Microsoft tells Windows 11 Insider build users with unsupported PCs to reinstall Windows...

[midian182]

A hot potato: While Windows 11 hasn't officially started rolling out yet, Microsoft has made it clear that plenty of PCs aren't going to meet the OS' minimum requirements. Now, members of the Windows Insider Program with incompatible hardware are being asked to uninstall Windows 11 and reinstall its predecessor.

Twitter account @BetaWiki published an image of a message seen by testers in both the Dev and Beta channels running Windows 11 on hardware that doesn't meet Microsoft's requirements for the new OS.

"Your PC does not meet the minimum hardware requirements for Windows 11. Your device is not eligible to join the Windows Insider Program on Windows 11. Please install Windows 10 to participate in the Windows Insider Program in the Release Preview Channel," it reads.

Microsoft's Brandon LeBlanc tweeted that people were warned in a Windows Insider blog post from June that this would happen.

We communicated this would be the case back via this blog post on June 24th here: https://t.co/rTIRMSHJHD https://t.co/7cvXHQ65nF

— Brandon LeBlanc (@brandonleblanc) September 1, 2021

The Insider Program had been one way of getting Windows 11 early builds onto PCs with unsupported hardware, though Microsoft said that users would stop receiving preview builds once Windows 11 is generally available. Linus Tech Tips looked at this method, among others, and possible workarounds in a video last month.

It seems those who ignore Microsoft's message will stop receiving further updates for the OS—the same fate facing users with non-eligible PCs who upgraded via the Windows Media Creation Tool or with the official Windows 11 ISO.

Microsoft recently updated its Windows 11 minimum hardware requirements to include 7th-gen Intel Core X-series and Xeon W-series processors, along with the Intel Core 7820HQ (only select devices that shipped with modern drivers based on Declarative, Componentized, Hardware Support Apps (DCH) design principles, including Surface Studio 2). No first-gen AMD Zen processors are included on the list.

Microsoft will soon roll out its updated Health Check app for users to check if their PC meets Windows 11 requirements.

There's been plenty of confusion surrounding Windows 11 ahead of its October 5 rollout date. "For those who are using a PC that won't upgrade, and who aren't ready to transition to a new device, Windows 10 is the right choice," Microsoft said, noting that Windows 10 will continue to be supported up until October 14, 2025. That's unlikely to appease angry consumers, though.

A recent report found that over half of Windows 10 users want to upgrade, while over a quarter of those polled have laptops or PCs that don't meet the minimum requirements.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/91057-microsoft-tells-windows-11-insider-build-users-non.html

 

[Dimitriid]

Ok now I can see the *final release* strictly adhering to all the nonsense MS has been trying so hard to convince everyone cannot be done except at a hardware level.

But people on the insider's program are supposed to be your beta testers. In fact, most of the success of your October launch hinges upon proper testing and I'm sure 99.9999999% of the issues those testers might find wouldn't be related to a lack of TPM 2.0 on their hardware....Yet you're turning them away.

Is like they *want* Windows 11 to fail at this point: upgrading at October would be a bigger liability than just switching to Linux at this point.

 

[JKnight]

TPM 2.0 isn't going to stop data breaches and virus. I don't except organizes and individuals to throw away computer and buy new ones to use Windows 11.

 

[Plutoisaplanet]

Guys, I don't think TPM is the the issue here. It's a processor requirement set so high that PC's designed and sold with Windows 10 cannot be upgraded to Windows 11. Mine is a Microsoft Surface Book which only ever has and only ever will have Windows 10 installed completely supported by Windows 11 except by the age of the processor.

Currently there are 883 Intel processors and 369 AMD processors supported by Windows 10--that's changing to 586 and 179 respectively (source). That represents a 34% and 51% reduction of CPUs supported by Windows 11. Microsoft is intentionally cutting off old users trying to get them to buy new PCs because in the past decade processor speeds became fast enough for all foreseeable general computing requirements.

 

[VaRmeNsI]

I foresee an endless war between M$ attempting to restrict and people bypassing them.

 

[hahahanoobs]

TPM 2.0 isn't going to stop data breaches and virus. I don't except organizes and individuals to throw away computer and buy new ones to use Windows 11.

