Max For Live Essentials Discontinued

[Fairy Dawdy]

We don't know what is going to happen with Windows Live Mail 2009 on XP and 2011 on Vista. It is clear that users will no longer be able to sign in with a migrated account to synchronize contacts and calendar, and they won't be able to synchronize mail messages and folders using DeltaSync. Whether the programs will continue to work in other respects (e.g. as a POP3, IMAP and NNTP client) remains to be seen.

It is recommended that you switch to new Mail and Calendar on Windows 10 as Windows live essentials are not supported on Windows 10. Else try using Windows Live Essentials 2012 as it currently working on Windows 10.

MiniTool OEM program enable partners like hardware / software vendors and relative technical service providers to embed MiniTool software with their own products to add value to their products or services and expand their market.

Windows Essentials is a discontinued suite of Microsoft freeware applications that includes instant messaging, email, photo sharing, blogging, as well as parental control program. It is formerly named Windows Live Essentials or Windows Live Installer. Essentials apps are designed to integrate well with each other, with Windows operating system (OS), and with other Microsoft web-based services like Outlook.com and OneDrive.live.com.

Windows Live Messenger, formerly known as MSN Messenger or just MSN, is a cross-platform instant messaging client developed by Microsoft. It connected to the Microsoft Messenger service whereas also having (as of the final version) compatibility with Yahoo! Messenger and Facebook Messenger.

Windows Live Mail is a free email client from Microsoft and it was formally called Windows Live Mail Desktop, code-named Elroy. Windows Live Mail is the successor to Windows Mail in Windows Vista, which was the successor to Outlook Express in Windows XP and Windows 98.

Windows Movie Maker, which is known as Windows Live Movie Maker for the 2009 and 2011 releases, is a discontinued video editing software program by Microsoft. It provided the ability to create and edit videos and to publish them on OneDrive.

Windows Live Writer is a discontinued desktop blog-publishing app that was created by Microsoft and distributed as part of the Windows Live Essentials suite of apps. An open-source fork of Windows Live Writer was released as Open Live Writer on December 9, 2015. Windows Live Writer was completely discontinued in January 2017.

Parental Controls is a free set of features available on Windows 7 and Vista. It is the predecessor of Windows Family Safety in Windows 8 and Windows 8.1. And, Windows Family Safety was rebranded as a Microsoft family feature in Windows 10 PCs and Mobiles that are bundled with Windows 10 Home.

With Parental Controls, a parent can manage settings for a child if both of their Microsoft Accounts are in the same family. When parents turn on settings for their child, these settings are applied to every device that the kid logs into with that Microsoft Account.

Microsoft OneDrive, formerly known as SkyDrive, is a file hosting service and syncing service operated by Microsoft as part of its web version of Office. It enables users to save crucial data in the online cloud, share files, as well as synchronize files across Windows, Android, and iOS devices.

It might be hard to imagine now, but Microsoft used to offer a number of add-on apps that didn't require a subscription to unlock their full potential. Some of them were paid, like the Microsoft Plus! suite and its successor, Windows Ultimate Extras, but you could also enjoy applications such as Photo Story without paying a dime. The customization potential and the geeky challenge of dabbling with those apps were part of the appeal of PCs decades ago when hobbyists made up a core part of the target audience.

In a bid to recapture some of that fiddling enthusiasm, Microsoft came up with Windows Essentials (formerly Windows Live Essentials) in 2008. These were fine-tuned utilities to bridge the gap between Windows and Microsoft's various web-based services. The first version appeared all the back in 2006 as an invitation-only beta, which gradually became a rich collection of handy applications, consisting of a standalone email client, a photo gallery, a casual video editing tool, a Word-esque blog writer, an instant messenger, and a OneDrive client, among others.

Many agree that Windows Essentials was actually a productive OS add-on. It was fast, responsive, and clean. Still, it lacked the long-term commitment, which resulted in Microsoft failing to create an ecosystem diverse enough to build up any kind of traction, ultimately resulting in them killing it off.

We feel it was a bit of a missed opportunity, but with Microsoft starting to revamp its Windows roadmap, could now be a good time for the Redmond giant to revisit Windows Essentials and bring the platform back to life?

