Steam, Windows 7 - 2025

[Master.Constructor]

We're almost finished 2024 and we've had several Steam client updates as well as Windows 7 updates via UpdatePack7. So far Windows 7 seems to be running well and will carry me into 2025 at the very least.

I've been running Windows 7 since transitioning from XP after bypassing (and watching the fallout from) Vista. So far so good aside from DirectX12 and some driver restrictions.

I closely followed the roll-out of Win8, 8.1 and 10 waiting for a good time to transition to a newer OS, testing a few other options while I've been waiting (Linux, Windows Server, Tiny/Lite Windows). So far I haven't found anything that seems to worth the effort or privacy risks / compromise.

Windows 7 SP2/3?

In 2021 I found UpdatePack7 which is a monthly security pack for all editions of Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008R2 (seems to be in development since 2013) and have had very good results with it. There is a small ~1MB downloader program (v1.5.0.0) which will download and/or verify the update pack (~800MB). The latest release was three days ago (24.6.12) and no issues to report. It's a significant saving of bandwidth, time and drive space and I am very grateful for it's consistent and diligent development. It is essentially the SP3 that Win7 users were always waiting for.

If you're having issues on Windows 7 SP1, try running the following from CMD (as administrator) and post your results here.
chkdsk
sfc /verifyonly

Hint:
I find starting Steam offline is much faster and smoother. Here's my steps to starting Steam Offline:
1 - edit the file loginusers.vdf
... mine was located here: \Steam\config\loginusers.vdf
2 - change "WantsOfflineMode" from 0 to 1
3 - save and set file [Properties] to [Read-only]
4 - start steam to check

Also, to remove the red banner at the top I added this to my steam.exe shortcut:
-pretendeol-w10


Updates
=======
UpdatePack7 25.4.10 (Windows 6.1.7601.27666)
- Added KB5055561-x64 with disabling telemetry and checking processors (replaces KB5053620-x64)
- Added KB5056456-x64 (replaces KB5050681-x64)

UpdatePack7 25.3.12 (Windows 6.1.7601.27615)
UpdatePack7 25.2.12 (Windows 6.1.7601.27566)
UpdatePack7 25.1.15 (Windows 6.1.7601.27520)
UpdatePack7 24.12.12 (Windows 6.1.7601.27412)

Steam Beta Branch: Stable Client
Steam Version: 1730853000
Steam Client Build Date: Thu, Nov 7 7:55 PM UTC -08:00
Steam Web Build Date: Wed, Oct 9 5:44 PM UTC -08:00
Steam API Version: SteamClient021

- UpdatePack7 2024.10.10 (Windows 6.1.7601.27366)
- Steam Version: 1726604483 (Tue, Sep 17, 2024)

[Komarimaru]

These updatepack patches make no sense. KB5053620? Seriously?

Applied to Windows 7? Time to break out some facts.

KB5053620 is just a security patch for MMC...
What does it do? Fixes these.

-CVE-2025-24991
Out-of-bounds read in Windows NTFS allows an authorized attacker to disclose information locally.
-CVE-2025-24985
Integer overflow or wraparound in Windows Fast FAT Driver allows an unauthorized attacker to execute code locally.
-CVE-2025-24993
Heap-based buffer overflow in Windows NTFS allows an unauthorized attacker to execute code locally.
-CVE-2025-24983
Use after free in Windows Win32 Kernel Subsystem allows an authorized attacker to elevate privileges locally.
-CVE-2025-26633
Improper neutralization in Microsoft Management Console allows an unauthorized attacker to bypass a security feature locally.

Snake oil patches that do nothing... How many are actually using MMC, or even know what it is on Windows 7? lol Who is letting someone log into their PC from their home, and abusing MMC to create custom consoles?

The answer? No one...

[bidulless]

Messaggio originale di Komarimaru:

These updatepack patches make no sense. KB5053620? Seriously?

Applied to Windows 7? Time to break out some facts.

KB5053620 is just a security patch for MMC...
What does it do? Fixes these.

