Installing Windows 11 on Unsupported Hardware

foreign [Music] welcome to another video from explaining computers.com this time I'm going to demonstrate two different methods for installing or upgrading to Windows 11 on computers that don't meet Microsoft's stated requirements given that support for Windows 10 comes to an end on the 14th of October 2025 such methods are going to become more important so let's go and get started here we can see the hardware requirements for running Windows 11 and whilst most computers manufactured in the past 10 years do me most of this specification many are unsupported for one or two reasons firstly some computers do not have TPM 2.0 security modules and secondly most PCS or laptops that are more than three or four years old have an unsupported processor to be clear this doesn't mean that their processor will not work just that Microsoft have chosen not to officially support it computers that don't meet all windows 11 requirements will display this message in the update section of windows 10. or we can visit this page which like all the pages I show will be linked in the video description where we can download and run Microsoft's PC health check application we can then click on check now to find that the computer I'm using which is the HP Elite desk 800 G2 but I looked at on the channel a few weeks ago does not meet Windows 11 requirements and if we scroll down we find out why and it's because it hasn't got a supported processor if we try to install Windows 11 on unsupported Hardware the installer won't let us continue so what are the best Solutions well we can download a Windows 11 ISO file use a program called Rufus to create an installation media but includes some registry hacks and then uses to perform a successful clean install or we can download a Windows 11 ISO file and then whilst running Windows 10 edit the registry to avoid Hardware checks and then perform a successful upgrade as a third option we could create and boot a standard Windows 11 installation media and break out of it to manually edit the registry to avoid Hardware checks and then perform a successful install but as this produces an identical result to the first option and is more complex I'm just going to demonstrate the first two methods just before we proceed I must caution that Microsoft does not recommend installing Windows 11 on unsupported hardware and it's got a page all about this right here which includes this disclaimer as it states installing Windows 11 on unsupported Hardware may result in compatibility issues and your PC will no longer be supported and won't be entitled to receive updates now since the launch of Windows 11 in August 2021 Microsoft has supplied security and other updates to unsupported computers running Windows 11. and there is no indication it's going to stop doing so but you must accept that everything shown in this video is undertaken at your own risk right whether you want to do a clean install using Rufus or an upgrade Vara registry edit the process starts by downloading a Windows 10 ISO file to do so visit this page which I'll link in the video description and scroll down to the section where we can download the windows ISO here it is down here where we can select here the one option which is Windows 11 multi-edition iso4 x64 devices and then we can click on download and once it's validated our request let's scroll down a bit to see things properly we now need to choose our language I'm going to choose I think a English International like that and click on confirm and it'll validate again there we are and we can now download our ISO file I've set things up to save this in my downloads folder in a folder called Windows 11 but you can save it wherever you like although do note that the file is over five gigabytes in size foreign with our ISO downloaded we're now ready to do a clean install of Windows 11 using Rufus and do note that this will delete everything from the system drive on your computer including all programs and data this noted let's now go across to the Rufus website and we can download from here the Rufus utility we just scroll down under there it is we'll just click download like that and save the file there we are nice small file so we'll now close down the browser and go across the file which is now sitting here and run up Rufus do we want to do it Windows yes we do and here we are running Rufus and I'll get rid of that just to make things tidy as we can see at the top Rufus has picked up a USB flash drive that I've got plugs into the computer and which it's going to turn into our Windows 11 install media note that this drive must be at least eight gigabytes in size and that everything on it will be deleted next here we need to pick up our ISO image so we'll go across to here and click on select and there is our ISO file we downloaded like that and then everything else here I'm going to leave on the defaults so now we just need to click on start and this is the really clever bit Rufus is giving us some very useful options for our installation media and the first one here is remove requirement for four gigabyte RAM secure Boot and TPM checks that doesn't there mention the check for a compatible processor for Windows 11 but it will include the registry edit for that as well and below that as you can see it's an option which is pre-ticks for removing the requirement for an online Microsoft account and I'm going to leave this ticked because I want to create a local account during this Windows 11 install but do note if your windows license is linked to your Microsoft account you probably shouldn't tick this box because you'll want to log in with your Microsoft account which should allow Windows 11 to be automatically activated although you could always log back into your Microsoft account later on just because the option is available I'm also going to click disable data collection so we skip the Privacy questions during the Windows installation and with this all set let's click on OK it does now check we know we're about to delete everything on our USB device we know that's true so we'll click OK and there we are our Windows 11 installation media with hacks pre-applied for unsupported Hardware is being created and there we are it's finished so let's uh close this down like that and we now need to reboot our computer so we'll go down there and do a restart and here we are booting up again where we need to boot from the USB drive on this particular HP computer I'm doing this by pressing the Escape key on boot and I then need to select the boot menu down there and from that I can now select our USB drive but do note the method for doing this varies between computers and if you