Here Comes Windows 11....

[Bobby Henderson]

Apparently, Microsoft has pulled the Health Check (haven't tried it yet, but I read it somewhere yesterday). Also, apparently, the whole thing got so much backslash, they're now, apparently, also considering to support "a select number of 7th generation Intel CPUs that conform to their ideas about 'security'.", whatever that may be...

My guess is Microsoft got a reality check on just how much of the user base is relying on aging or really old PC hardware. It's now pretty common to find PCs that are over 10 years old in both office and home environments. It sounds like the TPM 2.0 and Secure Boot requirements would not only knock out all of those users, but also quite a few people who consider their computers still fairly new. We're many years removed from the 1980's and 1990's when PCs were replaced more frequently.

I personally don't care if I'm unable to install Windows 11 on any PCs I currently use. Obviously other people feel different about the issue and want to be able to upgrade their existing PCs. I think Microsoft is possibly looking at much greater levels of backlash in 2025 when they're scheduled to end support for Windows 10.

Most of us understand any computing device in general has a limited life span. Nevertheless, many people buy a computer in the same mindset as they would buy a TV set or some other kind of home appliance that can deliver 20 or more years of use. They get pretty angry if something forces them to replace a device that otherwise seems to be working properly. They look at the "upgrades" as nothing more than ploys to make more money. Honestly, that is part of the deal for Microsoft and other PC vendors. They're not going to stay in business if the customer base has to buy a product only one time ever.

The big elephant in the room here, at least from my perspective, is Adobe, which never really committed itself to the Linux desktop. Even back when Flash was somewhat relevant, they never managed to deliver a single good release of their player for Linux, let alone a 64-bit version.

From Adobe's point of view Linux has all kinds of problems. First: there is the previously mentioned issue of all the different versions of Linux out there. That fractures the potential Linux customer base into multiple smaller pieces. Which distro(s) do you support? Second: a pretty big chunk of the Linux user base is hardcore about open source ideology and want people making applications for Linux to do it all open source. There is no way Adobe is going to give away applications like Photoshop, Illustrator or After Effects for free.

Then we get to add in the variables of new CPU types and having to write code native for them. Adobe is a huge company, but even they are having to move slowly, application by application, creating M1-native versions of their applications for Mac OSX. And they're having to maintain the Intel versions for at least the next couple or so years. That's a fairly big burden. I could just see Linux getting even more scattered if there was Intel, ARM and other CPU code bases for various distros.

Maybe we only see Linux on the desktop getting hold when the desktop itself has become a mostly irrelevant concept, but stuff like this Windows 11 thing may just be the push it needs to drive enough people away from Windows, into a completely new ecosystem. You can see how quickly stuff can change, while Microsoft may be the dominant player on the desktop market by far, they're all but irrelevant in the mobile OS space as of now and it's not like they didn't throw billions and billions of dollars at it. Sure, they were late to the party, but I also blame part of the failure simply due to the fact that people simply didn't trust Microsoft.

The mobile phone market and desktop computing are two completely different paradigms. Mobile phone users didn't need anything from Microsoft there. Google and Apple managed to consolidate much of the mobile space to themselves. I vaguely remember Microsoft's attempts there; IIRC, it was a mess. At first the devices appeared to be aping the Blackberry or other handsets with less or more physical buttons. Once Google and Apple were running away with the market it was too late for Microsoft to adjust.

The advantage Microsoft has on the desktop is their position is historically entrenched going all the way back to the days of MS-DOS.

When anyone uses a personal computer for any significant amount of time they'll develop a growing collection of files. Some files might be simple media files that can be viewed in different applications, different operating systems or even on mobile devices. But other files are often dependent on a host application to open and edit. That's where Microsoft and other commercial software vendors like Adobe really build their leverage.

Asking a computer user to switch OS platforms can be one hell of a big ask. The user's applications have to be available on that alternative platform. And the versions of those applications on the different OS need to be able to open the user's existing files accurately. That's not so easy. Little things like font files can gum up the works there. For most computer users the act of switching to a different platform is often more trouble than it is worth.

