Windows 10 is old news, making Windows 11 the new hotness, and despite warnings from resident PCWord
Windows expert Mark Hachman, you’ve decided you can’t wait to get your hands on the latest from
Microsoft. While I echo Mark’s suggestion to wait I know not all will, and in fact,
I’d wager to bet many PC enthusiasts are looking forward to something new.
If that’s the case then hopefully this video will help you know what you need
in preparation. I’ll also give you a big tip to make you feel a bit more at home, what you can
expect in terms of gaming performance, and what NOT to expect in the operating system for now.
Well if you want to get into the weeds of Windows 11 you’re going to have to install the operating
system first. Otherwise, you’re not going very far in your journey. But, there are
some things you’ll need in your current system in order to do so. Let’s go through the list.
First and foremost, this is the official END of single-core CPUs, although I can’t imagine many
people still rolling around on a single core at this point for a daily PC. Past that you’re going
to need a VERY modern CPU. We’re talking at least an 8th Gen Intel CPU or a Ryzen 2000 Series CPU.
If you’re an ARM user then Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 850 and up are also supported.
Memory and storage requirements are beefier than in the past as well. You’re going to need at least
4GB of RAM in order to install Windows 11, and you’re going to need AT LEAST 64GB of storage.
My personal recommendation would be to not install this on anything smaller than 240GB
because you want to leave plenty of room for your most-used applications and updates.
Graphics cards and displays have requirements as well, and they’re worth mentioning as people
don’t generally think about those as much when it comes to the upgrade. You’ll just need to
make sure that your graphics card is DirectX 12 capable and your display is 1280x720 or greater.
Now onto the other features: UEFI, Secure-Boot, and TPM 2.0. All of these security requirements
need to be in place. The TPM 2.0, or Trusted Platform Module 2.0, includes a hardware-based
random number generator that can issue encrypted keys to keep your data protected.
Now it’s worth noting that Microsoft will be allowing Windows 11 to be installed
with limited and short-term support when a system has the older TPM 1.2. But doing this
will be very much ‘at your own risk’ and I can’t recommend that. Microsoft even makes
you click through a disclaimer saying you aren’t entitled to updates, but you DON’T
want to be using a potentially insecure computer on the Internet.
Okay, so you’ve decided to install Windows 11 and you’ve booted in for the first time.
Then you notice something really strange—the Start Button and icons. They’re in the middle.
What in the Macintosh is going on here?! Okay, let’s get that back to
the bottom left corner where it belongs, or at least where it’s been since 1995.
1. Right-click the Windows 11 taskbar, in a blank space
that other icons aren’t occupying. You’ll see one option, for Taskbar Settings.
2. Clicking that will open the generic Windows 11 Settings menu,
specifically Personalization > Taskbar. Scroll down to the bottom and click Taskbar behaviors.
3. Under the first entry, Taskbar alignment, click the only other option,
Left. This will automatically slide all of the Taskbar icons to the left,
approximating the organization that accompanied Windows 10. That’s all you need to do.
Unfortunately for those who like to have the taskbar on the side
or top of the screen you’re out of luck. This is something Microsoft decided
wasn’t needed it seems. But, at least you’re able to make things feel a bit more normal.
So things are installed and looking a bit more normal.
Now it’s game time. But you’re worried that these new security features and overhead requirements
might slow down your games—specifically speaking, Virtualization-Based Security,
or VBS. Well, our very own Gordon Mah Ung has already put that theory to task, admittedly
on a small sample size, but it’s still consistent with results from other sites like Tom’s Hardware.
For testing Gordon used an Acer Predator Triton 500 laptop equipped with an 8th-gen
Intel Core i7-8750H, 16GB of DDR4 memory,, and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Max-Q GPU.
He compared Windows 11 gaming performance with this setup across 10 different titles,
flipping Virtualization Based Security on and off. The findings were quite interesting.
Most games stayed within margin of error, with only Counter-Strike:
Global Offensive seeing a bigger departure, and it was only about 6%.
But at the end of the day, I don’t think I would be too terribly concerned about the
gaming performance. If you are, maybe wait for things to get ironed out a bit more.
- Maybe don’t upgrade just yet
But why wait? I’m sure a lot of folks are curious why Mark and myself would hold back on upgrading.
It’s simple: Beyond the usual early adopter bugs and annoyances like the overhauled Start menu and
locked-down taskbars, two of the biggest new features of Windows 11 aren’t even ready yet.
The first one is very centric to gamers and the one I was looking forward to the most:
DirectStorage. This is the bedrock for the Quick Resume feature on the new Xbox Series
consoles and once you’ve used it you know how good it can be. Basically, you leave a game
and want to jump back in? BOOM you’re in baby, no need to start from scratch on that title.
It’s insane but does require at least a 1 terabyte NVMe drive to take advantage
of worth the cost of admission in my book. The technological backbone is already in Windows 11,
but no games support the technology yet - not even Microsoft’s own games.
The other feature isn’t exactly a gamer thing but it was a HUGE feature touted early on:
Support for Android applications to run within Windows.
According to Microsoft that feature ‘just isn’t ready.’
But if you’re ready to jump on Windows 11 and have all the requirements in place
then it’s a decision you’ll have to make for yourself. So far there’s no technical
or practical reason to do so and that’s honestly the biggest reason I’m holding on to Windows 10.
As far as support goes, I’ve still got over 3 years of planned support for Windows 10 left
and that DirectStorage feature I’m excited about will be coming to Windows 10 as well.
If you do decide to make the jump I hope this video helped you with gaming expectations,
reconfiguring some familiarity to the desktop layout, and what to expect to be missing for now.
If you’ve enjoyed this video or learned something new, let me know by hitting that thumbs up,
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