Intel’s 12th Gen CPU can’t handle the Bar exam

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Law students getting ready to take the Bar exam digitally may run into a serious issue: one of the nation's most frequently-used test-taking software packages, Examplify, is incompatible with Intel's latest generation of processor

Examplify isn't compatible with 12th Gen Intel processors according to a notice from ExamSoft. Examplify said that new Windows devices containing the Intel 12th generation Chipset are triggering their automatic virtual machine check. Currently, they are not supported. They can't be used for the July 2022. A screen cap of a notice given to Bar applicants was included in a post by one user.

According to Examplify, laptops with an Intel 12 Gen processor are not supported. It isn't clear when that information was added, but it wouldn't have made a difference. If a person has a laptop with all the latest hardware, they wouldn't be interested in that page. Someone with a 3090 Ti, one of the highest-end graphics cards, should be asked to check system requirements before they start a game.

Students don't have many options if their laptops are incompatible. Only MacBooks that run macOS Catalina or above and Windows laptops that offer Windows 10 or 11 are supported by Examplify.

It is not known if students had any other warnings beyond the message spotted on the social networking site. Examplify is the piece of software used to administer the Bar in many states, and the Bar exam is just two weeks away. It is used by over 150 law schools in the US.

ExamSoft and Intel didn't reply immediately.

The bar exams took place through Examplify. If the test didn't crash completely, students experienced difficulty uploading files, had portions of their essays deleted, and were kicked out of the test. An ExamSoft spokesman said at the time that the problems were due tomemory issues on some devices.

The National Conference of Bar Examiners said that it was aware of the issue, but that it was up to the individual jurisdiction to figure it out. Each state has a say in the exam software.

While NCBE is not directly involved in the administration of the exam, it is aware of ExamSoft's communication to examinees about Windows devices with an Intel 12th generation chip. Examiners with questions should contact ExamSoft.

After hearing reports of the various technical difficulties during last year's exams, the NCBE issued a similar, equally useless response.

There are other compatibility issues with a recent Intel processor. The 11th and 12th Gen Intel processors didn't support SGX, which makes it hard to play 4K movies on newer devices. In order to play in 4K, SGX is needed.