-CVE-2025-24991
Out-of-bounds read in Windows NTFS allows an authorized attacker to disclose information locally.
-CVE-2025-24985
Integer overflow or wraparound in Windows Fast FAT Driver allows an unauthorized attacker to execute code locally.
-CVE-2025-24993
Heap-based buffer overflow in Windows NTFS allows an unauthorized attacker to execute code locally.
-CVE-2025-24983
Use after free in Windows Win32 Kernel Subsystem allows an authorized attacker to elevate privileges locally.
-CVE-2025-26633
Improper neutralization in Microsoft Management Console allows an unauthorized attacker to bypass a security feature locally.

Snake oil patches that do nothing... How many are actually using MMC, or even know what it is on Windows 7? lol Who is letting someone log into their PC from their home, and abusing MMC to create custom consoles?

The answer? No one...

hello
yeah sur xd
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/march-11-2025-kb5053620-monthly-rollup-d5bbe280-7e12-4aa5-b8e4-96a044e5c9eb
https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/releaseNote/2025-Mar
https://i.postimg.cc/xj66bCGV/Capture.jpg

[Ontrix_Kitsune]

Messaggio originale di bidulless:

yeah sur xd
https://msrc.microsoft.com/update-guide/releaseNote/2025-Mar
https://i.postimg.cc/xj66bCGV/Capture.jpg

You might notice that no versions of Windows 7 are listed under the "Applies To" section at the bottom of that website. As I said previously: Nothing listed there has anything to do with Windows 7. There's no reason to even discuss it here.

[Princess Luna]

Steam: Works on previosuly installed Win 7
Why I need Win 10 exactly?

[Ontrix_Kitsune]

Messaggio originale di Princess Luna:

Steam: Works on previosuly installed Win 7
Why I need Win 10 exactly?

Only old versions you already have installed. If you ever have to re-install windows or reformat your computer you won't be able to install steam on Windows 7 if you download it from the website today. Even older versions won't work forever. At some point Steam will completely not work on Windows 7.

[Crashed]

Messaggio originale di Ontrix_Kitsune:

Messaggio originale di Princess Luna:

Steam: Works on previosuly installed Win 7
Why I need Win 10 exactly?

Only old versions you already have installed. If you ever have to re-install windows or reformat your computer you won't be able to install steam on Windows 7 if you download it from the website today. Even older versions won't work forever. At some point Steam will completely not work on Windows 7.

When attempting to get Winlator (Wine and Box64 on Android) to run Steam, I have run into that very issue because the Wine settings had defaulted to Windows 7 causing Steam to throw a steamui.dll error early in startup.

[Ontrix_Kitsune]

Messaggio originale di Crashed:

Messaggio originale di Ontrix_Kitsune:

Only old versions you already have installed. If you ever have to re-install windows or reformat your computer you won't be able to install steam on Windows 7 if you download it from the website today. Even older versions won't work forever. At some point Steam will completely not work on Windows 7.

When attempting to get Winlator (Wine and Box64 on Android) to run Steam, I have run into that very issue because the Wine settings had defaulted to Windows 7 causing Steam to throw a steamui.dll error early in startup.

Interesting. Thank you for sharing with us.

[Lixire]

Messaggio originale di Princess Luna:

Steam: Works on previosuly installed Win 7
Why I need Win 10 exactly?

If you have to reinstall Steam or your Windows 7 install at some point then the patcher will simply give you the Win10 client right away as Valve hosts only the newer client
So you might need to backup your existing Steam client or grab it from someone who did archive it (the security of your account will be at risk, gotta trust the uploader not including malware with it)

But at some point, the Win7 client won't be able to connect to Steam and you won't be able to access your games as the DRM will simply prevent you from doing so. it can take months or years depending on what Valve changes in the backend.
Or if you decide to get a new computer later on. Windows 7 on those is out of the question due to non-existent driver support so your options will be Windows 10/11 or Linux.

You can stay on 7 for now if it works for you and your use case but the OS itself is pretty much obsolete and dead.

