Is Your Current PC Powerful Enough for Windows 8?
It’s hard not to be at least a little excited about upgrading to a shiny new operating system, but the catch is that a new OS sometimes means your aging computer isn’t up to the task. So is your current PC powerful enough to handle Windows 8? Most likely!
Over at Microsoft’s Building Windows 8 blog, the Windows 8 team has posted the following system recommendations for Windows 8:
Whether you have a logo PC or you’ve built your own PC, the recommendations for the Consumer Preview include:
- 1 GHz or faster processor
- 1 GB RAM (32-bit) or 2 GB RAM (64-bit)
- 16 GB available hard disk space (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)
- DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver
This setup gets you going with Windows 8 such that it is functionally equivalent to Windows 7, and as we have talked about previously, you should see measureable improvements in performance in a number of dimensions with a system at this level.
As you can see, the system requirements are actually pretty low, and a low-powered system might actually run better running Windows 8 than Windows 7. In fact, it was specifically designed to run better on low-powered devices—like netbooks and tablets.
Speaking of tablets, if you’re looking to take advantage of the touch and feel of Windows 8 on a tablet, Microsoft recommends the following touchscreen devices:
- HP Elitebook 2760p convertible (Note: This PC is 1280×800 and so does not support snap.)
- ASUS EP121 tablet (Note: his PC is 1280×800 and so does not support snap.)
- Dell Inspiron Duo convertible
- Lenovo x220t convertible
- 3M M2256PW 22″ display (Note: The raised bezel can make it harder to swipe along the edges)
- Samsung Series 7 slate (Note: This PC has two models, one was provided to attendees at //build/ and the other is a commercial release; the latter has slightly different peripherals and firmware.)
(via http://lifehacker.com/5889650/is-your-current-pc-powerful-enough-for-windows-8?tag=windows-8)