Meanwhile more people are using the AV built into Windows than ever before. In the beginning everyone swore not to use it. Guess what? Software can be patched and improved over time!
See also: DLSS

Predictions are just that. Actual data matters. People hated W10 and I bet 80%+ of those people are running it. I also bet some excuses would be that W10 has features or support they want, even if they weren't completely satisfied. Windows doesn't just have to support various hardware. It has to support various users and you'll never please everyone. But if they don't please everyone, that's no excuse to make premature accusations.

Think for yourself. I just wanted to use this opportunity to also show the other side of the non literal argument, because it def isn't one sided. People complain about every windows OS requirements and they always will, but it does get old fast.

If you want your system to run its best, do the best for it and stop expecting every old piece of hardware to run with every new piece of software, because you don't want to pay out of pocket to upgrade to get the best experience. I know I def won't be rushing to help anyone trying to run W11 on potatoes.

 

[Geralt]

Not even training you can be so unfriendly. Company with a bad soul.

 

[DrSuess]

TPM 2.0 isn't going to stop data breaches and virus. I don't except organizes and individuals to throw away computer and buy new ones to use Windows 11.

No one ever said TPM 2.0 was going to stop data breaches and virus. Its most important function is a secure boot to prevent malicious code from injecting itself before the trusted components run. It also provides some cryptographic functions in certain instances. Granted they are more of use to the enterprise customers as we have been using them for years.

 

[wiyosaya]

Not even training you can be so unfriendly. Company with a bad soul.

M$ has a soul?

 

[wiyosaya]

I suppose that this is M$'s way of saying that they want Win 11 to fail, or of them just dangling a carrot in front of enterprise users to get them to throw money at M$ for the upgrade. (I bet M$ is finding that the free upgrade to 10 for most home users is leaving them wondering where the cash will come from for the future.) I bet many businesses have still not completely "upgraded" their pile of computers to Windows 10, and they are expecting them to move to Win 11 already?

 

[punctualturn]

Guys, I don't think TPM is the the issue here. It's a processor requirement set so high that PC's designed and sold with Windows 10 cannot be upgraded to Windows 11. Mine is a Microsoft Surface Book which only ever has and only ever will have Windows 10 installed completely supported by Windows 11 except by the age of the processor.

Currently there are 883 Intel processors and 369 AMD processors supported by Windows 10--that's changing to 586 and 179 respectively (source). That represents a 34% and 51% reduction of CPUs supported by Windows 11. Microsoft is intentionally cutting off old users trying to get them to buy new PCs because in the past decade processor speeds became fast enough for all foreseeable general computing requirements.

Thats what I said but was called a conspiracy theorist nutjob.

 

[Nobina]

Well, people have been warned, I can't blame Microsoft for this one. You signed up to be a beta tester you should understand things like this can happen.

I don't understand why people even want to install Windows 11, it's not like there are notable improvements. Guess it's cause it's "new", people can't resist new.

 

[Geralt]

Well, people have been warned, I can't blame Microsoft for this one. You signed up to be a beta tester you should understand things like this can happen.

I don't understand why people even want to install Windows 11, it's not like there are notable improvements. Guess it's cause it's "new", people can't resist new.

Direct 12 storage.

 

[Tantor]

I guarantee that Microsoft is rummaging through all your photos, personal files and more. Just like Apple recently did.

TPM has little to do with your security. It has everything to do with access to your computer.

 

[Wrinkle]

Ok now I can see the *final release* strictly adhering to all the nonsense MS has been trying so hard to convince everyone cannot be done except at a hardware level.

But people on the insider's program are supposed to be your beta testers. In fact, most of the success of your October launch hinges upon proper testing and I'm sure 99.9999999% of the issues those testers might find wouldn't be related to a lack of TPM 2.0 on their hardware....Yet you're turning them away.

Is like they *want* Windows 11 to fail at this point: upgrading at October would be a bigger liability than just switching to Linux at this point.

Well, it's common sense not to upgrade right away. Let the early adopters be the guinea pig.