[Lixire]

Messaggio originale di HIVEmind:

its supposed to update the server kernel which we know is different to the home/business kernel. it does the install process, but does it patch? no one knows or can test. for all I care, its a dud.

my opinion. he just wants the attention and a long thread of Jerry springer.

this thread should be locked and deleted.

I did try the tool on a VM to see what it does and yes. it does install and patch the OS so the tool does what it says but there are other concerns with this software.

OP is basically advocating to software piracy. the ESU updates of Windows 7/Server 2008 R2 do require a separate license which was available only for corporate users.
As in fact, on a clean install of Windows 7 before UpdatePack7 or BypassESU. attempting to install the 2020-02 and newer updates will result in the following message in the reboot process
"Failure to configure Windows updates. Reverting Changes. Do not turn off your computer,”

The reason is simple, as the updates do check for a vaild license which is missing. UpdatePack7 does add the "license" so those updates will install and apply system wide but we are getting into software piracy with that one. if someone doesn't care about it then it's on them but that's something I believe people should be aware of.

The other issue is that while those updates will work fully on Windows 7. Don't expect those updates to be tested against the typical use case of a Windows 7 user in terms of compatibility.
Just a couple of months ago.. Microsoft did push an update to Windows Server 2008 R2 which did fix sereve security flaws within the video stack of the OS that is rendering graphics. However, that update did break every single Chromium based application so Steam, Discord and etc were appeared to be broken.

if someone doesn't care about the part of piracy. might as well just run Win10 LTSC or Linux instead and save the hassle of dealing with an OS that became obsolete years ago

[bidulless]

Messaggio originale di Lixire:

Messaggio originale di HIVEmind:

its supposed to update the server kernel which we know is different to the home/business kernel. it does the install process, but does it patch? no one knows or can test. for all I care, its a dud.

my opinion. he just wants the attention and a long thread of Jerry springer.

this thread should be locked and deleted.

I did try the tool on a VM to see what it does and yes. it does install and patch the OS so the tool does what it says but there are other concerns with this software.

OP is basically advocating to software piracy. the ESU updates of Windows 7/Server 2008 R2 do require a separate license which was available only for corporate users.
As in fact, on a clean install of Windows 7 before UpdatePack7 or BypassESU. attempting to install the 2020-02 and newer updates will result in the following message in the reboot process
"Failure to configure Windows updates. Reverting Changes. Do not turn off your computer,”

The reason is simple, as the updates do check for a vaild license which is missing. UpdatePack7 does add the "license" so those updates will install and apply system wide but we are getting into software piracy with that one. if someone doesn't care about it then it's on them but that's something I believe people should be aware of.

The other issue is that while those updates will work fully on Windows 7. Don't expect those updates to be tested against the typical use case of a Windows 7 user in terms of compatibility.
Just a couple of months ago.. Microsoft did push an update to Windows Server 2008 R2 which did fix sereve security flaws within the video stack of the OS that is rendering graphics. However, that update did break every single Chromium based application so Steam, Discord and etc were appeared to be broken.

if someone doesn't care about the part of piracy. might as well just run Win10 LTSC or Linux instead and save the hassle of dealing with an OS that became obsolete years ago

hello
no difference between ltsc and updatepack both running in grey area as you can't buy ltsc licence unless you're a company ( they are not sold to any consummer) or if you buy it on a grey market ....
and no , updatepack does not add the licence because there is no need as it does not use wuar.exe and it component but dism... unless you know how to unpack the nis script from the setup itself
and for your info, if this kind of key are used they should be appeared here
https://i.postimg.cc/m2Xh0y8c/Capture.jpg
and saying that, you should check here i guess
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Component Based Servicing
https://i.postimg.cc/m2Xh0y8c/Capture.jpg

[Lixire]

Messaggio originale di bidulless:

Messaggio originale di Lixire:

I did try the tool on a VM to see what it does and yes. it does install and patch the OS so the tool does what it says but there are other concerns with this software.

