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Why Intel Kaby Lake and AMD Zen Will Only Be Optimized On Windows 10 (hothardware.com)
MojoKid writes: There was quite a stir caused recently when it was determined that Microsoft would only be fully supporting Intel's Kaby Lake and AMD's Zen next-generation processor microarchitectures with Windows 10. It's easy to dismiss the decision as pure marketing move, but there's more to consider and a distinction to be made between support and compatibility. The decision means future updates and optimizations that take advantage of the latest architectural enhancements in these new processors won't be made for older OS versions. Both of these microarchitectures have new features that require significant updates to Windows 10 to optimally function. Kaby Lake has updates to Intel's Speed Shift technology that make it possible to change power states more quickly than Skylake, for example. Then there's Intel's Turbo Boost 3.0, which is only baked natively into Windows 10 Redstone 1. For an operating system to optimally support AMD's Zen-based processors, major updates are likely necessary as well. Zen has fine-grained clock gating with multi-level regions throughout the chip, in addition to newer Simultaneous Multi-Threading technology for AMD chips. To properly leverage the tech in Zen, Microsoft will likely have to make updates to the Windows kernel and system scheduler, which is more involved than a driver update. Of course, older versions of Windows and alternative operating systems will still install and run on Kaby Lake and Zen. They are x86 processors, after all.
When the fuck did /. start posting shit that is nothing but some douchenozzle sucking MS's cock!?
stll not upgradng to it , f U
I can think of two other operating systems, other than Windows 10, that will "Optimize" Kaby Lake processors, but I'll leave it as an exercise for the student to figure out which ones they are.
just a ghost in the machine.
Still a better love story than Twilight.
Windows 10 NSA Edition and Windows 10 Plebeian Edition?
There are no other operating system than Windows 10. It is The One, The Only, The Nadella.
I love seeing actual tech articles on /. as much as any other old timer but this one is scraping the barrel. A proprietary software vendor won't be changing some code on their older version of the operating system they sell. Does this really qualify as newsworthy?
Put another way, if Apple didn't support some piece of new hardware on Mavericks could even the most diehard Apple fanatic find that interesting?
On second thought, it actually reads more like some type of shill marketing piece to sell more copies of this particular manufacturer's latest operating system. Who knows these days with all the creative astroturfing going on. Any exposure is good exposure I guess.
"Of course, older versions of Windows and alternative operating systems will still install and run on Kaby Lake and Zen."
So, basically, the whole fuzz about compatibilty is moot and amounts to little more than nada... OK then.
After all, while Win10 will have those performance improvements, they will most likely be negated by all the spyware bullshit installed by the integrated adware/data mining system.
Next news story please.
Well Linux started supporting the new CPU features six months ago. Probably earlier inside Intel - when you're wanting to test your new CPU features before you release the CPU, you can either wait for Microsoft to use them in Windows, or do it yourself in Linux.
I know that was done with x64, AMD ported Linux's existing 64 bit support, then a few years later Microsoft released 64 bit Windows.
Can we phrase this the other way that doesn't make Microsoft look good? Just say Windows 8.1 and older will not get updates for Intel Kaby Lake and AMD Zen.
We expect most modern OSes to do these kinds of upgrades. Only calling out Windows 10 makes it seem like these are somehow special windows features, when they are nothing of the sort. Linux already has patches available for Intel's Turbo Boost 3.0, and that's just the first example I searched for.
The summary makes a good, logical-sounding statement as to the state of OS optimizations with these new chips. Anyone who's followed the release of new CPU feature sets could tell what was going to happen this time around (new features are only supported in newer OSes), and that's what we're seeing here.
The bigger question, IMO, is support. Specifically driver support. Will Intel and AMD release drivers for older OSes (mainly Windows 7/8)? I'm not looking to get support for any new features in these processors. I'm looking to make sure I'll be able to run these chips with the accelerated functionality I'm used to having (using AHCI instead of ATA compatibility mode, using the onboard/integrated graphics functionality instead of the VGA driver, etc.).
That is the question I'm looking for answers on.
This thing needs to be pulled apart and examined from a slightly higher level.
First of all, it is HIGHLY UNLIKELY that these chips do not support Windows 7 or 8 outright. Intel and AMD, despite their apparent lobotomy, will only shoot themselves in the foot if they start making x86 architecture backwards-incompatible. Indeed, the fact of the matter is that this is the one thing they bring to market that ensures their dominance. Additionally the processor itself is unlikely to be able to specifically lock on to Windows 7 or 8 and refuse to run because of that.
