I just took possession of a computer running Windows 7 (DON’T JUDGE ME! ), and I’m running into issues that I didn’t expect to.
First, how can I find my beloved Microsoft games, such as Solitaire, msHearts, Minesweeper and Freecell? Are they available at all?
I’m having a Rick Perry moment on the other issue, but I’m sure it will blossom within my brain the moment I hit “submit.”
Anyway, TIA for any info on my games.
Start button. The column on the right should have a shortcut to games. At least, that’s the way it works on mine.
What’s wrong with Windows 7?!? It’s currently the best version of Windows. A fixed Vista and without the gay touchscreen tiles of 8*!* I’m only using 8 because I had to get a new computer last year and nobody had one with 7*!*
Also, games are sometimes under **Accessories **or Windows Accessories. You can also type *minesweeper *in the Search window on the Start menu…
Works that way on mine too.
They might not be installed on your system.
Working from memory (I’m on my linux laptop ATM, no Win 7 machines handy), you can install them by going to Control Panel>Programs and Features>Add/Remove Windows Features. They’ll be in there somewhere.
I’d agree with Hail Ants - until Win 10 comes out later this month (looking promising so far), 7 is the best version out there. Certainly less annoying than Win 8, anyway.
Windows 7 start menu search is amazing. I don’t even keep much in my start menu Programs list anymore.
Just open up the start menu and type “Free” or “Soli” into the search box and if you have the games, they will appear!
Thanks, all, I just found that the feature was turned off, and how to turn them on.
Now if some kind soul can tell me how to find those games in Win8. When I hit on the games menu I am sent to some site for x-box games. And if I go there, they want my MS password that I have long since lost. Bastards. Always make things worse.
Absolutely nothing wrong with windows 7, and xp and 95 before that, but I’d skip all the others. I don’t understand the Mac snobbery or the need to have an iPhone. My cheap (compared to Apple) Android phone works just fine, and cost a lot less.
Anyway, I have Rick Perry moments daily :smack: , so totally understand. Glad you found the games!
Perhaps someone can confirm of debunk something the salesman at Goodwill told me. He said that every legal copy of Windows 7 gets a free upgrade to Windows 10 when it’s released.
Is this true? And if so, what do I have to do to make it happen?
There will be a little Windows logo deal in the right lower corner of your screen (near the clock). When you click, it will allow you to ‘reserve’ your copy to be automatically downloaded sometime after July 29. There’s another thread around here somewhere about it.
Is Windows 10 going to be like the dopey tiles of 8, or the previous interface of Windows 7 ?
Windows 7 from my dead cold … 
I’m kind of like that, too, but my understanding is that one can operate Windows 8 essential like 7, if you wish–so maybe 10 will be the same?
My question is how sure can I be sure that Windows 10 will truly operate as it’s supposed to on a machine designed for 7? I mean, for us folks happy with 7, who haven’t really felt any reasons to go to 8.2, what will be different about 10? Convince us!
I have that logo sitting there in the task bar and I haven’t touched it yet. I’m just cautiously eyeing it.
Those screen shots make Windows 10 look like it’s some kind of hybrid of 8 and 7.
As far as the UI, that’s pretty much it.
There’s two modes, desktop and tablet. It should automatically adjust to one or the other, depending on screen size.
In desktop, you’ll have your old desktop back - shortcuts on the screen and suchlike. When you hit the Start button or the Windows key, you’ll get a popup with commonly used programs, pinned programs, and power options, plus (a bit over to the right), whatever live tiles for the apps. All customisable, that you can pin or unpin as you like. Taskbar across the bottom, again just like Win7.
In tablet mode, it’ll be more like base Win8 - large tiles across the screen. The Start key will still be more like Win7, however, with access to programs pretty much like Win7.
I’ve been running Win10 on the Insiders Preview for the last few months, and it’s pretty much ready to go. I’ll be updating most of my computers to Win10 as soon as it’s available. Lots of under the hood improvements make it worth the while, over Win7, and the UI changes make it better than Win8, IMO. As best I can tell, both Win8 and Win10 operate more efficiently, and do more with lesser hardware than Win7.
One exception will be my home theatre PC, as Media Center will no longer be available in Win10. I’m one of the few people who actually use that and like it, so I won’t upgrade that one from Win7.
It looks fellatingly like Windows 8.
Does it have a DOS prompt (or the equivalent) and a control panel, like a civilized machine? 
To clarify, Microsoft is finally doing with Windows 10 what they should have done with Windows 8 in the first place. Namely have two separate UI modes, desktop (for keyboard & mouse) and tablet (touchscreen). The reason they tried to force tablet mode on everybody with 8 is because the success of the iPad made tablets the new standard and desktops (like Windows) seem obsolete. To be sure, the sales of desktops has declined steadily in the last five years or so.
Microsoft saw the writing on the wall, that they have almost no mobile (or tablet) presence with Windows Phone, so they had to convert their flagship product to tablets to survive the future. But they did it too fast, by thinking everyone would just convert from desktops to tablets and Windows 8 would ‘help’ them by essentially forcing them to learn a tablet style UI whether they actually had one yet or not. They quickly found that this was the wrong approach, as it is nearly impossible to use a touchscreen style UI with a mouse. So they backpedaled a bit and released Windows 8.1 which allowed you to boot to the desktop at least.
And for those curious, the reason they skipped Windows version 9 is because the old versions of Windows 95 and 98 are collectively referred to as Windows 9x, both in print and in computer code. So it may have confused both consumers and applications that needed to check the Windows version…