Intel Kaby Lake and AMD Zen processors to only support Windows 10 and Unix

HOW does a CPU NOT support an older operating system, it just carries out a bunch of instructions?

 

Just because it is not officially "supported" doesn't mean windows 7 won't work, just won't be able to complain if you have problems. Just a clever way to trick everyone into buying new windows 10 licenses.

 

Good, i find this as a positive notion. This will allow to get maximum optimization for latest system and provide ease for both developers of OS and Software to optimise it in order to make it work optimally, instead of wasting resources trying to make it compatible.

Windows 7 is old and dated, besides using it for work on some older application / machine GUI's e.t.c. that were not updated for YEARS (same as some companies using Win 95/ 98/ ME/ XP, for that same purpose) there is absolutely 0 reasons for not moving to New OS - Win X in our case.

While i personally probably wont upgrade to 7700k processor, and rather wait for next 10nm generation, a lot of people will upgrade, and i see this as a great benefit for them!

 

I agree. It's likely that Windows 7 and 8.1 could still work with the new processors, you just won't be able to use any of the new instructions. However, the CPU will probably not be recognised by the OS either, seeing as Windows does load CPU 'drivers' which mostly relate to microcode etc. Look under device manager, processors, you will see that for Intel (example) that there is intelppm.sys for Intel CPU's, and amdk8.sys or amdppm.sys for AMD processors.

If you run Windows 7 or 8.1 with Kaby Lake or Zen, it will likely just mean you will see a yellow exclamation mark in the device manager. I'm not sure what happens in this case, quite possibly you won't have access to anything but the base required extensions? If they did add support for these devices, as long as the new instructions don't affect registers then it will be possible. I don't believe any of the new instructions on Kaby Lake or Zen require a new kernel like was required with AVX, neither support AVX-512 from what I know of (that will be added later to the standard CPU's).

In any case, even if they did add 'support' for it on Windows 7 and 8.1, they won't go to the extent of adding support for other new features of the CPU and motherboard. They gain nothing doing so, and support for Windows 7 and 8.1 has been pretty good considering almost any other company would have dropped support from them pretty much straight after a new version comes out apart from security updates.

 

It'd be nice if Windows 10 supported my rather expensive external soundcard, which it doesn't...

 

If you build a totally new Windows machine, I reckon Win10 is the only way to go at that point anyway, with dx12 games increading rapidly, and ultimately new software and hardware shifting to it. Those who didn't upgrade their old license during the free period knew what they were doing, likely far better than many of those who did just because of the incessant MS nagging.

 

Remember that a lot of people have zero interest in games and DX12..

It's of course good if MS can focus on fewer OS but it's far from optimal to be forced to "upgrade" for a huge number of people.

 

Move to cripple steam OS I reckon?

 

Who cares about a 7 years old Operating System? I mean, move on guys...

 

The issue is not really with the CPU vendors, but with the OS support for the new and upcoming hardware features and extensions (power management, new instruction sets, IGP, etc.), i.e. things not concerning baseline capabilities. As long a CPU architecture is labeled "x86-compatible", it can boot and run any software from the last 30 years. As the CPUs become more like SoC, with a lot of closely integrated functionalities, sharing common resources (memory, caches, machine states), the older operating systems will not be worth the investment to bring all those "peripheral" goodies to them. For the most, it will simply be impossible.

Windows XP will run fine on Zen and KL, just with most of the advanced features sitting idle and unused. Only benefiting from whatever incremental improvements are made to the baseline ISA (memory, cache, branch prediction and op's execution).

 

I am sure enthusiasts will find a way to make it work if they want to use W7. Windows 7 refused to install on Skylake already, showing nonsense error about optical drives while in reality it requires a simple USB 3.0 drive integration into installation media..
Some features like new instructions will probably be not supported.
AFAIK Windows 10 is already the only Windows version that support Intel Speed Shift debuted in Skylake CPUs.

 

with change in instruction set supported and removal of old one so the OS think it is not a CPU made for him...

Remember the drama when nearly all OS were needing 100% SSE to work and AMD Athlon have only partial??? now no one complain neither on M$ Windows or Linux. (more recentely with Pentium Anniversary despite patched on windows just after)

 

To me what it boils down to is not just CPU compatibility and optimization with older OSes but down to Motherboard manufactures creating drivers for the old Oses like Windows 7. There has to be a cut off point somewhere. I think when ever users decide to upgrade their cpus to either a Kirby-Lake cpu or a Zen cpu they may want Windows 10 because there is nothing wrong with it after certain tweaks are applied.

 

I could understand if we were talking about old OSes not being supported by Zen and Kaby Lake, like Windows 98 or XP.

But one would expect support for recent OS like Windows 7, 8 and 8.1. These OS are still being used by millions of people, especially Windows 7.
How can it be that the only supported OS is only one year old?

This is clearly a scheme from Microsoft to force users to upgrade to Windows 10. I wouldn't be surprised if there is some kind of deal made under the table, where MS was paying AMD and Intel to end support for OS that are not Windows 10.

 

Windows 7 is getting rather old. There's no reason why they should support ancient relics.

 

Windows 7 was released in 2009. It's not even a decade old. It's just 7 years old.
We have never seen an OS losing support for new CPUs this fast.

This is just Microsoft being anti-consumer.........once again.

 

This is Bull**** story. It's not going to happen. There are countless reasons why not. Doesn't take a genius to understand.