Furthermore, Windows 7 or 8 out of the box CANNOT recognize these new chipsets and CANNOT refuse to install because of them. If someone sucks down all the updates Microsoft throws at them, there may well be a Win 7 update that deliberately bricks it somewhere down the line. But if you keep updates off Windows 7 will not commit suicide on behalf of Microsoft, at least not in this manner.
What is more likely is that things like the chipset drivers are not going to be backported. Does this mean inherent incompatibility? The answer for that is unclear. It is likely, IMO, that it will run, but with degraded performance, e.g. a lot of the onboard goodies may not work. I doubt that it is so obsessed with specific drivers that everything will be disabled. For instance, I imagine USB 2.0 will work but 3.1 might not. It is also possible that there may be attempts by users to backport the drivers, which may or may not be successful. In terms of the need for a next-generation kernel, if the chipsets are so incompatible that they REQUIRE new drivers to operate, and there is no way around that, even by using legacy protocols and drivers, then yes, only a next-generation kernel will run on it. However, that strikes me as unlikely (although it's possible, at least in theory).
Now, is any of this absolutely for certain? No, not really; the only way to test that out is to actually attempt to install it.
In terms of virtualization, unless Intel has put in some kind of anti-virtualization sabotage to shoot down Windows 7 (which again would be difficult for the processor to detect), it is unlikely that it will work.
In terms of Secure Boot, that IS a problem, but it is an entirely separate problem that, in theory, applies to all recent UEFI machines. It may very well cause serious problems for Linux installations. I've heard some references to a signed version of GRUB, but I think that there is a serious danger of Microsoft cooking up ridiculous reasons for refusing to sign binaries for anything they dislike. Additionally I recall hearing on at least one occasion about needing everything in the boot loader's chain to be signed (e.g. drivers). I do not know how they would manage that once the kernel is running, but if that is the case then that is a significant problem, and any machine which Secure Boot cannot be disabled on is as such essentially Microsoft-owned hardware.
Ultimately what this boils down to is part sabotage and part FUD with Intel and AMD being willing co-conspirators with Microsoft, and essentially participating in collusion. I'm not sure why Intel and AMD are so loyal to Microsoft, though; Microsoft has demonstrated it has no loyalty to x86, and has done so repeatedly over the years (see: Windows Phone, Windows NT for Alpha, etc.). Microsoft is the filthy whore you really don't want to get in bed with. You'd think after contracting leaking dick so many times before they would have figured this out by now.
"Why Intel Kaby Lake and AMD Zen Will Only Be Optimized On Windows 10 "
that is misleadingly worded.
correctly speaking m$ will only optimize windows 10 for these processors. they can optimize their older os to these, if they want to, but will not due to costs, etc.
similarly any other os can optimize for these processors, if they want to. there is no prohibition for doing that.
why editors at /. want to word this only from m$ pov leading to misleading readings(in at least 2 summaries dealing with this issue) is puzzling.
When I hear or see the word "turbo", my first thought is of this Far Side cartoon.
#DeleteChrome
$subject
for not going out of their way to support Win 7. That market is only going to shrink, and the core market for new processors is an enthusiast likely to be running Win10 already. It's like Mac users who say they're 20% of the market. Yeah, but that 20% isn't really the market. The market for Mac users is the ones that won't just go out and buy a cheap Windows PC to run their PC apps...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Windows 10 can go to hell. I'd rather switch to MacOSX or Linux, either way, both -SIGNIFICANTLY- less shit than Windows 10. Fuck that noise
This is just plain wrong. You could very easily make an OS that uses a whitelist of CPUID responses and PCI probe responses and refuses to install/boot on anything else. CPUs provide features for detecting/identifying generations, it would be easy enough to abuse this to make an OS refuse to install/boot on a chip that was released after it.
I'm not saying any mainstream OS does this, just that it's by no means impossible, and pretending that it's impossible just makes you look uninformed/ignorant.
First of all, it is HIGHLY UNLIKELY that these chips do not support Windows 7 or 8 outright.
Anyone who reads the title of this story can figure that out, as it has to do with optimization and support of new features.
