Skylake CPU to ONLY support Windows 10: Microsoft denying support for Win 7 and 8.1

[Overmind One]

This is so Microsoft. I have been warning people about Windows 10 since it's launch, because it is nothing but fancy spyware. You are told in the EULA, if you bother to read it. But this is new. The new Skylake CPU processors will not support Windows 7 or Windows 8.1:

http://www.computerworld.com/articl...t-support-windows-10-new-hardware-itbwcw.html

This is not a hardware limitation, it is an EDICT from Microsoft. We know this because some devices on a "specific device" list will be supported. Microsoft really really REALLY needs for you to switch to Windows 10 because....if you look into the WHY, then you have your answer. Windows 10 is ready made for the NSA, for advertisers, for aggregators of data, for DCMA enforcement, for anti-pirating and you get to use it and be a honey pot. If you are using it, that is your own choice but don't say you weren't warned...

"MUST run Windows 10". Really? Frack you Microsoft, I MUST do nothing, bitch!

 

[Tripler]

WTF eh !!! Stinkin my crow soft dinks !!! Well that just sets me up to not do an upgraded build now doesn't it !!!
Fricken microspy creeps !!!

 

[Tripler]

Makes you wanna go with apple huh and definately stay with Linux . I just wish Linux would get its gaming abilties caught up so I could use Linux and tell my crow soft to go stuff it .

 

[Overmind One]

Makes you wanna go with apple huh and definately stay with Linux . I just wish Linux would get its gaming abilties caught up so I could use Linux and tell my crow soft to go stuff it .

The thing is, if you just run Windows in a VM (any version except Windows 10), you can stay with Windows 8.1, Windows 7, or even Windows XP or Windows 98 or 95. . Those Skylake machines will run Linux just fine, and then you just run your VMs. Seriously Trip, the power you have in your rig just needs some tweaks to the settings and you can play any game in your Windows VMs. I have seen it. I don't have that kind of horsepower and I can still run games in my VMs. Not high CPU games, but my favorite games play fine.

 

[heisenberg]

http://fudzilla.com/news/40409-linux-will-eventually-be-desktop-king

 

[Tripler]

The thing is, if you just run Windows in a VM (any version except Windows 10), you can stay with Windows 8.1, Windows 7, or even Windows XP or Windows 98 or 95. . Those Skylake machines will run Linux just fine, and then you just run your VMs. Seriously Trip, the power you have in your rig just needs some tweaks to the settings and you can play any game in your Windows VMs. I have seen it. I don't have that kind of horsepower and I can still run games in my VMs. Not high CPU games, but my favorite games play fine.

I tried doing that but there was a glitch with VMWare that I could not rectify and my games did not play well enough . I can't remember what it was exactly but I think VMWare was throttling back video playback or it was not letting the vid card use all its ram . I know FSX would not run well in virtual . A little busy this spring/winter still here kinda /summer but I will try it again come late fall that's if we get summer at all . We had 2 inches of snow 2 days ago ... 32f this morning and it may go to 45f today .

 

[Overmind One]

I tried doing that but there was a glitch with VMWare that I could not rectify and my games did not play well enough . I can't remember what it was exactly but I think VMWare was throttling back video playback or it was not letting the vid card use all its ram . I know FSX would not run well in virtual . A little busy this spring/winter still here kinda /summer but I will try it again come late fall that's if we get summer at all . We had 2 inches of snow 2 days ago ... 32f this morning and it may go to 45f today .

There is program in the repository called KVM. It is also a virtualization program like VMware, except that it allows the VM to "touch" the hardware on the Kernel level (like Wine does). Once you have a machine on there, Windows will see your actual hardware and you can access all of your GPU memory. Im actually doing that today as an experiment. I will respond back here with the results.

 

[Bluce Ree]

There is program in the repository called KVM. It is also a virtualization program like VMware, except that it allows the VM to "touch" the hardware on the Kernel level (like Wine does). Once you have a machine on there, Windows will see your actual hardware and you can access all of your GPU memory. Im actually doing that today as an experiment. I will respond back here with the results.

My post here is slightly off-topic but touches on virtualization.