want assistance booting from a USB drive just look to my video called PC bios settings anyway the windows installer has now started as we can see so let's uh click on next and I'll install now and setup is now starting so we should be able to proceed on through in the normal fashion on this screen you'll see what offered the option to either upgrade or to do a customize install of Windows only and we're going to take the second option here which is for a clean install as we'll look at upgrading in the next part of the video so and now click on next it's picked up the right place to install well accept we want to do it and all that and it'll get on with the installation here we are things are happening I'll just flip rapidly through all of these questions and now it is asking us to sign in Rufus has sadly failed in its attempt to stop this happening Microsoft really does want this to happen so I'm not that surprised there's no way we can get out of this doesn't matter what we click on so let's revert to plan B where I enter the email address no at thank you dot com and continue which will cause problems we can put anything in there we'll put hello it won't like this oh look something's gone wrong never mind and guess what we're Now setting up a local account which I'll call EC and I now just have to go on to the three stupid Microsoft questions and here we are the processes successfully complete Windows 11 is now installed on our computer in all of its Glory with its centered menu exciting things like that but for now I think I'll just check that Solitaire is working always a good idea and I'll come back to you very shortly to demonstrate an upgrade as opposed to a clean install foreign greetings here I am back again and by the magic of filmmaking our Elite desk 800 is now once again running Windows 10 and we've got the windows 11 ISO file downloaded as we had previously so everything is now ready for me to demonstrate an upgrade from Windows 10 to Windows 11. and you may be thinking why can't we just boot the Rufus installation media like we did in the last part of the video and select the upgrade option but if we do that as we're seeing here a compatibility report pops up saying that the upgrade option isn't available using the installation media so we have to use another method specifically what we're going to do is to follow a process detailed by Microsoft on this webpage and if we scroll down here we see the method here it is it outlines a registry hack that allows you to upgrade to Windows 11 although Microsoft do advise you shouldn't do this and it is worth noting that this hack only works on computers that meet all windows 11 requirements aside from having a compatible processor and or TPM 2.0 so it's possible you may try this method and find out that you can't proceed but you won't have lost anything and you can still do a clean install as we did in last part of the video also make sure that you're fully backed up before you begin as the only sensible assumption is that you might lose everything on your C drive trying this out so if you're not fully prepared for that do not proceed but of course we are going to proceed and we'll start by mounting the windows 11 ISO file so we'll right click it and click on Mount like that it'll mount a virtual DVD drive and we've now got a setup file and if we double click that setup file to run it like that there we are yes Microsoft we want to do it and then the second it'll come up there it is and we're going to now click on next but I will tell you this isn't going to work it'll check for updates and then after that it will check our PC and oh look our processor isn't supported for this version of Windows and the reason I've run this and let it fail is because doing so makes it easier to apply a registry hack because by running that process it set up a new folder in the registry editor so let's go to the registry editor we'll go to search and type reg edit like that it'll bring it up there we can click on registry editor do we want to go there yes we do and we want to navigate to hkey local machine to system and then to setup down here and then in setup we need to go to the newly created mode setup next we want to right click Mo setup and do a new d word value like that and we need to call this allow upgrades with unsupported TPM or CPU and do note that this is case sensitive and we then needed to change the value of this from 0 to 1 so we'll double click it and change that zero to a one like that and there we are we've applied our registry hack so if the world is with us we can now click on setup again and run it again and let it go through there we are click on next it'll check for updates we've seen this before and it's now again checking our PC and yes this time things are going to be okay so we'll accept the license agreement like that and look Microsoft is now informing us that our PC doesn't beat the minimum system requirements for running Windows 11. we've got a version of a disclaimer we looked at earlier in the video so we have to accept this is okay which of course I will like that and there we are we're now ready to install Windows 11 Pro keeping personal files and apps so let's click on install well knock me down with a feather it's worked we had no questions to answer during the process and clearly this is an upgrade of our previous system I can still see we've got blender there we can run up blender now in Windows 11. as it going to work it looks like it is this is a test and does it pull in a file this is checking your application to that and our files are there they most definitely are so I'm impressed we've successfully upgraded from Windows 10 to Windows 11 on unsupported Hardware unless your computer is very old indeed it's likely you'll be able to install Windows 11 using one of the methods I've covered in this video I also suspect that Microsoft will continue to provide updates to unsupported Hardware so it can't be accused of forcing millions of people to scrap perfectly decent computers but now that's it for another video if you've enjoyed what you've seen here please press that like button if you haven't subscribed Please Subscribe and I hope to talk to you again very reason [Music]

Channel: ExplainingComputers

Views: 383,560

Keywords: How to install Windows 11 on older PC, How to install Windows 11 on unsupported hardware, Windows 11 upgrade, upgrade Windows 10 to Windows 11, Christopher Barnatt, Barnatt, Windows 11 installation, Windows 11 Rufus, Windows 11 registry hack, Windows 11 install tutorial, Windows 11 upgrade tutorial, Windows 11 tutorial

Id: UL_maCWM5bk

Length: 16min 11sec (971 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 30 2023