[Marcel Birgelen]

Apparently, Microsoft has pulled the Health Check (haven't tried it yet, but I read it somewhere yesterday). Also, apparently, the whole thing got so much backslash, they're now, apparently, also considering to support "a select number of 7th generation Intel CPUs that conform to their ideas about 'security'.", whatever that may be...

They're not going to bother for a variety of reasons. Here's the two most obvious ones:

I'd say it depends on the company and their underlying strategy. The big elephant in the room here, at least from my perspective, is Adobe, which never really committed itself to the Linux desktop. Even back when Flash was somewhat relevant, they never managed to deliver a single good release of their player for Linux, let alone a 64-bit version.

Then there is Microsoft itself, but interestingly, Microsoft is increasingly adopting Linux into its own stack of solutions, going even so far as releasing a MS SQL for Linux, that actually seems to work better than its counterpart on Windows. This is all server-side, so it doesn't hurt Microsoft's desktop business, but nevertheless, those are striking developments.

Another thing that's severely lacking on any relevant Linux distribution is integration into corporate networks. This is were Microsoft stole all the good ideas from Novell NetWorks and integrated it directly into Windows. Even though Novell became a major player in the Linux ecosystem, they never managed to deliver anything compelling to replace the Microsoft domain and policy infrastructure. This is what eventually caused Microsoft to become a dominant player in the corporate and enterprise networks infrastructure and where it largely remains till this day...

First, Linux is not an OS that is consumer friendly. The insult that Windows is a "toy OS" is really a double edge sword that turns into a damning judgment against the marketing potential to sell Linux to the general public. Linux has an image ofA being only accessible to hardcore computer geeks. Any casual user should not even dream of attempting to try. A great deal of the Linux user base even cultivates and promotes this for experts only image. Well, here's the thing: the overwhelming majority of the world's computer users are not experts at all. It's scary to consider how many don't even understand how to organize files and folders in the computer's file system. I think Microsoft and Apple understand this dilemma very well, perhaps even more so for Apple. If a potential customer is scared of using the product that person is not going to buy it or use it.

Yes, many Linux distros were notoriously hard to install, but if you look at one of the biggest current distros: Ubuntu Linux for Desktop, then there is nothing really hard about installing it and using the out-of-the-box functionality provided within, at least if the hardware is fully supported. Honestly, the experience may even beat Windows 10 in many aspects, one being the fact that the installer automatically pulls the latest packages from the Internet during installation and you don't need to go through 5 separate update/reboot loops for example.

Things start to go south once hardware isn't fully supported and you need to start tweaking around with stuff. It's not like this can't happen with Windows, but most people get their computers pre-loaded with Windows on top of it and hardware suppliers make sure their hardware at least works with the then-current iteration of Windows.

Second: there are too fucking many different distros of Linux out there. They're not all compatible with each other. Why can't there just be one Goddamn standard for Linux? Software companies do not have endless amounts of resources to be able to develop applications for multiple operating systems. Many can't even go beyond just developing for Windows. Making a Mac OSX version is too big a burden for many firms. In the graphics market I look at Corel and their CorelDRAW application as an example. They can't even keep up to speed with their Windows version (Adobe is running circles around them, providing far more frequent updates to Illustrator), much less fix the bugs that are present in their fledgling Mac OSX counterpart. Adding a Linux version would be a bridge too far for that company. Even Adobe had only fleeting amounts of experimentation with UNIX variants in the 1990's and did away with it going into the 2000's.

Personally, I totally agree, although many people in the community say that having many distros and many choices is part of the "freedom". In my opinion: An operating system should just work. Not having to mess around with nitty gritty details that should be trivial and having more time to do other stuff, that's what I consider freedom. It looks like the community is maturing though and there now is a more common understanding that less is sometimes more. Many distributions are being abandoned and there is a pretty strong consolidation going on right now, with Ubuntu and Debian being strong favorites.

Maybe we only see Linux on the desktop getting hold when the desktop itself has become a mostly irrelevant concept, but stuff like this Windows 11 thing may just be the push it needs to drive enough people away from Windows, into a completely new ecosystem. You can see how quickly stuff can change, while Microsoft may be the dominant player on the desktop market by far, they're all but irrelevant in the mobile OS space as of now and it's not like they didn't throw billions and billions of dollars at it. Sure, they were late to the party, but I also blame part of the failure simply due to the fact that people simply didn't trust Microsoft.

