If you’re someone who’s using the same Windows PC today as you played the original Guild Wars or bought the year Youtube and Reddit were born, you may soon have problems going forward if you prefer the Chrome browser to the web .
Although small, the user base for Chrome users exists on devices dating back to the early to mid 2000’s. A new policy document released by the Chromium development team states that they will abandon support for processors that do not have SSE3, or Streaming SIMD Extensions 3, in x86 Chrome builds.
The requirement to run SSE3 does not affect macOS, Android or Chrome OS devices, as they have been running it since 2014 (Chrome 35, Android L), but will require a small amount of Windows and Linux users affects what Chrome uses on dusty old systems. . That’s right, users who haven’t upgraded their hardware in over 15 years! Those affected will receive a notification starting with M87 that they need to upgrade to use Chrome. From Chrome 89, attempting to run Chrome on these devices will result in an accident and the option to install it will be completely removed if the user’s hardware is detected and insufficiently viewed.
‘Until we need SSE3, Chrome users who are affected (with x86 CPUs that do not support SSE3) will be warned that their computers will soon be unsupported. The implementation uses the framework in // chrome / browser / obsolete_system. This will result in a drop-down alert bar and a permanent alert in the chrome: // settings / help page, ‘
Chromium Developer Policy Document
Devices with the outdated SSE2 are likely to be abandoned by Google because there are so few of them, and this could slightly improve the majority of users. In fact, the policy document mentions a 5kb enhancement on the official Chrome Builds. Yes, I know it’s virtually nothing, but it’s something.
I actually have my earliest, dearest memories of these devices, but it seems like it’s time to move on now if you are able to use Google’s browser and are still interested. Remember that Chromium Edge also requires SSE3, so if you are dealing with one of the most important players in the market, you need to use the latest hardware.
