Windows 11 on unsupported PCs won't receive OS updates

[Humza]

In context: Microsoft recently updated the minimum requirements for installing Windows 11 and rolled out an improved PC Health app for Insiders. While a couple of Intel chips made the cut, the company has said that users with CPUs absent from its officially supported list would still be able to manually upgrade to Windows 11, either by running the Windows Media Creation Tool or with the official Windows 11 ISO. The catch? These PCs won't receive Windows Updates.

Windows 11 is expected to launch publicly this fall as Microsoft continues to make adjustments to minimum system requirements for the OS. The company recently expanded hardware support by adding several CPUs to its Intel compatibility list.

Although PCs running on older hardware will be ineligible for an official upgrade, users interested in running/checking out Windows 11 would still be able to upgrade/install the OS through manual, offline means. The company recently started rolling out Windows 11 ISOs for Insiders to ease the installation process, which will also be helpful once the final version releases. The only downside of going this route is no future OS updates from Microsoft.

The company told The Verge that it won't block the manual upgrade path for unsupported PCs; however, such devices won't receive Windows Updates and could also be barred from getting security patches and driver updates.

Although this option allows users with older PCs to check out and explore new features in the OS, potentially convincing them to get a Windows 11 compatible machine -- inline with Microsoft's recommendation -- their devices won't get feature updates and could become vulnerable once security flaws and bugs around Windows 11 start surfacing.

Even if such users ultimately decide to roll back to Windows 10, they still have peace of mind until 2025, which is when Microsoft will stop supporting the older OS.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/91007-windows-11-unsupported-pcs-wont-receive-os-updates.html

 

[Hardware Geek]

No OS updates or security patches. Yeah, sounds like a good idea to "upgrade" to Windows 11.

 

[Dimitriid]

Just in case you had any doubts about Microsoft not wanting your money this time around if you're an enthusiast or commit the sin of still using a perfectly good PC built in 2017 well, there you go folks.

Seriously at this point the thin foil hat person in me is thinking Microsoft *must* be being heavily lobbied by hardware manufacturers that just want perfectly good systems to go into a landfill somewhere.

 

[Nobina]

My PC supports Windows 11 but I don't.

 

[hahahanoobs]

No OS updates or security patches...

..with incompatible hardware.

Makes complete sense.

 

[aqteh]

It will just flop like Windows Vista with no people supporting it

 

[Plutoisaplanet]

I can already see it now: someone is going to create a Windows updater tool to automatically manage Windows patches on PCs unsupported by Windows 11. I’m guessing it’ll probably be Stardock just because they tend to support people who want to use Windows in ways Microsoft doesn’t want its users to.

 

[Achaios]

M$ claim to care about PC security but they will leave PC users running CPUs they have decided not to support w/o security updates.

GG.

 

[Uncle Al]

Sounds like just another great reason to move to Linux ...... and I'm happy I did!

 

[m4a4]

That... sounds like a great deal. I hope if I run Windows 11 I can trick it into thinking my hardware is "incompatible" until I want to do a bunch of updates lol

 

[Mike M]

Admittedly, I've had both my desktop (i7-7700K w/ 32GB RAM and Z270 chipset) and laptop (Dell XPS 13 9350 with Skylake and 8GB RAM) for a while now. However, they run everything I need them to with ease. While I've already been looking at laptop replacement this up-coming holiday season, I was hoping my desktop would last a bit longer. I just returned from military deployment and was fortunate to find that even though my Asus Prime Z270-A didn't have a BIOS update yet, I did find I could activate pseudo-TPM 2.0 in existing BIOS and pass the "WhyNotWin11" test. My processor is the only hardware showing as not compatible. Same goes for the laptop. Hopefully, more testing will change this. Otherwise, I'll either stay on Windows 10 for a bit longer until component prices come down (especially graphics cards) or switch over to a Linux distribution and hope they have equivalent software to what I use now.

 

[madboyv1]

TBH, outside of allowing companies to be able to install it in a test environment to check for software/hardware compatibility, allowing anyone to force the install with the MCT but not actually supporting it seems -almost- negligent...

But yeah I agree with @Plutoisaplanet that someone will probably make a updater tool that'll help you pull updates from the Update Catalog, or something.

 

[Sausagemeat]

So MS are actually enforcing hardware standards for their new OS. Personally I think that’s a good thing.

 

[DjoCoeur]

It's stupid to force users to upgrade to a newer computer when there is a shortage of all kinds of hardware worldwide that is going to last for possibly another year or two. There are some seriously retarded people at M$

 

[TheBigT42]

I can already see it now: someone is going to create a Windows updater tool to automatically manage Windows patches on PCs unsupported by Windows 11. I’m guessing it’ll probably be Stardock just because they tend to support people who want to use Windows in ways Microsoft doesn’t want its users to.

https://download.wsusoffline.net/

Hopefully this will work with Windows 11

 

[Rocky4040]

So what they are saying is if I decide to go with Windows 11 on my i7 2600K I won't get Windows 11 updates. Heck yea where do I sign up for this lol all joking aside though. They talk the talk of making everything so secure and all that but then say oh but if you put our shiny new Windows 11 on a system we deem not compatible you are out of luck with security patches uhm WHAT.

