Microsoft kills hope old PCs will run Windows 11 as death of world's most popular OS nears

Microsoft has just shattered any hope that older machines that don't meet the requirements for Windows 11 will get some leeway leading into the official ending of the world's most popular operating system.

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Windows 11 was released three years ago, and when the new operating system became available, users were faced with a slew of hardware requirements in order to upgrade. One of the biggest hurdles for users to get around was the Trusted Platform Module (TPM) hardware requirement, which is a hardware-based security requirement that resides within a motherboard or CPU processor. Most modern PCs shipping today automatically ship with TPM 2.0, making them Windows 11 eligible, but that doesn't help millions of machines with older hardware that don't meet the specification.

Microsoft explains in a recent blog post that TPM 2.0 will be required for how it integrates into the security side of a system, with The Verge explaining features such as Windows 11 like Credential Guard and Windows Hello for Business, BitLocker disk encryption, and Secure Boot, are all being helped by TPM 2.0. Microsoft even goes as far as to write, TPM 2.0 will be "a non-negotiable standard for the future of Windows," which means Microsoft won't be going back on any of its hardware requirements for Windows 11.

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Why is that a big deal? Microsoft is currently in a pickle as the adoption rate for Windows 11 has been much lower than that of previous generations of operating systems. It was only a few days ago that I reported Windows 11 lost customers while Windows 10 gained customers. Additionally, Windows 10 currently holds 61.8% of the OS market, with Windows 11 holding 34.9%. Continuing at this current pace of adoption, by the time Windows 10 support is cut off in October 2025, there will still be hundreds of millions of Windows 10 users now no longer receiving critical security updates, exponentially increasing the security risks to each affected machine.

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Microsoft will be leaving its customers out to dry on an outdated operating system, forcing its customers to upgrade their system or pay for continued security updates to what Microsoft considers outdated hardware. Moreover, experts have estimated that Microsoft severing support for Windows 10 could result in as many as 240 million PCs ending up in landfills due to customers upgrading and disposing of their now obsolete machines.

As we approach October of next year, Microsoft will likely increase the frequency of its upgrade reminders for Windows 10 customers. The company has already started rolling out various advertisements for Windows 11 by baking them into the Windows 10 operating system. These will likely increase in quantity, along with other Windows 11 advertisements, as Microsoft will need to push as many Windows 10 users over to Windows 11 before the cut-off date.