versions of Steam readily available for download still? I imagine you can just not update on existing machines, but I wonder for a new retro rig.

[ENTERPRISE]

Hello all, 

 

I am up for debating and the continuation of this conversation, however let's be sure to keep it civil as it has mostly up to this point. It is clear not everyone's experiences will be the same and there will be some learning done on both sides of the fence

 

Thanks,

E

[UltraMega]

Thanks E. 

 

My stance on this is that it's not really an issue because any game that runs well on 7 should also run well on 10, with the exception of games that were designed for XP and had been "ported" to 7. 

 

Since any of these particular games could be considered retro games, they don't need enthusiasts level hardware just to run today, and that's what I meant by my earlier comment about retro vs enthusiasts. Poorly worded at the time. 

 

If anyone does know of a game that consistently runs fine on 7 but not 10, I'd be curious to know what it is. 

 

I think some of you may be forgetting just how hard Microsoft pushed to make 10 perform as well as 7, and with similar hardware requirements. 

[The Pook]

2 hours ago, Sir Beregond said:

Are old versions of Steam readily available for download still? I imagine you can just not update on existing machines, but I wonder for a new retro rig.

 

old versions check after installing, and any version moderately recent (past 5+ years?) will force you to update to the latest before installing.  

 

probably not impossible to work around (find a very old version and stick to offline mode?) but it'd be a PITA at best. pretty sure Steam requires offline accounts to log in every once in a while for verification and that might break something. 

[iamjanco]

> see's people getting frustrated about gaming on older versions of windows;

> boots up Commodore 64 and runs Zork 1;

> wants to avoid getting eaten by a gru;

> breaks out old dust covered box with cheat sheet in it;

> dusts off and opens old box with cheat sheet in it;

> takes out cheat sheet and studies it;

> go north;

 

 

> you enter a pitch black, dark chamber where you hear an ominous, scruffling sound. a gru hits you over the head, takes your wallet, and eats you. 

> would you like to play again?  yes | no;

 

 

[The Pook]

what's in this room 

 

[iamjanco]

4 minutes ago, The Pook said:

what's in this room 

 

stilleto (fixed blade)

 

i usually don't go in there though because of the trolls

 

Edited January 4 by iamjanco

[The Pook]

4 minutes ago, iamjanco said:

stilleto (fixed blade)

 

i usually don't go in there though because of the trolls

 

 

nice cover story for your collection of women's shoes 

[iamjanco]

42 minutes ago, The Pook said:

 

nice cover story for your collection of women's shoes 

 

originally started/made back before video cards were a thing (plenty of places to hide women's shoes):

 

 

updated 2008:

 

 

and again in 2023:

 

 

lots of games come and go, but some games live forever. 

 

Edited January 4 by iamjanco

[The Pook]

31 minutes ago, iamjanco said:

lots of games come and go, but some games live forever. 

 

Oregon Trail, Chips Challenge, SkiFree, and JezzBall = Pook 

Zork = D'Jango 

[Slaughtahouse]

1 hour ago, iamjanco said:

 

originally started/made back before video cards were a thing (plenty of places to hide women's shoes):

 

 

updated 2008:

 

 

and again in 2023:

 

 

lots of games come and go, but some games live forever. 

 

Wow Zork sounds awesome. Btw, I love those axo section cut, drafted view in that last map. 

[iamjanco]

3 hours ago, Slaughtahouse said:

Wow Zork sounds awesome. Btw, I love those axo section cut, drafted view in that last map. 

 

I enjoyed it (and a lot of other text adventures). If you'd like to give it a go, you can play it online for free these days:

 

Zork I: The Great Underground Empire | Play game online!

PLAYCLASSIC.GAMES

---

Zork I: The Great Underground Empire is an interactive fiction adventure computer game written by Marc Blank, Dave Lebling, Bruce Daniels and Tim Anderson and published by Infocom in 1980. Play Zork I: The...

-----------------------

Following is an excerpt (screen cap) from a short run of that game, which runs in an online dos emulator:

 

Edited January 5 by iamjanco

[pio]

1 hour ago, iamjanco said:

 

I enjoyed it (and a lot of other text adventures). If you'd like to give it a go, you can play it online for free these days:

 

Zork I: The Great Underground Empire | Play game online!

PLAYCLASSIC.GAMES

---

Zork I: The Great Underground Empire is an interactive fiction adventure computer game written by Marc Blank, Dave Lebling, Bruce Daniels and Tim Anderson and published by Infocom in 1980. Play Zork I: The...

-----------------------

Following is an excerpt (screen cap) from a short run of that game, which runs in an online dos emulator:

 

I remember playing something similar to that in my Windows 98 days, wonder if it was Zork.  I'll have to look around for that, I want to experience it actually natively on DOS!   Not trying to keep off topic or anything, but hey..........cool vintage games count me in!