Coming back, I should probably qualify that snarky retort some.
Sure, Windows could be written to work on older CPUs, but the kinds of instructions a CPU supports these days isn’t just the run-of-the-mill x86 processor superset, but includes a whole lot of stuff like extended versions of MMX and the like.
This would require MS to maintain, essentially, many multiples more in versions of their software just to support PCs that people are, by and large, not using anymore or upgrading from in the near future.
And MS has slashed their budget for that kind of stuff, just like they did for QC, so that Billy and other top shareholders can live on a yearly income capable of supporting every currently living human being for the remainder of their natural lives.
Alas, sounds cynical, but this is the consequence of unfettered capitalism, when you cut all the safeguards year after year in bill riders just to get both sides to pass the yearly budget and things like that.
Seriously, if people really understood how the rich were ripping us off we’d be close to civil war.