Off with its head! The powers that be at Redmond have made the decision to end support for the OneDrive desktop program on older versions of the operating system.
As in, Windows 7, 8, and 8.1.
If you are, for one reason or another, still rocking these versions of Windows, and want to use the desktop app to manage and sync your files up in the cloud, then upgrading to a new version of the OS will be must.
You have two choices here — the trusty old Windows 10 or the shiny new Windows 11.
Starting the very first day of 2022, the OneDrive desktop application will stop receiving updates on these machines. If you still want to use the program beyond this January 1 date, then you can for a little while further. That’s because cloud sync will only go away on March 1, 2022.
This is what the company had to say on the matter:
“If you are currently using one of these operating systems, we recommend upgrading your operating system to either Windows 10 or Windows 11 to avoid disruption. For machines that do not meet system requirements for Windows 10 or Windows 11 operating system upgrade, you can back up and protect your files by manually uploading them to OneDrive on the web, and continue to access, edit, and share your files on all your devices.”
Deal?
If no deal, then there is a way for people who can’t upgrade to reasons like system requirements or lack of new hardware to maintain their files on the cloud storage service. They will simply need to do things manually, which involves syncing their files using the OneDrive web interface.
This announcement, obviously, only affects consumers, as business users of the OneDrive desktop app will have their support period aligned with the lifecycle of the version of Windows that they are using.