About the upcoming failure of Windows 11 - it won't happen. New systems will have it and systems that can be upgraded will be upgraded. The world will keep on turning and in a year or so it's business as usual for Microsoft.

 

[Dimitriid]

Well, it's common sense not to upgrade right away. Let the early adopters be the guinea pig.

About the upcoming failure of Windows 11 - it won't happen. New systems will have it and systems that can be upgraded will be upgraded. The world will keep on turning and in a year or so it's business as usual for Microsoft.

It entirely depends on what you consider "failure" Because if we just go by how many system installations Windows manages to basically force on systems by dealing directly with system integrators and manufacturers well they haven't actually "failed" at all since 1995 if you ask me.

But if you think about public perception and how many rogue users just stay on the previous version intentionally well we have 98 users refusing Millennium, XP users refusing Vista, Seven users refusing 8 and I suspect we'll have a lot of 10 users refusing 11.

Whenever that's ultimately important and to your point, it's up to interpretation. If it's not hurting "sales" then it doesn't really matter what users think and use.

The only other point that I would mention is that there's a real push now by Apple with the M1 stuff that seems to be capturing a decent chunk of the consumer space. And maybe that's ultimately ok for Nadella mind you: I wouldn't be surprised if all the decisions that are driving Windows 11 are designed to secure and capture the enterprise market first and foremost and if consumer/home users decide to start switching to Linux or macos well, they sill need 11 for work stuff and they'll know offer a convenient, ready-to-go-anywhere 11 Virtual Machine so it's not a bad plan if that's the case if you ask me.

 

[gamerk2]

Direct 12 storage.

You are aware that RAM exists right? All the tech will result in is shorter load times, given load times are just the result of copying data into RAM (so you don't need to access the HDD nearly as much in game). There will be no measurable in-game performance impact.

Seriously, Direct Storage and it's Sony equivalent will improve performance little more than the Xbox One's cloud processing [which I called out as BS from the beginning].

 

[cliffordcooley]

But if you think about public perception and how many rogue users just stay on the previous version intentionally well we have 98 users refusing Millennium, XP users refusing Vista, Seven users refusing 8 and I suspect we'll have a lot of 10 users refusing 11.

It's worse than that for me. My journey with MS stops at Win10. I will continue using Win10 until my hardware completely fails. At that time MS will be a thing of my past.

 

[dragosmp]

It entirely depends on what you consider "failure" Because if we just go by how many system installations Windows manages to basically force on systems by dealing directly with system integrators and manufacturers well they haven't actually "failed" at all since 1995 if you ask me.

But if you think about public perception and how many rogue users just stay on the previous version intentionally well we have 98 users refusing Millennium, XP users refusing Vista, Seven users refusing 8 and I suspect we'll have a lot of 10 users refusing 11.

Whenever that's ultimately important and to your point, it's up to interpretation. If it's not hurting "sales" then it doesn't really matter what users think and use.

The only other point that I would mention is that there's a real push now by Apple with the M1 stuff that seems to be capturing a decent chunk of the consumer space. And maybe that's ultimately ok for Nadella mind you: I wouldn't be surprised if all the decisions that are driving Windows 11 are designed to secure and capture the enterprise market first and foremost and if consumer/home users decide to start switching to Linux or macos well, they sill need 11 for work stuff and they'll know offer a convenient, ready-to-go-anywhere 11 Virtual Machine so it's not a bad plan if that's the case if you ask me.

I too think this will be a Vista / 8 moment - just a point release dressed up as a full release with some arbitrary requirements which enthusiasts dislike. I have to wonder what's their "vision", to shove Teams down our gullets?

 

[DrSuess]

Guys, I don't think TPM is the the issue here. It's a processor requirement set so high that PC's designed and sold with Windows 10 cannot be upgraded to Windows 11.

I bet the real reason the processor requirements are so high is that those older processors have security vulnerabilities that cannot/won't be fixed. Any security fix would require microcode from Intel/AMD and also BIOS/UEFI updates from the motherboard manufacturer, none of these companies would want to spend money or engineering resource to fix a 5 or 10 year old product.