I've had the chance to test virtualization in a carrier-grade environment over the last few years, running high volume real-time applications. Xen blew KVM out of the water. When I upgraded some nodes to KVM, performance tanked by 50%. Both Xen and KVM are free.

For the home user, KVM is easy and integrates well in a familiar paradigm. In my experience, though, it's just not enterprise-ready.

 

[Overmind One]

My post here is slightly off-topic but touches on virtualization.

I've had the chance to test virtualization in a carrier-grade environment over the last few years, running high volume real-time applications. Xen blew KVM out of the water. When I upgraded some nodes to KVM, performance tanked by 50%. Both Xen and KVM are free.

For the home user, KVM is easy and integrates well in a familiar paradigm. In my experience, though, it's just not enterprise-ready.

That is interesting...I have always used a layered hypervisor like VMware and HyperV, and I did try KVM way back but it just was not feature heavy enough for me after being exposed to VMware. The kernel-level hypervisor would be great for home gaming on windows running in KVM (or Xen?) on Mint.

 

[Tripler]

Guess whos back in Linux . I just did a windows update and got all this crap now windows wont boot !
WTF ,,,
Looks like no gaming tonight

 

[Overmind One]

Guess whos back in Linux . I just did a windows update and got all this crap now windows wont boot !
WTF ,,,
Looks like no gaming tonight


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Oh wow.... Microsoft UEFI is like a bouncer. It is a BIOS that can be changed by the operating system via update or remote. How is that an advancement? The generally accepted idea is that a software BIOS allows it to be installed on hardware which does not have a hardware BIOS chip. If Microsoft was making the hardware itself, the Windows BIOS would be on a chip and they would still be controlling it. All previous Windows used the BIOS on the board, and Linux still uses it but Linux too is going UEFI. Theirs will be open source, of course.

I mentioned earlier that I was going to attempt to do a KVM install and I am going to do that right now. I will let you know how game performance is.

 

[Bluce Ree]

That is interesting...I have always used a layered hypervisor like VMware and HyperV, and I did try KVM way back but it just was not feature heavy enough for me after being exposed to VMware. The kernel-level hypervisor would be great for home gaming on windows running in KVM (or Xen?) on Mint.

I only use type-1 hypervisor on the enterprise level stuff to get near bare-metal performance. In fact, parts of my software platform perform better in a virtual machine than on bare-metal.

In a nutshell, rather than have the core process manage tens of thousands of active threads in a single environment, I split that out to multiple vms each running an instance of the core process with far fewer threads per vm. Although I end up with the same volume of threads over all, breaking them up into vms each running (for example) a thousand active threads makes better use of the allocated resources and performs several orders of magnitude better.

 

[Bluce Ree]

Oh wow.... Microsoft UEFI is like a bouncer. It is a BIOS that can be changed by the operating system via update or remote. How is that an advancement? The generally accepted idea is that a software BIOS allows it to be installed on hardware which does not have a hardware BIOS chip. If Microsoft was making the hardware itself, the Windows BIOS would be on a chip and they would still be controlling it. All previous Windows used the BIOS on the board, and Linux still uses it but Linux too is going UEFI. Theirs will be open source, of course.

I mentioned earlier that I was going to attempt to do a KVM install and I am going to do that right now. I will let you know how game performance is.

Linux already works with UEFI. I'm typing this from a Yoga 3 Pro running Ubuntu 15.20. I configured it to dual boot either Windows 10 or Ubuntu without disabling UEFI in BIOS.

 

[Joelist]

UEFI is an open standard that has been steadily replacing BIOS for a while now. It has a completely different architecture which (among other things) radically speeds up system boot time, allows a lot of different things to happen before the OS starts when desired, booting from volumes greater than 2 TB and so on. When you are seeing a BIOS like interface (only on some machines) that is UEFIs legacy BIOS interface support.

Linux needed to adapt partly because the bootloaders in use (like GRUB) use MBR (Master Boot Record) partitioning. UEFI especially on relatively newer machines has no MBR but instead uses GPT (GUID partition table), which can address volumes up to 8 Zebibytes (crazy large). Linux is also enabling Secure Boot in UEFI as well which is interesting.