I'm thinking if they are so worried about security they would be allowing security patches to keep everything safe for when we ravage the internet on these PC's lol. Sounds like they will be back tracking again before Windows 11 is released with the oh we thought about it and oh boy what the frack were we thinking when we said at least 3 quarters the PC's on the internet won't be getting updates because we goofed and tried to force people to upgrade perfectly good PC's just so everyone that makes and sells PC's can make a lot of extra bucks.

I guess they do not mind all of those PC's hitting the landfills as well if everyone actually decided to throw out their perfectly working PC's just because MS decided your CPU was not good enough for their shiny new Windows 11.

I already had Windows 11 preview installed on my system on a back up SSD drive and it worked just fine and there was no performance issues at all on the system it ran just as good as Windows 10 does for me now. Yes the i7 2600K@5.1GHz OC I have does not support the newest features for the security they want in Windows but hey it is really none of their business what I choose to run or not to run if they want to buy us all new PC's then heck yea lets get those Windows 11 installs all going.

By the way Windows 11 only lasted on my PC for 6 hours before I pulled the SSD drive out and hooked my Windows 10 SSD back up. I found so many things in Win 11 very redundant and just not user friendly by the ways they choose to make getting to some of the menus and daily things we do just a lot harder to get to and find. Don't even get me started on the start menu they have now it is even worse than Windows 10 start menu and that was bad enough

But hey love it or hate it Windows 11 is here to stay I guess but I for one won't be upgrading my PC just for the sake of running a new OS when I know for a fact my current setup can run it just fine.

 

[defaultluser]

M$ claim to care about PC security but they will leave PC users running CPUs they have decided not to support w/o security updates.

GG.

Yeah it's unlike any previous windows revision!

Every previous Windows release has been runnable and supported on older hardware than official. This is the first tim I've looked at Microsoft, and mistaken them for Apple (not good for their future).

 

[dragosmp]

I can already see it now: someone is going to create a Windows updater tool to automatically manage Windows patches on PCs unsupported by Windows 11. I’m guessing it’ll probably be Stardock just because they tend to support people who want to use Windows in ways Microsoft doesn’t want its users to.

WSUS should work just fine, if it comes to this.

Haven't I read the original declaration is that MS "reserve the right to withold automatic updates"? How did that morph into "will stop updates" not sure. Not will, may, and not updates, but automated updates. The way I read it, you'll click Win, tap updt / enter, refresh and you can manually install updates in 11 like the good old XP days when you had an update only if you wanted to. What's there not to like? Might have been dreaming, but don't think so, only wish I could find the reference.

 

[Rdmetz]

No OS updates or security patches. Yeah, sounds like a good idea to "upgrade" to Windows 11.

Why not? 99% of you complain about the updates anyways and go out of your way to break them so they won't work.

Now MS is doing us and you a favor.

 

[Rdmetz]

Just in case you had any doubts about Microsoft not wanting your money this time around if you're an enthusiast or commit the sin of still using a perfectly good PC built in 2017 well, there you go folks.

Seriously at this point the thin foil hat person in me is thinking Microsoft *must* be being heavily lobbied by hardware manufacturers that just want perfectly good systems to go into a landfill somewhere.

It's more about drawing a hard line in the sand somewhere and trying to cut off the most security vulnerable issue and help is live forward in a world where security is in a position that doesn't leave so many vulnerable to the types of attacks we've Seen as of late.

I say it's good if you're hardware is 4+ years old just stick with 10 til you're ready for new hardware.

 

[Rdmetz]

So what they are saying is if I decide to go with Windows 11 on my i7 2600K I won't get Windows 11 updates. Heck yea where do I sign up for this lol all joking aside though. They talk the talk of making everything so secure and all that but then say oh but if you put our shiny new Windows 11 on a system we deem not compatible you are out of luck with security patches uhm WHAT.

I'm thinking if they are so worried about security they would be allowing security patches to keep everything safe for when we ravage the internet on these PC's lol. Sounds like they will be back tracking again before Windows 11 is released with the oh we thought about it and oh boy what the frack were we thinking when we said at least 3 quarters the PC's on the internet won't be getting updates because we goofed and tried to force people to upgrade perfectly good PC's just so everyone that makes and sells PC's can make a lot of extra bucks.

