Windows 11

[Mike_P]

Maybe they think laptops are dominant and the life of a laptop is usually quite short, my latest is now using a separate screen permanently after accidentally volleying it across the room when I caught its plugged it power lead. The separate screen is amazing in its resolution compared to the laptops own so in no hurry to fix it. The previous still works but it's casing shows signs of melting and it weighs a lot. The previous to that died eventually after having wine split on it and the two before both gave up shortly after adding more memory to them, a lesson learnt there seemingly.

 

[Rezillo]

There's no confirmation of it and im theorising but i suspect W11 could get more nefarious yet. Currently there are a list of "supported" CPU's required to run windows 11, some as have been pointed out aren't that old. There is nothing stopping W11 from not supporting/dropping support for 3 year old processors in 2025 etc that are yet to be sold, Not too unlike the current mobile phone market. Yes, your old android device will still work when the manufacturers drop support for your 2-3 year old phone, but will become vulnerable to security flaws that won't be patched... That is essentially how W11 works now. My PC has TPM, secure boot, 48 gb RAM and has 16 cores and 32 threads is more than powerful to run W11, but is not "supported". A wasteful trend that does a big curly poo on the environment...

MS are claiming this is all down to cpus that don't support the security requirements for Windows 11. From The Register:

"The quick summary is that the Windows 11 has a new security baseline similar to the Secured-Core PC security baseline, including hardware root of trust via TPM (Trusted Platform Module] 2.0, Secure Boot, hypervisor-protected code integrity (HVCI) and hardware-enforced Stack Protection.

Virtualization Based Security (VBS) is now a requirement, as explained by director of OS Security David Weston here. In other words, features that were optional in Windows 10 are now on by default – which means that hardware that does not support them blocks installation.

It is hard to shake off the suspicion that pressure from OEM partners to encourage a hardware refresh was a factor in the reasoning, despite some merit in the arguments about security and performance

In an interview with CRN, Weston said that "if you make things optional, people don't turn them on … what we put into 11 is [that] we are going to secure you by default."

Another element in the system requirements, Weston explained, is that hardware features like mode-based execution control (MBEC), which improves the performance of HVCI, are specified to prevent performance issues – though users remain puzzled about the exclusion of Intel's 7th generation processors which do support MBEC".

The Register is clearly sceptical but unwilling to fling too much mud as it admits there are some merits to MS's case.

 

[Alex321]

Personally, I will never install a new major version of Windows until it has been out for at least a couple of months.

Let the early adopters find the bugs & glitches, and let MS fix them before I take it up. I used to also follow the rule somebody mentioned above of never going to an odd numbered version, but I'm not sure that holds any more.

 

[MontyVeda]

Personally, I will never install a new major version of Windows until it has been out for at least a couple of months.

Let the early adopters find the bugs & glitches, and let MS fix them before I take it up. I used to also follow the rule somebody mentioned above of never going to an odd numbered version, but I'm not sure that holds any more.

Even MS avoided W9

 

[fossyant]

Maybe they think laptops are dominant and the life of a laptop is usually quite short, my latest is now using a separate screen permanently after accidentally volleying it across the room when I caught its plugged it power lead. The separate screen is amazing in its resolution compared to the laptops own so in no hurry to fix it. The previous still works but it's casing shows signs of melting and it weighs a lot. The previous to that died eventually after having wine split on it and the two before both gave up shortly after adding more memory to them, a lesson learnt there seemingly.

I know a good place that fixes laptops - just dropped mine in after the cat threw a glass of red wine over the keyboard.

 

[numbnuts]

Just tried it on my old laptop windows 10 is OK

 

[presta]

MrsPete's HP laptop is just under a year old and it must be set to auto update as it just started doing it when she opened it yesterday morning.

Mine's HP, it powered up with an update icon on the task bar which was the same as the usual one except that the dot was blue instead of orange. I just selected the 'Stay with W10' option.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

I know a good place that fixes laptops - just dropped mine in after the cat threw a glass of red wine over the keyboard.

Did the cat want white?

 

[Scotty55]

Downloaded the update checker last week and it said my PC met all the specs for running Windows 11 (which I knew it probably would; it's a beast of a machine) EXCEPT it couldn't find a TPM chip. Thought that was a bit odd, as I bought it only 2 years ago and I thought those had pretty much been standard for ages now.

Checked the UEFI/BIOS just to make sure it hadn't merely been disabled and no, that reports "No Security Device" as well. Maybe the company that built it for me (it was a high-end gaming rig) decided not to add one?

Anyway, I guess it means I'll be staying with Win 10 for a while yet then. Which is fine with me, as I tend to skip odd versions of Windows - had 98, missed ME, had XP, missed Vista, had 7, missed 8, now on 10... when's 12 coming out?

Check online how to enable the TPM chip. I had to go through my BIOS setup to do that (google your device and TPM setup).

I've installed W11 but, apart from the taskbar centring itself, I can't say I've noticed any difference at all.

 

[SpokeyDokey]

Just installed today - not had much chance to runnage around tbh but first impressions are that it looks ok and as ever MS have made much ado about nothing for the end user. I'm definitely not going to go gaga over the rounded corners...

Maybe all the fancy stuff is behind the scenes eg security improvements etc.

 

[Mike_P]

I did fit the one I split wine on with a replacement keyboard, quite simple and YouTube if full of videos on how to fix whatever laptop of whatever problem. Around a year later the internal charging circuit to the battery failed, I assume the red wine corroded something over time.

 

[Smokin Joe]

I think a lot of people could well be tempted to give linux a whirl once support for W10 stops,

Linux is still a million miles away from being plug in & play, far too geeky for most people.

 

[mjr]

Linux is still a million miles away from being plug in & play, far too geeky for most people.

The main reason people don't realise that Windows is still a million miles away from being plug in & play and far too geeky for most people is that it usually comes preinstalled. That's part of why these major version upgrades are so disruptive and even upgrades are usually much much simpler than fresh installations.

 

[sasquath]

Has Linux yet overcome the need to command it to mount a newly connected device every time it is connected?

About a decade ago...

 

[sasquath]

Ethically, Windows 11 not "officially" supporting 3 year old hardware is a huge mistake in a time where most are getting more conscious about waste. Whilst there are workarounds, most menial pc users will likely swallow the hit of new hardware to ensure they're up to date and wash their hands with it. People will jump to microshafts defence and say its about security. Well, it is convenient but likely optional and unnecessary. Security holes caused by old cpu microcode is rare. Some might be aware of the spectre meltdown issues affecting some intel cpu's made around 2011-16 ish. This was fixed with a microcode update and to this day there is no evidence anybody exploited this security hole. Frankly, this level of security flaw is the least of Windows problems regarding security of users data. The cynic in me would suggest this all one big stuffed brown envelope exchange between the large pc hardware manufacturers...

Windows 11 exists only to justify new laptop sales.
Dell/hp and other big OEMs were getting push back on saleswith customers saying they don't need new computers as 5-7 year old ones are still going strong and running latest software.
So Microsoft resurected previously scrapped project and released windows 11 that isn't officially running on older hardware.