Latest Intel, AMD chips won't support Windows versions earlier than Windows 10

I don&#x27;t get what the big deal is. Does Linux add support for newer Intel and AMD chips in old kernels? No. Does Apple add support for newer Intel and AMD chips in older versions of Mac OS? I&#x27;m sure no. So why does Microsoft have to do something the other companies aren&#x27;t doing either? I mean it&#x27;s not like they actively prevent older Windows versions on running on these chips, it&#x27;s just that they don&#x27;t add support for the newest chip features.<p>Sometimes when I see these newspapers bashing Microsoft I question whether they even think about what they are writing before pressing the publish button. Headline: Microsoft is doing what all other OS companies are doing too.

<p><pre><code> Microsoft chooses not to support new Intel &amp; AMD chips in Windows versions earlier than 10. </code></pre> The title makes it the fault of chip makers. Isn&#x27;t it just a software problem?

Slightly mis-leading headline....bug it&#x27;s direct from the register. tldr; the headline should read &quot;Windows 10 is the only Windows OS that will support latest processors.&quot; Guess MS is tired of supporting 30 years of hardware with each OS release. Hopefully that&#x27;ll free them up a bit to do more interesting stuff.

To get an idea of what kind of grief arises from a legacy kernel on significantly newer hardware: XP doesn&#x27;t know how to save and restore AVX register state across context switches. The cpuid instruction doesn&#x27;t look at the OS, so AVX is detected as being available, but it doesn&#x27;t work right. (This has been an actual problem for crypto code in Firefox.)

In HN, the headline currently reads:<p><pre><code> Latest Intel, AMD chips will only run Windows 10 and Linux, BSD, OS X </code></pre> But on thereg it reads:<p><pre><code> Latest Intel, AMD chips will only run Windows 10... and Linux, BSD, OS X </code></pre> The ellipsis implies that Intel&#x27;s and AMD&#x27;s chips run other OSes too. In fact, according to thereg, they&#x27;ll run &quot;homebrew kernels&quot;, which I&#x27;m glad for. I don&#x27;t want to be limited to Windows and Unix-derivatives. I agree with commenter jcbeard that the headline should be changed to &quot;Windows 10 is the only Windows OS that will support latest processors&quot;, or something similar.

Windows 7 is now in extended support. Microsoft are 100% within their rights to not support the new CPUs on it.<p>But not adding Zen and Kaby Lake support to windows 8.1 is a little weird, it still has 16 months of mainstream support.

After having used windows 10 for about a year, I feel confident in saying that if you don&#x27;t want to use Windows 10, it is better to switch to Linux or something else you like, than using clearly inferior versions of windows. Most people want to stick with 7 just because of nostalgia, and it&#x27;s good that intel is cutting them off.

When the AMD Opteron came out in 2003, did Windows 95 run on it? I don&#x27;t think so.<p>Windows 7 is seven years old. It&#x27;s just a reality that commercial software that old doesn&#x27;t get support, unless you&#x27;re an enterprise customer willing to pay for the privilege.

All I want is an operating system to game on that doesn&#x27;t spy on me and advertise to me and force me to do things or disallow me to do what I want. I sure hope WINE has gotten better in the past couple years because I refuse to put up with this Windows 10 bullshit.

When microsoft is done shooting off its own feet, I&#x27;ve got a bridge to sell them.<p>But I&#x27;m all for win10 atm. I just bought a new dirt-cheap netbook. The push for Win10 meant that even the cheapest of netbooks requires the muscle to run win10. The fact that mine never even booted into that OS is beside the point. Rather than a machine that runs win10 poorly, I&#x27;ve now got a very nice little linux mint box ... and a pile of Win10-related stickers.

But new x86 chips are backward compatible. What will happen if I install windows 7? Will Microsoft introduce a kill switch or am I just not going to take advantage of the new features?

&gt; Why is Microsoft doing this?<p>&gt; Windows 10 must succeed at all costs. It&#x27;s Windows 10 or bust. If you&#x27;re buying a flash new machine, what a superb way for Microsoft to shoehorn its latest operating system onto it; that&#x27;ll really help inflate its usage numbers.

So loading win 7 ahould be no problem, it just won&#x27;t be supported any longer?

Won&#x27;t happen. Microsoft has made threats like this before, and backed off at the last minute.

Will the next Intel &amp; AMD chips support Windows 10, or will we see a similar planned-obsolescence dance again?<p>I&#x27;m asking to see whether this is part of a larger trend where compatibility is falling by the wayside or whether this is an isolated incident to kick the world up to modernity, and I am fully aware that it is difficult to predict the future.<p>IMO Windows 10 really is an atrocious piece of software and forcing it onto people could backfire.

<i>One example of Microsoft holding back support is the xHCI USB controller in sixth-generation Skylake and seventh-generation Kaby Lake: Windows 7 doesn&#x27;t support that USB hardware, so installing the operating system from a USB stick using those chips is tricky. Intel provides xHCI drivers for Windows 7 once it&#x27;s up and running.</i><p>As far as I know, the xHCI spec is freely available, and so are the DDKs that let you write your own drivers (or perhaps port them from Linux), so I don&#x27;t see anything stopping the enthusiast community from doing that, besides maybe (currently trivially circumventable, but who knows...) driver signing, and if my past predictions are any indication, that will likely happen.<p>Ironically, there are already xHCI drivers for <i>DOS</i>: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.georgpotthast.de&#x2F;usb&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.georgpotthast.de&#x2F;usb&#x2F;</a>

What a pain in the ass for people doing OS compatibility testing

It is the other way around Microsoft wont support Windows 8.1 and older on newer processors.

Does this mean<p>a) older Windows versions will not run at all on those chips?<p>b) older Windows versions will still run but cause some problems?<p>c) older Windows versions will run without problems or performance impediment compared to old chips but some new features are not supported?<p>d) everything will work just as well but when problems occur Microsoft won&#x27;t provide official support?

Cortana will force herself inside your hardware whether your willing or unwilling.<p>This is an interesting move and I wonder if these companies will back track under pressure from corporate. Is this just a matter of a few drivers built by AMD, Intel or Microsoft? I don&#x27;t know.

Bit of a tangent, but that was a surprisingly readable article for TheRegister. They seemed very clickbaity with CAPITAL LETTER WORDS scattered around not so long ago. Are they now back to this more reasonable style in general or was this a fluke ?

&gt;&gt; Microsoft loves Linux! Right?<p>&gt; Right.<p>Do I detect a note of sarcasm?

All I&#x27;m reading is that my next upgrade will see me move to Linux full time.

And what about Windows Server?

Seems like there&#x27;s a market for a tiny hypervisor.

Fix the title please, lets not bring clickbaits on HN.<p>Newest Intel &amp; AMD chips will not work with any Windows version below 10.