Windows Vista was a shock to many Windows users, as its hardware requirements represented a steep upgrade over those required to run Windows XP: most 32-bit versions required a 1GHz processor, 1GB RAM, DirectX 9 graphics, and 40 GB of mass storage with 15GB free. But those 2006-era requirements looked much less steep once Windows 7 rolled out in 2009: it required almost the same system specs, but now 16GB of available disk space instead of 15. Windows 8 again stuck with the same specs and, at its release, so did Windows 10.
But the Windows 10 Anniversary Update (referred to in documentation as version 1607, so it ought to ship in July) changes that, with the first meaningful change in the Windows system requirements in almost a decade. The RAM requirement is going up, with 2GB the new floor for 32-bit installations. This happens to bring the system in line with the 64-bit requirements, which has called for 2GB since Windows 7.
The changed requirements were first spotted by Nokia Power User and WinBeta.
After so many years, I’m okay with a small memory bump. Considering the state of software development today, it’s amazing enough as it is that Microsoft had managed to keep the minimum requirements level for this long.
Not really so amazing if you count the amount of code Microsoft retained from older releases.
FWIW the talks of hardware requirements of desktop OSes are pointless at this stage: browsers set minimum requirements.
Edited 2016-05-24 22:53 UTC
People still use 32-bit Windows?
What is this, 2006?
Meh. The last 32-bit CPU to be released by Intel was December of 2011. If it was on sale for a year and a half, that’s middle of 2013.
Not too old, really.
But, really, this is likely mainly for simplification of requirements – these specifically are for systems that are sold with the Windows logo, rather than hard requirements (Windows should still install and run with less ram).
I bought a new Lenovo 100s Cloudbook last week. It has 32 bit Windows 10 even though the Intel Atom CPU is 64 bit.
Edited 2016-05-25 02:00 UTC
windows was abysmally slow in the move to 64bit. Back when the opterons first came in 2003 we bought 2 identical machines. We built one 32bit, the other 64bit and deployed both into production (fedora i believe). That was the last 32 bit x86 machine i ever built.
It wasn’t until vista that 64bit was viable on windows and the switchover didn’t really happen until windows 7, many years later.
Edited 2016-05-25 02:47 UTC
There was also 64 bit version of XP which I very much preferred back in the days. Very solid foundation but not very well supported by developers.
Even today the amount of dedicated 64 bit applications is abysmal compared to “legacy” 32 bit versions.
Also, people still have 16-bit apps to use. For some reason…
Yep, terrible legacy applications in industrial settings I expect. We had some in my old job for running freeze dryers and maintenance schedules. The cost of replacing them was considered too expensive so we always used 32-bit versions of Windows. We even had some Win 98 machines and images knocking around for the freeze dryer. That’s not even getting into the instruments that still ran DOS software, or the dual 386 beast that ran one of our machines!
So, if they are increasing the hardware requirements, should I take they will ease down on forcing the Win 10 upgrade on people? Or I am too naive?
Considering the update will soon stop being free, that should happen automatically.
These requirements seem to be for OEMs that will make new devices that want to get a “designed for Windows 10” logo.
Why do I think so? Because otherwise the documentation wouldn’t include things like “TPM/UEFI” required or exact button placements.
Basically Microsoft is making sure that when people buy a new device they get something modern, like they expect.
So your pc without UEFI will continue to work just fine. And if you don’t have Wifi/Ethernet you will still be able to run Windows 10 1607 (yes, having either wired or wireless is a requirement for new machines now)
But it seems like a given that when Windows 10 no longer becomes free the nagging for 7/8.1 users will also go away. It would be horrible if those users would still continue to receive the already horrible popups and then get forced/nudged towards a 100 Euro purchase. (also: https://www.grc.com/never10.htm)
The current state of Windows 10 with its strictly enforced background activities basically require a SSD drive with a powerful multicore CPU to be even barely usable. I have had the ‘joy’ of using Windows 10 on an average market laptop and that trip was horrible.
Actually it is a shame as long as they can not give a compelling reason for it. I see nothing that Windows 10 does for me that not already Windows XP did, but with a lot less resources.
On the other hand, just because the OS doesn’t (or shouldn’t need to) take more resources, the average application is taking more and more.
I can see an argument for raising the minimum requirements of the OS, just on that basis alone – what is the point in saying the OS can run on minimal hardware, if you can’t run anything on top of it?
These are two different things. An appication usually puts forward its specific hardware requirements. Has nothing to do with the base requirements of the platform.
This is pure trolling, right?
How about not crashing the entire OS when a video driver crashes?
How about running most modern browsers/software/hardware?
How about actually being secure?
Or on a more fun/geeky note: How about better windows management (virtual desktops, windows snap, full screen command prompt)
If all you use XP for is an application launcher for your old programs then STILL 10 is probably better (although more heavy weight) than XP because of SideBySide DLL’s, etc
I am serious. None of this should require significantly more hardware resources.
The resources presumably a burned for ‘managed code’ and layers upon layers for the scene graph that produces those beautiful boxes they call ‘flat design’.