[Martin McCaffery]

"That might work with a really old car."

Well, it was about 40 years ago;>

[Bobby Henderson]

I don't think needing to know how to change your transmission is a very good analogy. That might work with a really old car. With any newer vehicles the DIY garage mechanic would need some speciality tools made only for that brand of vehicle and access to the computers made only for that brand of vehicle. This nonsense has even filtered into commercial vehicles like big rig semi trucks. That limits DIY garage mechanics to doing only basic maintenance tasks, such as changing air filters. And even that can be a big pain depending on the vehicle model, which is one reason why I drive a pickup truck (more room under the hood, parts are easier to replace, etc).

It's much easier to build a custom desktop PC from parts bought individually or do things to service a desktop or notebook computer. Unfortunately, OEMs have been doing things to make products with fewer components that are user-serviceable. This is especially true for a growing number of notebook models. They're doing sleazy things like soldering the RAM and other components onto the motherboard. If something breaks in a MacBook Pro the customer will likely have to ship it off to an Apple-certified repair center, and pay top dollar for the repair work. More OEMs that sell Windows-based notebooks have been copying Apple's moves in recent years.

40 years ago it took a bit more careful planning and paying attention in order to work with and manage files on a computer running MS-DOS or anything else with a command line rather than a graphical user interface. And that's what I really don't understand with so many people these days who can't figure out how to manage their files in Windows or Mac OSX. The Finder or Windows File Explorer isn't all that hard to use.

[Martin McCaffery]

I remember very early on in the personal computer age, pre-DOS, pre-Mac, I heard a computer guy on a talk radio show, pitching the glory of personal computers. He said "You need to know how to program your computer like you need to know how to change your transmission."
I still think that is about 90% correct and would be perfectly fine with most personal computer owner/ operators. Just make the damn thing work the way I want it to.

[Frank Cox]

Linux/Unix is designed with the idea that you have a system administrator. Your system administrator sets up your computer for you and you, as the user, use that computer in the way that it was set up for you. End users were never intended to be able to do things like installing new software, updating the operating system and the like. As a user you use the programs, and if you need another program you tell the system administrator. It's a great paradigm for the office since the receptionist and the machinist won't be screwing up the computers that are on the desk.

When you bring Linux home with you, now you can't just be the user. You also have to be your own system administrator, which requires at a modicum of know-how.

I can set up a computer for grandma to use to check facebook and read email from the grandkids. It'll be perfectly suited to the task at hand, she'll be happy with it and I can come back in a year and the thing will still be working just like and look just like it did the last time I saw it.

On the other hand, "I want to play the latest games and install random crap from the Internet." That's not going to work well with Linux unless you know what you're doing.

[Bobby Henderson]

Software developers really should step-up their game and make their stuff work under Linux.

They're not going to bother for a variety of reasons. Here's the two most obvious ones:

First, Linux is not an OS that is consumer friendly. The insult that Windows is a "toy OS" is really a double edge sword that turns into a damning judgment against the marketing potential to sell Linux to the general public. Linux has an image of being only accessible to hardcore computer geeks. Any casual user should not even dream of attempting to try. A great deal of the Linux user base even cultivates and promotes this for experts only image. Well, here's the thing: the overwhelming majority of the world's computer users are not experts at all. It's scary to consider how many don't even understand how to organize files and folders in the computer's file system. I think Microsoft and Apple understand this dilemma very well, perhaps even more so for Apple. If a potential customer is scared of using the product that person is not going to buy it or use it.

Second: there are too fucking many different distros of Linux out there. They're not all compatible with each other. Why can't there just be one Goddamn standard for Linux? Software companies do not have endless amounts of resources to be able to develop applications for multiple operating systems. Many can't even go beyond just developing for Windows. Making a Mac OSX version is too big a burden for many firms. In the graphics market I look at Corel and their CorelDRAW application as an example. They can't even keep up to speed with their Windows version (Adobe is running circles around them, providing far more frequent updates to Illustrator), much less fix the bugs that are present in their fledgling Mac OSX counterpart. Adding a Linux version would be a bridge too far for that company. Even Adobe had only fleeting amounts of experimentation with UNIX variants in the 1990's and did away with it going into the 2000's.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

I ran lots of stuff under VM Ware when I had my server rack back in SLC> But scaled down now and have two workstations and a NAS.I have no intere4st in Wind Blows 11, just like I avoided Wind Blows 10 as long as I could. But I know it's a lot different for you.