I couldn't think of a good reason for me to stay on Win 7 (if you're into hard core Strategy games there's lots that don't run on Win 10, when I say hard core I mean the grand scale hex based ones with menus that look like they were drawn with old Win32 libraries :) ) but other than that it's solid and the few Directx 12 games I have (the Gamecube/Wii emulator Dolphin & Killer Instinct) run great even on my 5 year old A10-5800k (which wasn't that great in 2011 when it launched). About the only thing I really don't like is being able to go file->new->new folder. They changed the short cut and it drives me nuts.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Fuck you both and Microsoft makes three. I'll stick with older generation architecture until you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
There is no guarantee a later generation of processor will even work with an earlier OS, either due to quirks of a previous generation's architecture that the OS took advantage of, or due to unexpected regressions in the chip which made it into production (Like those mobo failures on both intel and amd's part that lead to floppy controller and other 'legacy OS' breakage so DOS wouldn't run properly on anything post AM2/late LGA775.)
> Of course, older versions of Windows and alternative operating systems will still install and run on Kaby Lake and Zen. They are x86 processors, after all.
Either a naive one or a liar.
Been there, done that.
First, it was SSE2 and now came a time when my AMD will no longer work, despite having a reasonable processing power and enough RAM available.
Soon, two things will happen:
1. Older Windows and "alternative" OSes won't do certain things. Just now that Linux starts to get better at a lot of games, they move to position Windows as unfairly faster. I can imagine future recommendations to use W10 to get more performance, just because it's a closed party and Linux was not invited.
2. Your computer will be just like my AMD one. Even people with W10 won't get the new features on their older PCs and will hear: just get a newer computer and it will fly...
This is a UEFI rehash, but this time they got bolder and think they can get away with it...
You computer
No worries, Win7 will work fine for years to come on KVM.
Grandparent did not say it was impossible.
Grandparent said that as-shipped Windows does not do this, and as a result cannot refuse to install. Patching the software may result in this, in fact, becoming the case, but this has nothing to do with patched systems, just systems being installed with software straight out of the box.
Microsoft will have another Windows version out before this actually gets to market.
Sad thing is if I guessed "WIndows 10 Anniversary Edtion" and "Windows 10 sold by some pirate on the street in China" either would outsell your guesses by orders of magnitude...
Not the first time - Microsoft only fully supported the Pentium Pro, Pentium II and descendants on their server line of software.
Windows XP was stuck on 4GB even when the hardware could support more in MS Server 2003, linux and all the rest.
Annoying as fuck, a step backwards and one reason a Win2k machine in my workplace (two sockets and 6GB) was kept on Win2k for well over a decade.
For those without a clue who want to challenge this, at least look up PAE so you don't look so stupid when you do so.
One thing Kaby Lake is supposed to provide - that is an advantage to Windows 10 users at least - is fairly secure hardware DRM.
Not making a political statement either way, but Kaby Lake will allow UHD (4K & maybe HDR) video playback on new Windows 10 devices. Might as well have a good reason to upgrade to Windows 10, without this (or other DirectX/game motivation) why would anyone bother?
What, as opposed to non-simultaneous multi-threading, I.e. single threaded. Is that what the old chips had then?
You need to know how Microsoft operates to understand this. Once a release of Windows is "done", its support is handed over to Sustained Engineering organization. This org is where you go if you can't make it at Microsoft proper. They simply have neither the capability nor the desire to add new features to operating system versions you can't even buy anymore.
Consider also that the vast majority of "normal" people only update the OS to a new release when they buy a new computer. So support for newer hardware by older OSs is not as huge an issue in the real world as it is here on Slashdot.
Windows 10 ? No.
Linux.
aaaaaaa
as it says windows 10 is the only version being updated.
Other than the gamer community which seems to be Windows-focused - and I'm not one of you - who gives a bubbly-fart? Anything beyond W7 is utter nonsense and I use Linux for everything other than a very specific DAW app for which I use a W7 dual-boot arrangement. Fuck everything W8+!!!!
It is as simple as this: These new CPUs have integrated GPUs. I do believe these GPUs are fully DirectX 12 compatible. DX 12 only works on Windows 10, while Windows 7 supports DX 11. This is most likely the majority of the "support" and "optimizations" in Windows 10 for these new CPUs. The GPUs will still operate win DX 11 mode, just with a few new features disabled.
