NO Yearly Fee for Windows 10 Support After Upgrade Within One Year, Microsoft Clarifies

After all the confusion surrounding the Windows 10 upgrade paths, Microsoft has tried to clear this issue of yearly upgrade fee. It is already confirmed that Windows 10 will arrive as a free upgrade for one year to Windows 7, 8 and 8.1 users. So the question that remains: Will Microsoft charge yearly subscription free for Windows 10 after one year?
In a staging site for Microsoft, spotted first on Neowin, Microsoft recently published this clarification:

Once a qualified Windows device is upgraded to Windows 10, we will continue to keep it up to date for the supported lifetime of the device, keeping it more secure, and introducing new features and functionality over time – for no additional charge.

So, right now it seems as if you will NOT be paying yearly fee to keep the Windows 10 OS running on your PC after one year completion. All you need to do is to upgrade your Windows 7 or 8.1 PC within one year. This means that you will keep on getting Windows 10 updates for your PC for free.

I guess this settles down this confusion that Microsoft is going to make money with yearly updates. However it’s not clear how much the Windows OS maker is going to charge if you upgrade after one year.
This confirmation comes in the wake of the fact that the company has shown some sign in the past that show its drift from the conventional way of charging the users. With Office 365 for home users, Microsoft charges an annual fee for access to the Office Suite. This has also fueled the rumors in the past that Windows 10 could be released on a yearly subscription basis.
So, I hope this kind of clears the fact that if you upgrade your Windows , 8 or 8.1 within one year of the launch, you won’t have to pay for the future Redstone and the updates following that.

So, stop worrying about the subscription fee and wait patiently for the Windows 10 launch.
With inputs from Neowin and PCWorld


Recommended: What Will Happen if You Upgrade a Pirated Windows to Windows 10


 

What Will Happen if You Upgrade a Pirated Windows to Windows 10

The people running pirated copies of Windows will be getting Windows 10 for free? This question has been floating in the air for a while and vague statements from Microsoft has fueled this confusion. Back in March, Windows chief Terry Myerson reportedly said that the free Windows 10 upgrade offer will be extended to the pirated copies. After numerous explanations, Facebook has issued a full clarification.
If you have a pirated copy of Windows and you upgrade to Windows 10, you will see a watermark placed on your computer screen. In the previous version of Windows, Microsoft tells the users by displaying the message “This is not a genuine copy of Windows.” If you buy Windows 10 computer and you come across this message on your desktop, you should return the system.

However, in another statement Microsoft said: “While our free offer to upgrade to Windows 10 will not apply to Non-Genuine Windows devices, and as we’ve always done, we will continue to offer Windows 10 to customers running devices in a Non-Genuine state.”
This means that your Windows 10 copy will continue to work on pirated machines. Microsoft wants you to run a non-genuine copy and nag you continuously about the upgrade.
Microsoft says that it is planning to bring some very attractive Windows 10 upgrade offers to the users that will encourage people to move the pirated copies to an official one. More details haven’t been yet announced, but more information is expected to drop by soon as the expected summer release comes nearer.

In Windows 7, users with pirated installs are displayed occasional messages about the illegal upgrade. Such users have only access to critical updates and they are barred from the optional ones. Windows 10 too is expected to run with such stipulations.

Save Your Eyes From Computer Strain Using f.lux for Windows, Mac and Linux

No more watery eyes, when you wake up from sleep in the middle of the night to work on your bright computer screen. Your eye savior, f.lux is here. First things first, what is f.lux and why do you need it?

Why do you need f.lux ?

Decreasing the brightness is not that attractive an option, because the blue light emissions from your screen is still significant enough to well up your eyes with water and completely ruin your sleepy state. It is proven that exposure to blue light significantly aids in keeping you awake for a longer time in the night.
To get to the science behind it, here’s why. Most of us don’t know this, but there is another kind of receptor cells beside rods and cones in our retina. It’s called Melanopsin. The discovery was made about 15 years ago. Melanopsin is sensitive to narrow band of blue light in 460-480 nm range. Melanopsis works different functions for different creatures, but that’s another story.
There are two things I’d like to recommend to your reading list to get more information about melanopsin and effect of blue light on sleep:

1) Internal Time by Til Roennberg
2) Research Papers and articles – link

What is f.lux what does it do?

f.lux is a desktop applet for Windows, Linux, Mac, iPhone, iPad and iPod touch which limits the glow of your screen. Instead, it replaces that with a warm tone. There is no problem for your eyes not to feel comfortable on the screen in the morning. The daylight is sufficient and doesn’t let your eyes feel the glow that the screen throws. But say at 11 PM while you are, say trying to work late after sneaking on your father or wife, you power up your computer and you get instantly taken back by the brightness!
You can reduce the brightness and contrast to a certain extent, but there is a limit to which you can go without compromising your experience. f.lux comes to rescue here. It automatically switches to a warm tone at night and goes back to a brighter shade in the morning.
Don’t worry as it uses only 3.86MB of RAM approximately, is completely free, has no CPU load and works like a charm without any user interference. The working is also fairly simple. You can also customize the way it works, especially how warm you want your screen to be at night.

How to use f.lux to save your eyes?

It does the work by calculating your present location (through google maps)and works according to the sunrise/sunset cycle. The f.lux indicator applet automatically manages the color temperature of your screen based on your latitude and longitude, or if you are in the US, your zip code.

In the preferences panel, you can set your preferred night-time color temperature and see a preview, as well as seeing the current color temperature.


You can even pause the applet if you want to:

You can download f.lux for windows here and for Mac here.
For iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch you need to jailbreak your device in order to install it. You can follow the instructions here.
To install f.lux on Linux (Ubuntu) open up the terminal and copy paste the following commands one by one.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kilian/f.l

1	sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kilian/f.lux

sudo apt-get update

1	sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install fluxgui

1	sudo apt-get install fluxgui

If you are having an error in adding the ppa (the first command), follow this link to troubleshoot it.
The Linux GUI of the f.lux applet doesn’t provide as much customizing options as that of the other platforms, so if you are interested in adding features to it, you could do it on its open source code on GitHub.
If you have any other query regarding f.lux, comment your queries below. Do share your experiences.