[Rusty Gordon]

Just wanted to update everyone on what I had mentioned about not being able to upgrade Windows 10 to Windows 11. First, I did finally do this successfully. Something on the machine was corrupt to start with. For months it has not worked with the PIN instead of the password at startup. Trying to set up the PIN again repeatedly failed. Also, it would not install the latest Windows 10 updates including multiple failures installing the features update to move from 20H2 to 21H1. It would not let me remove any prior updates. Finally, I used a backup dated just after installing 20H2, then, I successfully updated from Windows 10 build 20H2 to build 21H1 using the manual Windows update manual you can download from Microsoft. After successfully installing that last Windows 10 build, I moved on and successfully installed Windows 11. The virtual machine with Windows 11 is setup with 8 GB RAM and a 256 GB Drive. I'm just now at the stage where I am testing everything, but it all seems to work fine.

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

Have not tried either notebook yet and probably won't bother. I am in.a similar situation with my workstation. But it did not tell me why. I am.just going to.ignore 11 like I did 10 for as long as I can.

[Marcel Birgelen]

But did it pass?

My notebook did pass, but my workstation, a 4-CPU 16-core-per-chip Xeon affair, didn't, because the 1.5 year old CPUs are "unsupported"...

[Mark Gulbrandsen]

If you want to check if your current Windows system is compatible with Windows 11, you can install the Microsoft Health Check app.

I tried Health Check on mine. It says I have a 1TB SSD which I do not. I actually have 1TB 3.5" HGST drives on a hardware raid 1. It also says my computer is three years old and it's more like eight... So much for their "Health Check"., it's not very Healthy!

[Marcel Birgelen]

If you want to check if your current Windows system is compatible with Windows 11, you can install the Microsoft Health Check app.

[Marcel Birgelen]

Well, it looks like a fairly large number of computer users will not be able to upgrade to Windows 11 when the update is released later this fall.

The minimum system requirements are going up: a minimum of at least a dual core 64-bit CPU, 4GB of RAM, at least 64GB of storage space and a graphics board or chip set compatible with DirectX 12.

Here's the kicker: Windows 11 will not install if the PC lacks a security chip that supports Trusted Platform Module (aka TPM) version 2.0. It's a device that's designed to store login information. Not all PCs have such a chip, especially PCs that are more than 5 or so years old. Of the PCs that do have TPM capable chips, many of those chips will have to be turned on in the computer's BIOS settings. Windows 11 will also require Secure Boot.

People are keeping personal computers longer than ever. I strongly doubt the hardware requirements for Windows 11 will make a difference. Anyone who is satisfied using an old PC that seems to be working just fine will not be in any hurry to upgrade.

Combine this with the current hardware shortage and you'll see how much incentive there will be to upgrade: Zilch. I guess Microsoft will start reversing their decision soon enough, or people will just stay on Windows 10 for the foreseeable future, just like many just stayed with Windows 7 as long as they could.

Software developers really should step-up their game and make their stuff work under Linux. Dick moves like invalidating all hardware older than 4 years or so for your newest, most shiny OS is not going to go down well with people and they will look for alternatives. This whole TPM combined with secure boot limitations. has been a pain in the butt for too long too. It's just a way closer for those big companies to take your control away.

[Rusty Gordon]

I run Windows on VMWare Fusion on my Mac. So far I have successfully clean installed Windows 11 twice, but I have not successfully upgraded any Windows 10 virtual machine. After going through the process to completion (takes about 30 minutes) it begins the "installing updates" phase then reboots with a "Rolling back your machine to its original state." message. Then it returns to Windows 10 unchanged. Researching this suggests there is a problem with software on the system that is incompatible with Windows 11. So far nothing I have seen is.

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