You could very easily make an OS that uses a whitelist of CPUID responses and PCI probe responses and refuses to install/boot on anything else.... I'm not saying any mainstream OS does this...
Actually OSX does do this I believe. That's why you never see Hackintoshes running better CPUs than you can find in actual shipping Apple Macintosh hardware -- even when they are available.
One day, son, Microsoft will bankrupt itself to oblivion. That day we will celebrate as our new global Independence Day.
You could do that for a future OS, but can you patch an old OS to reject current (new) processors? If you did patch it to do that, would anyone install those patches?
Learn to love Alaska
never heard of osx and linux ?
Because Intel won't provide drivers for the new CPUs' integrated peripherals.
Last time I checked chipset drivers for Intel are maintained by Intel them self. Only relevant M$ driver I can think of that would be affected is the ACPI. So pretty much all the work and cost supporting Windows 7 would be done by Intel.
No disrespect intended to MojoKid, but this story about Microsoft being unable to optimize pre-Windows 10 Operating Systems for older processors is outright nonsense.
I've been working with the "Windows NT" family of operating systems [i.e. the codebase that Microsoft developed after they grabbed all the VMS OS Programmers from Digital] since NT3.51. Since that OS release, as this Microsoft Knowledgebase article shows https://support.microsoft.com/... Microsoft's 32-bit [and now 64-bit] Windows offerings included a proper Hardware Abstraction Layer. In other words, it is possible for Microsoft to replace the HAL for Windows 7, 8 and 8.1 with one that is entirely compatible with these latest Intel and AMD chips. In fact, this story is almost laughable, given that the HAL was designed and conceived specifically to allow for seamless transition between successive generations of processor platform.
For example, Microsoft Windows NT 3.51 actually introduced support for the PowerPC processor [the Motorola/IBM design that evolved into the CUBE processors that are found inside PS/3s]. In order for Microsoft to be able to support NT3.51 on two hugely different processor architectures, they needed a way of maintaining a very complex codebase easily. The HAL was the answer. By abstracting away the details of the low-level hardware and having the basics of the OS "Windows Services" call an internal API, Microsoft made it possible to maintain a single block of source code [above this watermark] that was then compiled down onto each architecture. This is the whole point of abstraction layers.
This is an old Microsoft trick, previously used to great effect with the "DirectX" scam, in which Microsoft would wait for a new generation of GPUs, then introduce a new edition of DirectX to take account of the enhanced functionality of the GPU silicon, only to not back-port that DirectX release to older OS versions [thereby forcing gamers to upgrade]. Over the last few years the gaming market has shifted away from PCs and on to either consoles or portable devices [tablets and phones], so there is less demand for gaming on PCs: consequently, Microsoft needed a new incentive to force OS upgrades - and this is it.
Microsoft would love for you to forget about the HAL. The problem is that the world has moved on. 10, 15 years ago, the Wintel hegemony relied upon new Windows features to drive the latest generation of hardware sales. All that is now upside down. People don't care about the OS; they are using portable or cloud applications anyway, so now the "wow factor" is driven by the latest generation of hardware - see what effect new Apple product has. Microsoft have learned from this, so now they are using new processors as pull-through to forcibly migrate users on to Windows 10, to try and discourage them from porting their retail license copies of Windows 7, 8 and 8.1 onto latest-generation hardware.
It's perfectly OK for Microsoft to do this. It's their code. They can do what they want. I'm not going to rail against them for making a decision that they have a perfect right to make.
What I most definitely DO object to is the deployment of specious half-truths as justification.
After all, all the spyware takes processor cycles. Of course, if you already got the spyware crap into your Windows 8 via "security updates", you are screwed.
Jeeze, the pair of you. Number 1, from TFS:
Of course, older versions of Windows and alternative operating systems will still install and run on Kaby Lake and Zen. They are x86 processors, after all.
And number 2, yes of course an OS could have a whitelist, but as the GP points out, Win7 gold doesn't.
When you know most features on Intel processors works without OS support... it questionable what it is.
Of course it is phrased in a way to say "go get Win10 asap".
Commercially speaking, they say Win 8 and below is obsolete.
Technically speaking, you won't miss much. DX12 on Intel iGPU for example... eye-candy, but limited in performance. OpenGL features will work.
And it's easier for Intel too, less variants of drivers to make for there latest products.