Microsoft has been carrying software mitigation code for many of these old and obsolete processors which have caused performance hits and unnecessary code complexity from all of the possible branching that is done based on which processor you are running.

What they are doing is likely bad for business but it would simplify maintaining Windows and making it more secure not having to carry around legacy support of systems long obsoleted. Apple has been doing this for years, I have a Mac Book Pro that is stuck and an OS a couple of OS generations ago because Apple obsoleted my laptop. Apple got less grief when they told their users we are switching from Intel to ARM buy a new computer to get these sets of new functionality that will never be available on your Intel system.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

I bet the real reason the processor requirements are so high is that those older processors have security vulnerabilities that cannot/won't be fixed. Any security fix would require microcode from Intel/AMD and also BIOS/UEFI updates from the motherboard manufacturer, none of these companies would want to spend money or engineering resource to fix a 5 or 10 year old product.

Microsoft has been carrying software mitigation code for many of these old and obsolete processors which have caused performance hits and unnecessary code complexity from all of the possible branching that is done based on which processor you are running.

What they are doing is likely bad for business but it would simplify maintaining Windows and making it more secure not having to carry around legacy support of systems long obsoleted. Apple has been doing this for years, I have a Mac Book Pro that is stuck and an OS a couple of OS generations ago because Apple obsoleted my laptop. Apple got less grief when they told their users we are switching from Intel to ARM buy a new computer to get these sets of new functionality that will never be available on your Intel system.

That's a great theory that doesnt hold up at all. Intel has chosen to support some kaby lake CPUs, msotly mobile and HDET parts. The desktop parts and a majority of the laptop parts are left to rot. These use the same CPU cores as the approved models.

Similarly, zen and zen + are the same core, zen + has numerous tweaks for both stability and pereformance, particularly in the memory controller. However the core design is largely identical. And the most recent meltdown-esq vulnerability affected both zen + and zen 2, supported models, but not the unsupported zen 1.

It should be noted that not only does linux run ona ll this (and much older) hardware, but manages to do so while consuming fewer system resources and allowing for the same type of encryption without all these restrictions. MS isnt doing this to simply its codebase, as W11 is nearly identical to 10. It's doing this to drive hardware sales, which means more OEM $$$ for windows licenses.

 

[p51d007]

I never install pre-release software on my "current" computer, but opt to run it on a
VM, just to play with it.

 

[passwordistaco]

Win 8.1 bitches if your CPU is too new, and 8.1 isn't EOL until 2023. Win 11 bitches if your CPU is too old. MS really doesn't want people using Windows.

 

[Jblazsek]

Well I have a spare laptop a Surface Book 1 purchased in 2015 with an Intel 6th generation processor. I signed up for the Insiders and it said my pc didn't meet minimum specifications. Well I waited until the ISO came out and I downloaded and created a bootable flash drive. Well Sunday I noticed the reminder in my task bar there were updates and I went to setting and Windows Update. Guess what the doesn't meet requirements was gone and the option to update to Windows 11 was there. I clicked on it and it upgraded with no issues. It was very seemless and even my camera verfication login works. I haven't had alot of time to play with but it looks good.

 

[wiyosaya]

I bet the real reason the processor requirements are so high is that those older processors have security vulnerabilities that cannot/won't be fixed.

I think this is a "yes, they do, but" moment since many of those require physical access to the computer. The only one that I can think of that is potentially damaging is "Plundervolt" since it apparently dumps UHD Blu-ray encryption keys that could be used to hack the UHD blu-ray scheme. Even that has, supposedly, been mitigated with microcode/BIOS updates.

Most people, though, don't live under bridges and have computers - which would be a situation where their computer is definitely at risk. And if a company has unauthorized people in its data center, IMO, it has far worse security concerns.

Any security fix would require microcode from Intel/AMD and also BIOS/UEFI updates from the motherboard manufacturer, none of these companies would want to spend money or engineering resource to fix a 5 or 10 year old product.

Microsoft has been carrying software mitigation code for many of these old and obsolete processors which have caused performance hits and unnecessary code complexity from all of the possible branching that is done based on which processor you are running.

IMO, this is still no excuse to be forcing hardware upgrades to move to Windohs 11.