Forum Discussion
How can I bypass windows 11 upgrade requirements for tpm and cpu
As far as I know, Microsoft is pushing a new security standard called the Windows 11 Security Baseline. The core features of this baseline rely on specific hardware capabilities that were either not present or not universally implemented in older CPUs.
The three most critical technologies are:
Virtualization-Based Security (VBS): This uses hardware virtualization to create an isolated, hypervisor-protected region of memory.
Core Isolation & Memory Integrity (HVCI): This is a key feature of VBS. It acts as a bodyguard for the kernel, verifying that all code running there is from a trusted source.
Mode-based Execution Control (MBEC): a CPU feature that makes VBS and HVCI much more efficient. Without it, the performance hit from these security features was significant.
Why you need a modern CPU to run Windows 11? Intel 8th Gen (and newer) CPUs have native MBEC built into the hardware. Some Intel 7th Gen CPUs (like the i7-7820HQ in the Surface Studio 2) also have a version of this technology, which is why they made the official support list.
Older 7th Gen and prior CPUs lack this hardware-level efficiency. If you don't need these new security features, then you can safely bypass Windows 11 upgrade requirements and there is no issue to run Windows 11 on unsupported hardware.
- PerezOct 17, 2025Iron Contributor
I am a home user and not using these advanced security features. I am looking for a way to upgrade to Windows 11 on my unsupported computer.