Ds4windows: Windows 7 End of Life. RIP Windows 7

[Ryochan7]

I only recently heard that Microsoft is officially ending support for Windows 7 on 2020/01/14. Due to that announcement, I will no longer keep Windows 7 SP1 as the minimum platform target for DS4Windows starting at the beginning of the year. Windows 8.1 will likely be the chosen minimum platform target. Although DS4Windows will likely still work in Windows 7 for the foreseeable future, no priority will be given to Windows 7 specific problems.

[Ryochan7]

Also, I should mention that the future WPF based DS4Windows is already confirmed to work in Windows 7. The upgrade to version 2.0 should not impact current Windows 7 users.

[Ryusennin]

A shame, because I don't see myself permanently switching to my Win10 partition anytime soon. But as it is, DS4Windows has proven solid on Win7 for a long time now and I'll make sure to keep the latest functional version somewhere safe. Thanks for all your great work.

[TristanYoung]

I've been running DS4Windows on Windows 10 with no issues. For me, Windows 10 is working very well for gaming. Not saying it's for everyone, and a lot of my gaming buddies still run Windows 7, but it's mostly because they can't be bothered to upgrade. It's still a free upgrade from Windows 7 Pro if you use the Media Creation Toolkit. Been upgrading lots of machines to Windows 10 for free.

I like the interface better overall. I run Windows 7 at work because the software we use requires about a $1000.00 service to fulfill the upgrade (stupid Pervasive database and DSN long name changes required).

[Ryusennin]

I'm not really looking for arguments to switch to Win10 (as I said, I have both systems). I personally find it ugly and half of the Win7 features are either hidden in submenus and nested clicks, only accessible through the search engine or the registry (like the fonts, of all things) or missing altogether. And let's not talk about legacy drivers -- for game controllers, MIDI synths, extension boards...

Then again, I'm ok with DS4W being frozen on Win7 as the current version works great and suits my needs.

[Ryochan7]

The day has arrived. RIP Windows 7.

[Tiberiusmoon]

I still dunno why you wanna support the Win 8.1 with DS4 with the user base being >5% of the whole world.

[Ryusennin]

I will keep reporting if/when DS4Windows stops working on Win7.

[Ryochan7]

The app will likely work in Windows 7 for the extended future. I am using Microsoft's end of support decision as a way to reduce my own workload. Now I don't have to worry about having development tools installed on a Windows 7 VM just to test a few specific problems. Pull requests will be welcome in the case that Windows 7 specific fixes are needed in the code.

[Fierelier]

Just because Windows 7 is no longer supported, does not mean that people should just go ahead and no longer care. I understand why you would do it, but you really shouldn't. Legacy support with devices suffers intensely in 8.1 and up, 7 still has a place.

I think Windows 7 should be an active priority, and that issues that may prop up with it should be fixed, even if 7 is a bit of an edge case now. Don't just pass off the old, try to give equal opportunities to everything for as long as it is possible. Not putting any care in this will just support software and hardware decay.

@Ryochan7, I am not asking you in particular to maintain compatibility to 7, I know this can be hard with today's crippled-for-7 hardware, and that you might not have much time. I'm asking you to make sure that Windows 7 is valued within this project by other contributors.

Please think about reverting this decision.

[Ryochan7]

If it weren't for the poor BT stack in Windows 7, I probably would not have been so quick to accept the death of Windows 7. Plus it does not help that ViGEmBus won't work on Windows 7 SP1 as is but later hot fixes need to be installed to be able to install and run the driver. Windows 7 support was already becoming a liability before Microsoft officially killed it.

I have changed my mind about not needing Windows 7 whatsoever though. Testing the old Jays2Kings build of DS4Windows is going to keep getting harder with Windows updates especially due to the outdated ScpVBus driver. I will likely still need a Windows 7 VM around in order to test out the old version 1.4.52 build.

[Fierelier]

Thank you for the detailed response, laying things down more and so on. Unfortunate to hear that the bt performance is sub-par. Thanks for taking it into consideration though, it is much appreciated!

[Ryochan7]

DS4Windows 2.0.12 is confirmed to work on Windows 7. Haven't broke Windows 7 compatibility yet.

[Ryusennin]

Reports of Win7's death have been greatly exaggerated. I still get daily updates for Windows Defender!

[Ryochan7]

This issue will stay relevant until DS4Windows no longer works in Windows 7. Luckily, DS4Windows 2.1.4 works in Windows 7 so compatibility has not been broken yet.

[Ryochan7]

The recent drama just goes to show that I cannot win. I am pretty much giving up providing any support and going back to the old stance of scratching my own itch.

[Fierelier]

All good, as long as the last Win7 compatible release stays available. Don't worry about it.

[Ryusennin]

Well, 2.1.9 is still compatible (at least via USB, haven't used BT for months).

[Ryochan7]

Since ViGEmBus 1.17.333.0 is only compatible with Windows 10, this issue is more important than ever before. If you are still running Windows 7, it would probably be best for you to make plans to eventually migrate to Windows 10.

[mirh]

It is my very superficial understanding that at least for the time being the client API should still remain the same.