So Dorico 3 only supports the latest version of windows (10)? I’m used to other software at least supporting the last couple versions of an OS. So would i expect to run into issues with windows 8? Looks like you support latest 2 versions on mac.
runs perfectly on my windows 8.1
“MacOS 10.12 or later” is three years of historical OS support, since 2016. “Windows 10” is four years, since 2015.
Microsoft no longer supports Windows 8 at all, and mainstream support for Windows 8.1 ended in 2018.
There was a clear statement that Dorico 3 will NOT run on earlier versions of MacOS. Blame Apple’s policy of “continuous backward incompatibility” for that, not Steinberg!
There were certainly Dorico 2 users running on Windows 7 (released ten years ago) - it’s probably a bit too early to get any reports either way about Dorico 3.
I’m using windows 7 and it’s working perfectly with both Dorico 2 pro & Dorico 3 pro (also latest cubase 10 pro and Kontakt 5) 
Officially only Windows 10 (64-bit) is supported in Dorico 3 - see here (click) and open up ‘System requirements’. That requirement actually gives two versions back, as the only versions of Windows 10 when installed using a retail or OEM licence (i.e. Windows 10 Home, Pro or Pro for Workstations) that are not already end of life are the latest version 1903 as well as version 1809 and version 1803. All older retail and OEM versions of Windows 10 are already end of life (versions 1709, 1703, 1607, 1511 and 1507).
Installation of Dorico 3 on any older version of Windows is ‘at your own risk’. Steinberg have been pretty clear that they are dropping support for all versions of Windows prior to Windows 10 in all new products and paid upgrades from now on - it has already been announced that Cubase (and presumably therefore also Nuendo) 10.5 will only support Windows 10. There comes a point where testing on older versions of Windows cannot be justified for a dwindling user base, especially as Windows 7 goes end of life in January 2020. Windows 8 has been unsupported for a while. Windows 8.1 never got a particularly large user base and whilst it does not go end of life until January 2023, it may well be that most users have already upgraded to Windows 10.
It has not been possible to buy a new computer with official support for Windows 7 for some time - you have to work round Microsoft’s update block on newer processors and might struggle to find drivers.
There comes a point where developers need to leave behind support for an almost ten year old operating system and be able to take advantage of feature and API improvements in later operating systems. Adobe Creative Cloud has dropped Windows 8 and 8.1 support in all 2019 applications. Adobe Creative Cloud 2019 audio and video applications support Windows 10 1703 or later only. For retail licensees (Windows 10 Home, Pro and Pro for Workstations), all versions of Windows 10 prior to 1803 (i.e. 1507, 1511, 1607, 1703 and 1709) are already end of life.
Of all the Windows systems and VMs I am responsible for, only one is yet to be upgraded to Windows 10; it will be moved off Windows 7 in the next few months.
Just a nit-pick, David, all the “minor versions” of Windows 10 you mention are “Windows 10” - unlike MacOS where 10.12, 10.13, etc are not the same OS so far as general compatibility goes. (
Of course if somebody is still running WIndows 10 1507 or whatever, the reason is that they decided to ignore Windows update.
Microsoft “does backwards compatibility,” but in general Apple doesn’t. I still have apps originally written for Windows XP (20 years ago) running on the latest version of Windows 10, without any special tweaking required.
It is quite possible that as part of some necessary updates to our toolchain during the 3.x development cycle, it may not be possible to run on Windows 7 or 8. At this point in time we don’t know the impact of these changes, but please be aware that just because 3.0 happens to work on win7 that it means the next update will.
Very true, Rob. There are feature and compatibility changes along the way through the various Windows 10 versions though Microsoft try to avoid disruptive change where possible. Even so, quite a few applications only support Windows 10 1703 and upwards, and there were some important changes in driver compatibility from Windows 10 1703 if I remember correctly. 1703 was the first version of Windows 10 that felt genuinely mature to me.
Microsoft certainly seem much more concerned about continuing to support legacy APIs than Apple do. You can still run Win32 applications on the latest Windows 10 x64 version - though Win16 applications are not supported on 64 bit Windows and might not be supported any more on Windows 10 x86. I stopped caring about the only Win16 application I ever used seriously a very long time ago when it was replaced by more modern alternatives.