It's a trend globally, from M$ to Android to Apple : less and less and less Software support. Shorter in time (18 months for Android for most phones). They rather sell new / updates / make new versions than support existing customers, or sell renewable licenses. Soon you will pay monthly for everything. Owning is so past, leasing is future.
I know, the header is needlessly gloomy, but haven't we, some time ago, reached the point where advances in HW are no longer all that interesting? There were major excitements when we went from 8 to 16 bit, 32 bits 64 bits; and with the introduction of protected memory (which made pre-emptive multitasking workable) and virtualisation. It's been long since I thought a new CPU feature would be worth upgrading for - it would be great to have more cores and RAM, but it can wait. And while quantum computing, graphene and carbon nanotubes are promising technologies that may boost the speed to incredible heights, I probably wouldn't even notice the difference between a response time of a millisecond and a nanosecond. Yeah, some things would be snappier, but as a consumer, it won't matter enough for me to really care.
The same goes for SW - I haven't seen anything for almost a decade, that I thought I must have. I have all the tools I need and more: editors, compilers, databases engines galore, office packages, several classes of graphics editors (bitmap, vector, ray tracing, ..), I can design fonts that stretch all the way to the far end of Unicode and so on. Of course, because I use Linux, I have all of these things on any HW I am ever likely to encounter (and where they are relevant; I don't at the moment foresee a need for running Oracle or Glassfish on a mobile).
I guess the big question here is - from a consumer's point of view, have we reached the point where a computer is just a computer; an appliance, like a toaster, where they may look different and you may choose one look over another, but actually they just do the same basic thing?
Why would OSX need to support new Intel processors?
Watch this Heartland Institute video
You could very easily make an OS that uses a whitelist of CPUID responses and PCI probe responses and refuses to install/boot on anything else.... I'm not saying any mainstream OS does this...
Actually OSX does do this I believe. That's why you never see Hackintoshes running better CPUs than you can find in actual shipping Apple Macintosh hardware -- even when they are available.
That is untrue. Hackintosh machines are routinely way way more powerful.
No he's right. Windows 7 cannot because it's not programmed with a white list. If it was we would have found out about it a long time ago. Just because a programmer is capable of doing something doesn't mean the GPs content is right on the mark. Windows 7 cannot do this.
And I can say with some faith that any "fell-off-the-truck" version of Win7 and Win8.1 that actually registers ok with MS would outsell either of those by some magnitudes.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The ancients here will remember the IBM of the 1980s. And maaaaybe the early 1990s. A juggernaut that pretty much dictated how you would use computers if you dared to think you would, if you were a halfway decently sized company. Sure, there were petty little startups like that fruity company that created their "home computer" in 1978, but that was stuff a serious business company like IBM couldn't even snicker over. There was no sidestepping them, and they knew it. Anything central processing? Mainframe? It was IBM or the highway.
And they had the attitude for it. They would assess what computer system you "need" (read: what they deem you worthy of), and you could buy this one, and only this one. Provided you had an IBM certified administrator (which was pretty much impossible for anything smaller than, say, IBM to have, so they "lent" you one. Essentially, you paid an additional worker who did essentially nothing but call IBM whenever that crate bugged out. And yes, those calls costed extra). And then you were allowed to run a very specific set of approved software on those machines. Which of course costed extra, what did you expect?
And so on. If you think MS is bad, this was actually worse. By some magnitude of attitude and hubris that is virtually unimaginable today anymore.
Everyone wanted to get rid of them. Literally everyone who had an IBM mainframe was trying anything they could to get out of that adhesion contracts. So when MS came along, it was by orders worse. Actually, what MS delivers today still is. And STILL it was embraced with open arms, mostly because it was "not IBM".
Well, you know IBM today. Makers of pretty good blades and server solutions. And you will still find people today in the higher tech administration levels that will refuse vehemently and "irrationally" to buy anything bearing those three letters. They most likely were around in the 1980s and had to suffer from it.
And hate can sit very, very deeply.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
This absolutely seems to be a Microsoft-Intel marketing position making, after people were annoyed at their monopolistic move announced a few days ago. Mic cannot sell their new OS's if gamers don't have to so they need to make them or others need to. We really don't care unless Intel and AMD takes Microsoft position and don't let other OS's access the new features. And since there is even more money on the other side (Apple>>Microsoft), I dont believe it can happen even if they originally intend to.