OP is basically advocating to software piracy. the ESU updates of Windows 7/Server 2008 R2 do require a separate license which was available only for corporate users.
As in fact, on a clean install of Windows 7 before UpdatePack7 or BypassESU. attempting to install the 2020-02 and newer updates will result in the following message in the reboot process
"Failure to configure Windows updates. Reverting Changes. Do not turn off your computer,”

The reason is simple, as the updates do check for a vaild license which is missing. UpdatePack7 does add the "license" so those updates will install and apply system wide but we are getting into software piracy with that one. if someone doesn't care about it then it's on them but that's something I believe people should be aware of.

The other issue is that while those updates will work fully on Windows 7. Don't expect those updates to be tested against the typical use case of a Windows 7 user in terms of compatibility.
Just a couple of months ago.. Microsoft did push an update to Windows Server 2008 R2 which did fix sereve security flaws within the video stack of the OS that is rendering graphics. However, that update did break every single Chromium based application so Steam, Discord and etc were appeared to be broken.

if someone doesn't care about the part of piracy. might as well just run Win10 LTSC or Linux instead and save the hassle of dealing with an OS that became obsolete years ago

hello
no difference between ltsc and updatepack both running in grey area as you can't buy ltsc licence unless you're a company ( they are not sold to any consummer) or if you buy it on a grey market ....

Both are software piracy at the end. so if you are a business or someone who does have an issue with this aspect then both should be avoided
But if someone doesn't care and just wants to do it regardless of the piracy aspect or not then why bother with UpdatePack7 instead of going with a newer OS anyway?

LTSC does allow to disable Telemetry fully at the level of Group Policy
Performance? provided both OSes are installed on an SSD, I couldn't any find meaningful difference on a machine with Core 2 Duo E7500. 4GB DDR2 RAM and 500GB Kingston A400 SSD. I don't care how it does on VMs as on VMware. 7 runs like absolute crap while 10 is smooth on that one which doesn't reflect reality once I look at both OSes on physical hardware.

I'm fairly sure that people will call me a Windows 7 hater but I really just can't see any real use case for the average user when it comes to this OS as someone who went through every tier of hardware from absolute bottom of the barrel to my current 7800X3D+RTX 5080 desktop or i9 12900HK/RTX 3080 Ti laptop
I learnt too well that software cannot really fix crappy hardware
HDDs for example might be better on Windows 7 as a boot drive but its still terrible once you actually use the OS as a daily driver

[bidulless]

Messaggio originale di Lixire:

Messaggio originale di bidulless:

hello
no difference between ltsc and updatepack both running in grey area as you can't buy ltsc licence unless you're a company ( they are not sold to any consummer) or if you buy it on a grey market ....

Both are software piracy at the end. so if you are a business or someone who does have an issue with this aspect then both should be avoided
But if someone doesn't care and just wants to do it regardless of the piracy aspect or not then why bother with UpdatePack7 instead of going with a newer OS anyway?

LTSC does allow to disable Telemetry fully at the level of Group Policy
Performance? provided both OSes are installed on an SSD, I couldn't any find meaningful difference on a machine with Core 2 Duo E7500. 4GB DDR2 RAM and 500GB Kingston A400 SSD. I don't care how it does on VMs as on VMware. 7 runs like absolute crap while 10 is smooth on that one which doesn't reflect reality once I look at both OSes on physical hardware.

I'm fairly sure that people will call me a Windows 7 hater but I really just can't see any real use case for the average user when it comes to this OS as someone who went through every tier of hardware from absolute bottom of the barrel to my current 7800X3D+RTX 5080 desktop or i9 12900HK/RTX 3080 Ti laptop
I learnt too well that software cannot really fix crappy hardware
HDDs for example might be better on Windows 7 as a boot drive but its still terrible once you actually use the OS as a daily driver

hello
updatepack does not need a key to install update because it does not use windows update nor the msu package and the tool associated to it but dism ....

