L-MOK7H Posted December 25, 2021 Posted December 25, 2021 https://www.techradar.com/news/microsoft-in-2021-year-in-review The launch of Windows 11 as a free upgrade for Windows 10 users was the biggest development for Microsoft in 2021, without a doubt. The operating system that was never meant to be – remember that Microsoft said Windows 10 would be the final ever Windows version (not that we believed it) – was swirling around in preview for the latter half of 2021, before finally being unleashed and rolling out from October 5, billed as a “new era for the PC”. Sponsored Links If You Need to Kill Time on Your Computer, this City-Building Game is a Must-Have. No Install. Forge of Empires - Free Online Game But even before its official release in October, Windows 11 got off to a shaky and confusing start around its system requirements. The sti[CENSORED]tion for TPM 2.0 – a security measure Microsoft insisted on for tighter defenses with Windows 11 – caused confusion, which was compounded by the wonkiness of Microsoft’s own PC Health Check tool. The latter didn’t provide any details of why a system might be incompatible, and just left a lot of users scratching their heads (before it was pulled down for that very reason). In a nutshell, the compatibility problems for some PCs are easily enough solved by a BIOS tweak or update to turn on TPM 2.0 – the tech being present, just not enabled on some modern systems – but the whole affair left a bad taste in the mouth before Windows 11 was even out. The fact that some relatively modern CPUs from just five years ago – namely Intel’s 7th-gen range (or later) – aren’t compatible was frustrating news for owners of those kind of PCs, again compounded by the revelation that Windows 11 can actually (unofficially) run on something as old as a Pentium 4 (Cedar Mill) CPU from 15 years ago. That’s another oddity with Windows 11, that Microsoft made it so you can upgrade to the OS on non-TPM 2.0 compliant machines via various loopholes, but that this isn’t recommended, and really you shouldn’t do it, plus you might not get vital system updates in the future (even if you do now, at least anecdotally). So, there were unfortunate slips and general vexation around Windows 11 compatibility before and after release, and these weren’t the only elements causing a degree of bewilderment around the operating system – we’ll come back to that later, but first, let’s look at the initial reaction to Windows 11. Broadly, the atmosphere around Microsoft’s big redesign for its desktop OS was pretty positive. We felt it was a big step forward visually, and plenty of folks agreed. With the new streamlined desktop – and the likes of simpler File Explorer menus – everything is tidier and neater, and more modern-looking to boot (with those rounded corners for windows and menus, of course). The new Microsoft Store turned out to be a big improvement – and crucially is going to incorporate third-party stores, and already does this with the Epic Games Store – plus there are ongoing welcome updates to various core apps and fresh widgets. Okay, so there was flak fired at the new Start menu, which appears to have taken a leaf out of the Chrome OS playbook – not everyone likes its new centrally-aligned Launcher style vibe – and it’s a bit of a clunky fudge. There was also disappointment at there being no support for running Android apps on the desktop from the off (this is now in testing, though).
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