Unlike in the past, Microsoft recently announced that some versions of Windows 7 could be “downgraded” to Windows XP for until the next 10 years. This is for the second time in recent history that Microsoft has extended the Windows 7-to-Windows XP downgrade rights. Earlier it was in June 2009, when Microsoft backed-off, when it originally limited the Windows 7-to-Windows XP downgrades to 6 months. It had extended the downgrade rights till 18 months after the debut of Windows 7. According to this, the downgrade rights of Windows 7-to-Windows XP, would have expired around April 2011.
But according to the recent announcement, the downgrade rights of Windows 7-to-Windows XP extended until 2020, the same year in which Windows 7 Professional would be called out of the market.