[Lixire]

Messaggio originale di bidulless:

Messaggio originale di Lixire:

Both are software piracy at the end. so if you are a business or someone who does have an issue with this aspect then both should be avoided
But if someone doesn't care and just wants to do it regardless of the piracy aspect or not then why bother with UpdatePack7 instead of going with a newer OS anyway?

LTSC does allow to disable Telemetry fully at the level of Group Policy
Performance? provided both OSes are installed on an SSD, I couldn't any find meaningful difference on a machine with Core 2 Duo E7500. 4GB DDR2 RAM and 500GB Kingston A400 SSD. I don't care how it does on VMs as on VMware. 7 runs like absolute crap while 10 is smooth on that one which doesn't reflect reality once I look at both OSes on physical hardware.

I'm fairly sure that people will call me a Windows 7 hater but I really just can't see any real use case for the average user when it comes to this OS as someone who went through every tier of hardware from absolute bottom of the barrel to my current 7800X3D+RTX 5080 desktop or i9 12900HK/RTX 3080 Ti laptop
I learnt too well that software cannot really fix crappy hardware
HDDs for example might be better on Windows 7 as a boot drive but its still terrible once you actually use the OS as a daily driver

hello
updatepack does not need a key to install update because it does not use windows update nor the msu package and the tool associated to it but dism ....

Every Windows Update you install. be it through the WU client itself, downloading it manually from the catalog, pulling from WSUS server uses DISM to actually install the update since the days of Vista
and also, this was what slmgr was spitting after I did install UpdatePack7 and did let it finish.
Can ignore the /slient for this tool in cmd, I wanted to see if it could output a log on the console if I re-ran UpdatePack7 to get more information on it
https://i.imgur.com/iM5Tm9a.png

So far, the ESU updates themselves do check for the presence of MAK keys being installed as otherwise they would fail which is a normal intended behavior by Microsoft.
But if they are installed? the updates will go through and apply on a system restart
slmgr is the script in Windows that manages licenses if you didn't know
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/get-started/activation-slmgr-vbs-options

[bidulless]

Messaggio originale di Relire:

Messaggio originale di bidulless:

hello
updatepack does not need a key to install update because it does not use windows update nor the msu package and the tool associated to it but dism ....

Every Windows Update you install it. be it through the WU client itself, downloading it manually from the catalog, pulling from WSUS server uses DISM to actually install the update since the days of Vista
and also, this was what slmgr was spitting after I did install UpdatePack7 and did let it finish.
Can ignore the /slient for this tool in cmd, I wanted to see if it could output a log on the console if I re-ran UpdatePack7 to get more information on it
https://i.imgur.com/iM5Tm9a.png

So far, the ESU updates themselves do check for the presence of MAK keys being installed as otherwise they would fail which is a normal intended behavior by Microsoft.
But if they are installed? the updates will go through and apply on a system restart
slmgr is the script in Windows that manages licenses if you didn't know
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/get-started/activation-slmgr-vbs-options

hello
i wonder how you get this result, i tryed it and nothing so i guess i need to delete the vm and restart a new one
ok it was too small for my poor eyes and you are right ( used div instead of dlv )
i wonder how and why the licence is not in use and unlicenced
https://i.postimg.cc/63kKnzVP/Capture.jpg
when i have a different result doing it under my w7 home comp like extrended pid and installation pid but also a partial key and saying licenced with remaining rearm 2 on my comp
anyway thx @Relire , it's new for me and i liked it despite it opened more doors that it closed xd
so no licence has been used for the setup if i correctly understand the command and switch
/-----------------
/dlv [<Activation ID> | All]
Display detailed license information.
By default, /dlv displays the license information for the installed operating system. Specifying the <Activation ID> parameter displays the license information for the specified edition associated with that Activation ID. Specifying the All parameter displays license information for all applicable installed products.
This operation does not require elevated privileges.
/-----------------
now the best would have been to find some nsis script extractor to be sur on how it's been really working

[HIVEmind]

I 100 percent reduce to use a neglected and discontinued os. im gonna sit on win11. go ahead and play abandoned wares. gog.com will be your software source.