That is a bit of change from your original statement. First you said
Now it seems you agree with me that 10 does more than XP and does it better, but you think it should do so with just a bit more resources than XP. That is a whole different discussion though.
In reality the resources that the OS requires are now so low compared to the resources that the OS actually has available that using a computer has become a lot more pleasant and we can continue to use old computers without many issues. Most people don’t complain about performance anymore, they complain about weight and battery life of old machines.
By the way: Windows Server 2016 has listed resources of 512 MB and I can guarantee that Windows 10 works on those specs as well. I run several virtuals with such minimal specs for specific, isolated tasks. But devicemakers that want to sell a Windows10/2016 machine will not be allowed to put such low specs in a machine if they want to receive a Windows 10 Certified logo and Microsoft will not test any software to run on such instances
Replace XP with XP X64 and I’d agree with the guy, I’d take XP X64 over the bloated mess of spyware that is Windows 10.
BTW you DO know that Win 10 is one of the most buggy crash prone releases they’ve had in several years…right? So the first in your list equally applies to Win 10, the “modern browsers” bit is the choice of the browser makers and there are modern browsers (Kmeleon, OB1, and IIRC QTWeb) that will run on XP just fine, and Windows being secure? Yeah if you load it up with a third party AV, third party antimalware, and if you want to stop all the data leakage a third party firewall? Sure.
But frankly none of that matters as we have Win 7 which is better in every way than Windows 10. It uses less resources, just as fast (turn of Win 10’s fake boot and force it to actually boot clean? Its less than 6% difference, within the margin for error) and isn’t nearly as buggy. Oh and since you don’t have it constantly phoning home all the damned time you actually have more bandwidth to do what you want with your connection.
No, I do not know that Win10 is buggy. Please provide a source comparing it to XP/7. Stability hasn’t really been an issue since Windows 7 in our company and it also never shows up as a problem in reviews like these http://www.trustedreviews.com/opinions/windows-10-vs-windows-7.
(saying that it is one of the buggiest releases in several years…well, they only had a few releases in the last several years so all of them qualify for that)
How is Windows 10 more bloated than 7? It runs on the same resources, requires the same amount of diskspace yet does everything that 7 did and more. Yet a simple install+update takes forever in 7 while only taking minutes in 10. There was a major bump in the platform between XP (5.2) and Vista (6.0). XP64 could be considered as 5.3 as it was based on Server 2003 R2 instead of XP32. Vista/7/8/8.1/10 are basically 6/6.1/6.2/6.3/6.4 and require a lot more resources compared to XP while offering a lot more features, security and stability. Since the bump to 6.0 (9 years ago) there has basically been a lot of shaving/finetuning at the kernel-level but nothing that made newer releases slower, bigger or requiring more resources than previous versions.
You really seem to care a lot about spyware and phoning home but not from experience apparently. I would actually say that the privacy options in Windows 10 are much more clear than those in Windows 7 (http://media.redgamingtech.com/rgt-website/2015/08/windows-10-disab…). I do agree that the defaults are not what I would like them to be but that has been the case with every Windows installation ever
No matter how good (#not) Windows XP is, you upgrade from it because the nasty font vulnerabilities of 2015 were not fixed in Windows XP.
Windows 98 will use even fewer resources.
Windows 3.1 will SCREAM on modern hardware (well, the bits and pieces it supports).
I’ll bet MS-DOS 6.2 will REALLY blow your mind with performance! That soundblaster emulator will absolutely rock!
If you’re still running XP, and think it’s a good thing, you need help. Put a stripped down linux install on it, running XFCE, or get a real operating system (depending on hardware).
XP’s time has come and gone. Repeatedly.
My dislike of Windows 10 is not because of the operating system (which is based on 8.1, and is a pretty good OS underneath all the tablet crap), but rather the spyware / adware / marketware philosophy that seems to have overwhelmed common sense computing, combined with the “upgrade or die” attitude Micosoft now has.
Windows 10 is what happens when you add artificial sweeteners to a good recipe– it doesn’t make it inedible, just unpalatable.
If I do upgrade to it, I’ll have to go with Windows 10 enterprise.
People used Windows Vista and above with less than 2GB?
I ‘ve used Windows Vista and 7 with 1GB RAM, on an old Intel Core Duo T2500 laptop of mine, wasn’t much fun…
Edited 2016-05-25 08:31 UTC
Thom,
Where are you on HAIKU re:BeOS. I know MS ripped off Gary Kildall and CP/M but did they also kill BeOS? The current incarnation, HAIKU, is buggy but useable and fun. It runs like a champ on an old Compaq nc6400.
These aren’t hard requirements but minimum spec guidelines for good performance.
Windows 10 will in fact run on far less RAM:
http://s33.postimg.org/diom2om73/ramusage.png
32-bit Windows 10 is still useful as certain low-end CPUs like my Pentium 987 might not have VT-x or AMD-V support and therefore not support 64-bit Windows 10 in a virtual machine.
Edited 2016-05-25 16:58 UTC