Last week, Microsoft removed its own PC Health Check app in light of the confusion over which devices would be compatible with the upcoming Windows 11 upgrade.

Fortunately, an alternative is now available in the form of a new WhyNotWin11 app. This app can be downloaded for free from GitHub, and while it has a somewhat less sophisticated UI, it tells you the same good news or bad news.

Microsoft's tool should have been the definitive way to find out if your hardware is capable of running the new OS, but the company says the app "did not provide the level of detail or accuracy you would expect from us about why your Windows 10 PC does not meet the upgrade requirements. We were not fully prepared to share."

Perhaps the new version of the app will not only tell you whether your PC can or cannot run the OS, but will also tell you more specifically why, whether it is due to Windows 11 CPU compatibility issues or a missing TPM chip.

This is a good consumer-friendly move, but what if I want to know right now if my Windows 10 PC is compatible? In that case, WhyNotWin11 may be the answer.

GitHub may seem daunting to the uninitiated, but there is no need to panic at the sheer number of files listed on the WhyNotWin11 landing page. Instead, scroll halfway down the page to the "Download" section and hit the link marked "download latest stable release." A .exe file will be downloaded, double-click it to run it.

Of course, we do not recommend doing anything that you cannot prepare yourself. The result is this:

This green color is certainly encouraging! Compare this with Microsoft's PC Health Check:

Less detailed, a bit more friendly looking, and the definitive judgment is "Windows 11 is ready".

Note that this was not always the case for me. Initially, Microsoft downgraded my PC because it did not have a TPM 2.0 chip. However, in my case, and probably millions like me, the solution was to simply turn on the PC's bios setting at startup. How to do this varies from motherboard to motherboard, but if you want to learn more about this mysterious module, I urge you to read our complete guide to TPMs.