It is an interesting technology, and BIOS was getting rather long in the tooth. It originally came from Intel (it was called EFI then) and actually the first major computer OEM to move to it was Apple, back when they dropped Power PC and went to x86. Now most OEMs use UEFI and most are also members of the UEFI Unified Forum - their standards committee.

 

[Overmind One]

UEFI is an open standard that has been steadily replacing BIOS for a while now. It has a completely different architecture which (among other things) radically speeds up system boot time, allows a lot of different things to happen before the OS starts when desired, booting from volumes greater than 2 TB and so on. When you are seeing a BIOS like interface (only on some machines) that is UEFIs legacy BIOS interface support.

Linux needed to adapt partly because the bootloaders in use (like GRUB) use MBR (Master Boot Record) partitioning. UEFI especially on relatively newer machines has no MBR but instead uses GPT (GUID partition table), which can address volumes up to 8 Zebibytes (crazy large). Linux is also enabling Secure Boot in UEFI as well which is interesting.

It is an interesting technology, and BIOS was getting rather long in the tooth. It originally came from Intel (it was called EFI then) and actually the first major computer OEM to move to it was Apple, back when they dropped Power PC and went to x86. Now most OEMs use UEFI and most are also members of the UEFI Unified Forum - their standards committee.

I still prefer the hardware based BIOS, thank you! With EFI/UEFI, you no longer have secure control of your BIOS. Linux has introduced Secure Boot UEFI in order to be able to run on newer hardware that does not have a BIOS chip (and on phones). Long in tooth does not mean "bad".

 

[Tripler]

So what are my options then to get back into Windoz . My machine is legit ... I have a corporate version of Win 7 . I am not running any illegal or pirated software in Windoz ...
WTH . I also found out last time that to boot from the Win7 CD you have to physically disconnect every other drive in your puter ...Sheeese ... Talk about an over baring bitch OS

 

[Overmind One]

So what are my options then to get back into Windoz . My machine is legit ... I have a corporate version of Win 7 . I am not running any illegal or pirated software in Windoz ...
WTH . I also found out last time that to boot from the Win7 CD you have to physically disconnect every other drive in your puter ...Sheeese ... Talk about an over baring bitch OS

You have to do several things to Windows during install to make it install cleanly. First, to not use any of the "recommended settings". Control every step of the install process. Yes, you do have to disconnect every drive you do not want affected, because Windows will write certain files to those drives during the install (volume information). Partition the system drive first and leave the other partition unallocated (no formatting). Windows will create a 100MB partition in the new partition anyway. Use a USB flash drive to install Windows. Take your CD and use Rufus to make a bootable USB stick and install it that way.

 

[Overmind One]

I only use type-1 hypervisor on the enterprise level stuff to get near bare-metal performance. In fact, parts of my software platform perform better in a virtual machine than on bare-metal.

In a nutshell, rather than have the core process manage tens of thousands of active threads in a single environment, I split that out to multiple vms each running an instance of the core process with far fewer threads per vm. Although I end up with the same volume of threads over all, breaking them up into vms each running (for example) a thousand active threads makes better use of the allocated resources and performs several orders of magnitude better.

This proved to be a fail. The KVM machine proved to run no better than the VMware based machines I have in Linux. So, I am still dual booting my Windows when I want to play games.

 

[Tripler]

So that means I would have to flip all the ones and zeros on my SSD drive to make space on it because there is only 20 G's of space left on a 250 G SSD . Of course I do have another SSD that is new . This is basically starting over again like the tenth time or more ... This sucks ... Why am I having these issues in the first place ? . My Intel build has had none of these problems . Anyway thanks for the info OM1 . If I am not too pooped tonight I will begin the process . Building a work shop/storage shed in my back yard this month . Just had to wait for the dam weather to improve which it has finally ...

 

[Tripler]

This proved to be a fail. The KVM machine proved to run no better than the VMware based machines I have in Linux. So, I am still dual booting my Windows when I want to play games.

Dammit eh . That sucks ... Thanks for giving it a shot .