I guess they do not mind all of those PC's hitting the landfills as well if everyone actually decided to throw out their perfectly working PC's just because MS decided your CPU was not good enough for their shiny new Windows 11.

I already had Windows 11 preview installed on my system on a back up SSD drive and it worked just fine and there was no performance issues at all on the system it ran just as good as Windows 10 does for me now. Yes the i7 2600K@5.1GHz OC I have does not support the newest features for the security they want in Windows but hey it is really none of their business what I choose to run or not to run if they want to buy us all new PC's then heck yea lets get those Windows 11 installs all going.

By the way Windows 11 only lasted on my PC for 6 hours before I pulled the SSD drive out and hooked my Windows 10 SSD back up. I found so many things in Win 11 very redundant and just not user friendly by the ways they choose to make getting to some of the menus and daily things we do just a lot harder to get to and find. Don't even get me started on the start menu they have now it is even worse than Windows 10 start menu and that was bad enough

But hey love it or hate it Windows 11 is here to stay I guess but I for one won't be upgrading my PC just for the sake of running a new OS when I know for a fact my current setup can run it just fine.

I think the point isn't to try and guilt you into an upgrade its more to hopefully keep you where you're at til you're ready for an upgrade to a properly secured system.

Look I get it not everyone can afford the latest and greatest but if by 2025 you're still trying to use a 2600k well... I don't know maybe try sell g plasma if you need a "new pc" so bad but can't put off a few hundred bucks for some new hardware.... I'm kidding but really I grew up with hardware that was almost useless after 3 years and was painful to use at 4+ now these days its great that we use hardware as long as we've been able to but I also feel people have some mindset that we should be forced to support stuff for 10+ years when in reality that just adds to all the ransomware/malware/vulnerabilities we've seen as of late.

If you're comfortable using hardware that's more open to these types of attacks then you just need to accept that includes being stuck with o/s that aren't going to be nearly as secure or up to date as the ones designed for better more secure hardware.

It's still your choice and no one is forcing you to upgrade but if you yourself admit your hardware can't be nearly as secure because it's missing key features that make it secure well then you've already kinda accepted that this is something youre ok with.

 

[Rdmetz]

It's stupid to force users to upgrade to a newer computer when there is a shortage of all kinds of hardware worldwide that is going to last for possibly another year or two. There are some seriously retarded people at M$

Whose forcing you to upgrade? I know plenty of people still using 7 and even know of some who swear by xp.

No one's forcing anything you can say they make make you WANT to upgrade but by no means are they forcing you to.

Just because two parts of your mentality (wanting the cool new features/os while also sticking with cheaper and older hardware) don't line up with Microsofts plans doesn't mean they are FORCING anything... Except to say maybe trying to force security to be better as a baseline for the future.

 

[Rdmetz]

Admittedly, I've had both my desktop (i7-7700K w/ 32GB RAM and Z270 chipset) and laptop (Dell XPS 13 9350 with Skylake and 8GB RAM) for a while now. However, they run everything I need them to with ease. While I've already been looking at laptop replacement this up-coming holiday season, I was hoping my desktop would last a bit longer. I just returned from military deployment and was fortunate to find that even though my Asus Prime Z270-A didn't have a BIOS update yet, I did find I could activate pseudo-TPM 2.0 in existing BIOS and pass the "WhyNotWin11" test. My processor is the only hardware showing as not compatible. Same goes for the laptop. Hopefully, more testing will change this. Otherwise, I'll either stay on Windows 10 for a bit longer until component prices come down (especially graphics cards) or switch over to a Linux distribution and hope they have equivalent software to what I use now.

What exactly is it that you think you NEED to upgrade to windows 11 for anytime soon for?

Like you said your current software needs are met so if and when windows 11 isn't working for you what's the problem?

10 is still there and according to you meeting all your needs now so even if you can't ever upgrade to 11.... Why's that an issue?

Just use your current hardware and software til your needs change just because there is a new shiny os doesn't mean you need it.

MAYBE you can say something 4 or 5 years from now but do you honestly think it's OK to be mad that at almost 10 years old hardware would no longer be getting support is a problem?

By god by this point I think anyone could manage to pull out some kind of upgrade in almost a decade.

 

[Rdmetz]

M$ claim to care about PC security but they will leave PC users running CPUs they have decided not to support w/o security updates.

GG.

They didn't tell you to go install a non supported os on your system did they?

 

[Rdmetz]

So MS are actually enforcing hardware standards for their new OS. Personally I think that’s a good thing.

Yup!

Anyone who doesn't is only looking at this from a selfish "but I want the new shiny without spending anything" mentality.

They are giving you plenty of room to stay where you're at til your ready to upgrade to properly supported hardware and by the time any real support for your hardware is fully dead the said hardware will be almost a decade old.

If you're still using it at THAT point well I just think that's on you and more of a personal choice than anything else.