: Modern versions of MinGW and MSVC (Microsoft Visual C++) set default target Windows versions to Windows 8 or higher. The _WIN32_WINNT macro is often set to 0x0602 (Windows 8) or 0x0A00 (Windows 10), causing compilers to assume the presence of APIs that don't exist on Windows 7.

GetSystemTimePreciseAsFileTime is a Windows API function introduced in Windows 8 to retrieve the current system date and time with high precision (sub-microsecond accuracy). Modern applications—particularly those built using Visual Studio 2015 or later—use this for precise logging, networking, and performance profiling.