Why Intel Kaby Lake and AMD Zen Will Only Be Optimized On Windows 10
Do you mean "only Windows 10 and not any other Windows version" or do you mean "only on Windows 10 and no other OS"?
In any case, the wording is a bit weird. One doesn't optimise a processor. Better would be:
Only Windows 10 will be optimized for Intel Kaby Lake and AMD Zen
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
I know you're being funny because Apple's current product lineup looks like something unearthed from an ancient Sumerian ziggurat at this point, but I have a feeling they aren't quite done with Mac yet, and their A-series SoCs can't get anywhere close to the performance of even the lowest wattage CPU in Intel's x64 products.
Apple might be one of the first large OEMs to ship kaby lake - maybe that's why they took a pass on the current chips?
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Ok, I guess I am.
You don't see Hackintoshes running LESS powerful processors. This is because the OS actually USES the enhancements that they make, and doesn't support 5 different branches for every line of code.
Imagine what would happen tomorrow if Windows 10 started running on ARM processors?
That one was probably trotted out in-front of both of em' in a board meeting at one point.
You have it backwards - it's the Apple hardware that will refuse to boot on an OS released before the hardware shipped, with rare exception. The hardware has a minimum system version in the firmware, and if the OS chosen to boot doesn't meet that, you get a nice grey circle with a slash through it.
By the way, this isn't new behavior - you can go all the way back to System 7.1 on it - some old school 68K Macs couldn't boot unless the System Folder had the proper System Enablers in it, which only shipped with some versions of the OS.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
More than that, good luck patching the Windows 7 Ultimate DVD in my closet combined with a DNS blackhole for the Windows Update server.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Windows 10 is the only Windows now. Older MS OS versions cannot be updated significantly now that the test labs that originally supported them have been replaced by the Windows Insider program. It will take way more than a couple new x86 processor families to change the way MS runs its OS development organization. It's a brave new world. Get used to it, or get left behind.
Is that like getting your airport experience optimized by the TSA?
Intel and AMD can greatly improve their sales numbers when they offer support on older Windows. And even if not, "not optimized" does not mean Win7/8 do not run on these processors.
"Only the latest version of your OS will fully support the new processors!"
No full Zen or Kaby lake support on Linux 2.0.3! Or NetBSD 1.3! Or OS X 10.1!
THE HORRORS!!
None of those are still officially supported. Windows 7 on the other hand still has vendor support until 2020.
OS/2 and CP/M?
I considered pirating Win 10 and putting it on a gaming machine on its own quarantine vlan where it'll only be able to connect to the internet and not the rest of my lan (which is composed of FreeBSD, Xubuntu and Debian machines).
It's not even worth pirating. Yes, I can guarantee a properly installed pirated Win 10 has no third party malware (using official MS disc image for Win 10 pro x64 with verified checksums as well as the KMSPico loader). The problem is, it's full of first party malware placed there by Microsoft.
My buddies who are also software pirates are saying the same thing - Windows 10 isn't worth pirating, and when games require DX12, they won't be pirating them either (they'll just stop playing games).
Good job MS, you have fucked things up so badly that people no longer even want to pirate your shit.
Which is why the TSA is asking people to show up 3 hours before the flight instead of 2 hours...
IF and only IF you didn't already get the updates the bypass DNS.
Sounds like support for the new features requires changes to the kernel, and only MS can make those changes. From the article, it looks like the Intel Turbo features can be worked in with a driver and some management software, but AMD's changes are much deeper.
Want to play with new PC hardware bling? Windows/NSA 10 for you!
Remember also that Apple defensively develops for alternative platforms. Back before Intel Macs, they had an x86 line just in case PPC died suddenly. It would not surprise me at all if they already had people working on these processors (and OSX on ARM or something) just in case.
Which is why the TSA is asking people to show up 3 hours before the flight instead of 2 hours...
Because there is always a bunch of dumbasses that shows up with a freaking van-load of luggage that insists on having it all as carry-on, which takes the TSA drones forever to check. There is also a bunch of dumbasses that wear boots or shoes that takes 30 minutes to take off so that they can be put on the X-ray conveyor belt.
Dumbass folks don't do any research on how to get thru the TSA lines quickly. Wear slip-on shoes that you can quickly take off and on! Wear pants that don't require a BELT! Put all of your baggage as checked baggage and quit trying to cram into the overhead bins!
