Windows 7 and paper wallets I was wondering if BTC cold storage or paper wallets can work with Windows 7 and / or Linux Mint? Please advise. Many thanks indeed.
There are a few ways that you can create cold storage. 

One possibility is to make a new installation of Bitcoin Core on an offline PC, one that is never connected to the internet. This PC will generate addresses and you can add those as a 'watch-only' address on an online PC to monitor incoming payments.

It is possible to update your offline PC, for example, using a bootstrap.dat file so that it will have the blockchain without ever needing to connect.

This will work with Windows 7 and any platform where Bitcoin Core can be installed including on several versions of Linux.

Paper wallets do not require a computer until you want to import the keys. You can import the public address as a 'watch-only' address or when you are ready to spend your BTC somewhere, you can import the private key.