Future Windows 10 update will soften the blow of Spectre patches

Like with other companies, Microsoft's Spectre and Meltdown security fixes introduced a performance hit -- it mostly affected servers, but it was there. Thankfully, that blow shouldn't be quite so severe in the next several months. The company's Mehmet Iyigun has confirmed that a major Windows 10 update in the first half of 2019 will use Google's Retpoline solution to mitigate Spectre version 2 attacks without the usual slowdown. The improvement should be such that the impact will be "noise-level" in most situations. You may not even notice, then.

There's no indication this fix will be available outside of Windows 10's first big 2019 release. This won't need a more drastic microcode update, though, and it won't depend on collaboration with chip companies like AMD and Intel. Relief is in sight -- it's just a question of whether or not you're willing and able to update to Microsoft's latest software as soon as it's available.