Totally off topic, but I feel a lot better now that I have gotten that off my chest.
You're messin' with my Zen Thing, man.....
the same shit was said with skylake and the linux support was quickly added.
Windows 10 NSA Edition and Windows 10 Plebeian Edition?
There are no other operating system than Windows 10. It is The One, The Only, The Nadella.
Please just shut the fuck up.......squawk squawk !! Windows 10!! squawk squawk !! NSA in a black van outside your door!! squawk squawk !! The OS spies on my pr0n surfing!! squawk squawk !!
You're messin' with my Zen Thing, man.....
Please just shut the fuck up.......squawk squawk !! Windows 10!! squawk squawk !! NSA in a black van outside your door!! squawk squawk !! The OS spies on my pr0n surfing!! squawk squawk !!
pssst - hey buddy? He's as crazy as a shithouse rat, and you managed to sound even crazier! Coffee withdrawal? Stopped smoking? I dunno, but time to relax.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
what if microsoft could do the same thing to the graphics subsystem in windows 7 and 8 would you move because you could not run your new shiny Geforce gtx titan X without windows 10?
This is just plain wrong. You could very easily make an OS that uses a whitelist of CPUID responses and PCI probe responses and refuses to install/boot on anything else. CPUs provide features for detecting/identifying generations, it would be easy enough to abuse this to make an OS refuse to install/boot on a chip that was released after it.
I'm not saying any mainstream OS does this, just that it's by no means impossible, and pretending that it's impossible just makes you look uninformed/ignorant.
Come on man. No graphics, Intel RST, wifi, USB 3, type C, NVMe, etc. This is not a simple fix man.
Running a 7 year old OS on new hardware is weird to say the least and is like trying to Install Windows 3.11 on a pentium III. Sure you might get some of it to work but forget it being usable!
http://saveie6.com/
Yes and no. The title implies only Windows 10 will be optimized, the summary (and TFA) more clearly says that Microsoft will be optimizing only Windows 10 for Kaby Lake.
a few here were proudly boasting that their existing microsoft wares were future proof, they could always just run their older OS and MS Office products
nope. future hardware won't support them.
oh but virtualization you say. That assumes a LOT of things, including what virtualized devices are presented to your guest's OS, and whether Microsoft will allow activation/subscription on your virtualized platform
There are absolutely no issues with support for USB 3.1 or NVMe currently in windows 7. The only hassle which exists is the need for a Windows 7 installer with the USB support to allow you to load the NVMe drivers (if you do not slipstream them yourself). Intel has a tool freely available on their website which will update your install media for you.
Yeah there is
It is not supported. WIndows 7 relies on third party drivers which then are a wrapper for USB 2. NVMe BSOD often because it is not native as the ancient Windows 7 kernel does not support it directly and intel uses a utility to offer it.
With WIndows 8.1 and later it is installed automatically and just works without wrappers and work arounds.
http://saveie6.com/
"Of course, older versions of Windows and alternative operating systems will still install and run on Kaby Lake and Zen. They are x86 processors, after all."
... ?
This is contraty to what I've read elsewhere, but I'd be interested to know once and for all, if I need new hardware (Kaby or lateR), will I be able to continue using Win7? If there are no kernel drivers (which is what the other articles stated), then
> I have convinced a number of grandmas to switch to Linux Mint. Not many complaints.
I've found that for the roughly 80% of users who only use the computer to access the web (including Gmail or other web-based email), the only time they care about the OS is when an update breaks something. For these users, 99% of the time, all the OS is doing is hosting the web browser. A long term stable Linux works great for them, CentOS or Ubuntu LTS.
My wife loved her old laptop, it booted in seconds, the battery lasted all day, it was small and light. It didn't matter at all to her that it was a Chromebook, so the almost only program it could run was Chrome. That's all she wanted.
You could very easily make an OS that uses a whitelist of CPUID responses and PCI probe responses and refuses to install/boot on anything else. CPUs provide features for detecting/identifying generations,
It is a lot more complicated than that (unfortunately).
The Family/Model/Stepping values returned by the CPUID are not well defined, and are vendor specific. You would think that you could use these values to differentiate between, say, Skylake and KabyLake - but that isn't always true.
