Microsoft has just played its joker card twice in a week, forcing upgrades on millions of Windows PC owners. This will raise serious alarm bells for hundreds of million of users who may now need to upgrade their PCs with no alternative options.

Last January at CES, Microsoft chief marketing officer Yusuf Mehdi declared 2024 the “year of the AI PC.” And whether you believe that prediction came true or not—many new PCs come with AI-accelerating neural processing units onboard, but far from all of them—you can't deny that Microsoft did try very hard to make it happen.

Microsoft keeps adding upgrade roadblocks, but there are workarounds for many models. Here's how you can find out whether your Windows 10 PC can bypass the latest restrictions and safely upgrade to Windows 11 - for free.