Windows 11 launches on 5th October, 2021. It will come as a free upgrade to the eligible Windows 10 customers. Eligible users need not pay anything for natural upgrades from Windows 10 to Windows 11. While the date of launch is 5th October, the Windows 11 update will be handled through the Microsoft Windows Update program on your computer. When the update is ready to be installed on your eligible Windows system, Windows Update will oversee the installation of the upgrade.
Microsoft Windows 11 has specific hardware requirements, and it will only allow the compatible systems to be upgraded using the Windows update program. To know if your system is eligible for Windows 11 upgrade, you can install the PC Health Check App from the Microsoft site. This app will confirm your system’s compatibility with Windows 11. To know more about instructions on how to run the PC Health Check App, please visit the page here.
For the uninitiated, let us revise the requirements of running Windows 11 on your system. As per the requirements listed by Microsoft, your system should be using:
- The processor on the system must be 64 bit.
- Processor must have at least 2 cores
- Processor must have a clock speed of at least 1 GHz
- The chipset must support the TPM 2.0 standard.
- Graphics must support DirectX12
As per Microsoft, these restrictions have been put in place for improved user experience. In studies conducted by Microsoft, installing Windows 11 on unsupported hardware and processors caused up to 52% crash rate. This is way higher than the average crash rate on a computer system. For enhanced security and user experience, Microsoft has listed these basic eligibility requirements for Windows 11.
Users who have unsupported hardware platforms can install Windows 11 by downloading an ISO image. However, such installation of Windows 11 will not receive any future updates from the Windows Update program of Microsoft. ISO based installs of Windows 11 are not suggested to be taken up because such systems will not be able to take advantage of any security risks on the operating system that may require future security updates on the system.
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Rajesh Dhawan is a technology professional who loves to blog about smart wearables, Cloud computing and Microsoft technologies. He loves to break complex problems into manageable chunks of meaningful information.