Faking the CPUID and patching the kernel binary either through the bootloader or manually has been done forever for unsupported CPUs for Hackintoshes. We've gotten many newer Intel CPUs working before Apple added official support. It was done with Haswell-E, Sandy Bridge, and many more. Unsupported Xeon models have been fully functional as well. Apple also releases the xnu kernel source code which is how AMD CPU support has always been added. So you're wrong here - Hackintoshes run better CPUs than Macs all the time and if there's an issue getting in the way with the vanilla kernel then there's no doubt a way to get around it.
Source: me - I helped support unsupported CPUs in the 10.6 kernels. http://wiki.osx86project.org/w...
Because there is always a bunch of dumbasses...
Indeed.
ReactOS and Haiku?
So full of complete nonsense. Throwing out terms without knowing what they actually mean, let alone whether an operating system actually has to make any changes to support it.
Take speed-shift for example... all it does is remove the need for the OS to calculate a P-state for HLT/MWAIT. All ACPI has to do is present a smaller list of P states and *ANY* OS that supports HLT/MWAIT p-state setting (which basically worked meaningfully from Haswell onward) will instantly be using SpeedShift. There's nothing to 'support' unless the OS is coded to intentionally break it.
AMD's SMT improvements don't need any OS-specific coding. The original bulldozer architecture *DID* need OS-specific coding, because it was a piece of shit (and a lot of us just didn't bother to code the OS to try to characterized mixed integer/FP loads), but continuing to use that coding in the newer architecture doesn't really cost anything. And, again, the CPU topology is made available to the OS via ACPI, and any OS since before Sandybridge could use it. Linux and the BSDs have been using the topology info provided by ACPI for years, and Microsoft had better have been too, so no specific OS coding is required.
What a load of crap.
-Matt
Linux Mint
LOL. Oh, you mean you had to install a manufacturer driver for a device in Windows 7??? Heavens!!!! NVMe in Windows 7 is absolutely not a wrapper for USB 2.0. How in the world can you even possibly think or believe such a ludicrous thing? Besides that I literally have an office full of various models of brand new Optiplex, Precision, and Latitude. All Windows 7. All NVMe. All clean installs performed by me Do I need to show you my benchmarks of my Samsung NVMe disks and their "USB 2 wrapper". But please, tell me that I'm wrong as i'm typing on a windows 7 laptop with an NVMe disk with frankly smoking performance.
I said USB 3 is a wrapper for USB 2. Have fun with your BSOD with the intel drivers with NVMe are known to have under 7.
I will live in this decade thanks and enjoy better performance with something designed to be more module with battery life. Since Windows RT forced the kernel to be less dependent on PCI buses it makes it easier to make drivers for. It has a whole device API for thiings like NFC, 3d printers, or any device that is lacking under 7,
http://saveie6.com/
Wait, but I thought you were talking about USB 3 and NVMe and phantom crashes which don't exist, now we're talking about battery life and Windows RT? Well, it's pretty clear you have your finger on the button of Windows driver architecture and devices which don't have a PCI bus... hmmm let me look around my infrastructure base and see how many of those I have....hmmmm... nope, not a single one. Cheers!
It's funny because it's TRUE!
just a ghost in the machine.
> I would bet that 2.6.x still has a significant install base under the names RHEL5 & 6, centos 5 & 6, oracle linux 5 & 6.
If those people want the newest kernel, they can upgrade the kernel fairly easily. I just did. The config step is based on the existing config, so you don't need to make any changes to the config. You can either just make && make modules && make install, or the equivalent using a GUI.
Bunch is a singular noun so the grandparent's grammar was correct.
MS does this to their own hardware, for crying out loud.
I had an MS Internet Keyboard Pro that refused to work with the Windows7 version of the driver, despite the fact that the entire rest of their keyboard range is supported. Turns out, the driver just blacklists that one particular model because it was originally an OEM device and MS dropped support for those devices in newer versions of the driver. I mean, despite the fact that it's their own product, sold under their own brand name, and with their own logo painted on the fascia.
It's easy to add support by editing the main INI file and adding the appropriate hardware ID number. Then the keyboard works fine with no lacking functionality.
What possible point that that comment serve in the context of optimizing for Kaby Lake? None, so who cares?
Or live in a country not paralysed by fear like you are in the US. For goodness sakes, take a look at what you have all become. The dumbasses here are are the politicians whipping up the fear and the clowns who vote for them. Good luck to the old US, you are all going down the gurgler at a huge rate of knots.