[wtallis]

In other words, it's pretty common for Windows users to experience major driver breakage every time they upgrade to a new major version of Windows. Because it was pretty normal to go from Windows 9x to XP (skipping 2k), then skip Vista and not upgrade until 7, then skip 8 and 8.1 and not upgrade until 10. The exceptions were mostly if you bought a new computer that had one of the more disappointing releases preinstalled, but in those cases driver breakage would have been much less of a concern anyways.

[ftaghn]

>In other words, it's pretty common for Windows users to experience major driver breakage every time they upgrade to a new major version of Windows

This is really a high level arguing in bad faith here. Windows XP was released in 2001 and mainstream support ended in 2009 with the last security update in extended support being in 2014. Vista to 8.1 covers 2006 to 2023, that's 17 years of having compatible drivers. Windows 10 was released in 2015, 8 years ago, with 11 having a compatible driver model and will go for many years still.

What does "common" to experience breakage is supposed to mean here? you call this common? meanwhile you can't even get a Google Pixel, the official Google phone, to be supported more than 3 years of feature update, with 2 more years of security updates. This is all because supporting the linux kernel is a pain in the ass.

[Dalewyn]

I'll also add that it is very common for hardware manufacturers to just provide drivers for newer versions of Windows as they come out if necessary, with the hardware ending up supported across multiple versions of Windows.

It is very seldom when you actually come across hardware without drivers, unless the hardware is so old that the manufacturer isn't selling (and thus isn't supporting) it anymore.