Granted, most of the original components of the Windows Essentials suite are now redundant or have been succeeded by other inbox apps, but the 2020s variants don't have nearly the breadth of their ancestors yet. For instance, Clipchamp, the free video editor included in Windows 11, has a paid Essentials plan that costs $11.99 per month so that you can export videos in 4K and access the premium stock assets and filters. On the other hand, the current iterations of the Mail and Calendar apps are being retired in favor of the Outlook for Windows, which has an unsettling dependency on the cloud.

Those who prefer a lean and slim OS footprint always criticize Microsoft for bogging down Windows with a myriad of apps and services. Fortunately, with Windows 11, Microsoft actually listened to the community's opinions and considerably bumped up the number of uninstallable inbox apps. Newer OS revisions ship with stub packages by default for most optional stock software, and the actual payload gets downloaded only after the user executes the relevant application.

The elephant in the room is the Universal Windows Platform (UWP), of course. There is absolutely no need to carry the burden of archaic Win32 APIs, which means the current apps can be highly platform-agnostic and optimized for different device families out of the box. Besides, Microsoft has already adapted a majority of the Windows Essentials components into modern apps, such as Microsoft Photos (past: Photo Gallery) and Skype (past: Messenger). The final required bit is to bundle them under a familiar brand name and distribute them as an optional app suite. Windows Essentials is dead; long live Windows Essentials!

Not only would this will further trim Windows down, but marketing those apps as a standalone suite will also boost their popularity. Achieving the feat wasn't a cakewalk in the late 2000s, but now that the Microsoft Store is there, hurdles like seamless distribution and background updating won't be an issue at all. Oh, and we aren't forgetting winget for CLI lovers!

It has been four years since Microsoft brought the PowerToys lineup to life. The company also made the whole project open source, which is a great way to attract a wave of enthusiasts. According to many, Microsoft essentially uses the PowerToys as pilot experiments for features that might eventually land on Windows 12.

After graduating from mere shell extensions to a powerful set of tools, the modern version of PowerToys proves how much the Windows community admires the no-nonsense approach. The reboot so far includes 23 standalone utilities, but several others are under active consideration, thanks to community-based development. All we are asking is to opt for a similar initiative for a few "Essentials" apps.

The Writer app, for example, is a fantastic example of what open-source development can do. The desktop blog-publishing component of Windows Essentials was completely discontinued in January 2017, but a group of admirers and coding aficionados took the final available source code and forked it in the form of Open Live Writer. You don't have to deal with any kind of unnecessary cloud integration or tinker with obfuscated telemetry settings. You'll just get a pure vanilla experience adored by everyone.

Microsoft might not be interested in the blue/green bubble argument, but the company's strategy around messaging and communication apps is in a constant state of flux. The issue has only been made worse by the isolated teams working on Skype, Teams, and other products. While the numerous messaging solutions might not be merged into a unified experience anytime soon, (re)introducing the plain old Messenger could be a straightforward alternative.

To succeed, the company needs much more than just AI. It needs something special to make users switch away from numerous other apps. What could Microsoft do to give itself an advantage? The answer is rather simple, though. Stick with the basics. Believe it or not, people still crave an uncomplicated messaging app, so give them just that by bringing back Windows Essentials.

Every business needs to find new ways to earn revenues and stay profitable, so the subscription-based licensing model isn't going anywhere. That said, a one-time "perpetual" license purchase won't go away so easily. They are primarily intended for organizations who can't just migrate to the cloud due to their nature of work, but regular people often prefer it over a rolling release variant due to DBWW: Don't Break What Works.

Even Microsoft is working on the next pay-once-and-own version of Office, called Office Long Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) 2024. The pros and cons are very clear: You are eligible for some years (usually five) of mainstream support, but after that, it's over, while Microsoft 365 subscribers get continuous support and new features added as long as their subscription is active.

Just like that, the company can maintain two distinct development channels for a few basic but fundamental apps. The first variant would be tailor-made for ad revenues, hence backed by obvious subscriptions. The other one is meant to be old-school, which means a limited feature set and as minimal dependency on the cloud as possible. In a nutshell, generative AI in Microsoft Paint is great, but we don't want such apps in the revamped edition of Windows Essentials.

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