If you have an old incompatible PC and you want to clean install Windows 11 or you want to upgrade your existing Windows 10 operating system to Windows 11 in your device, this article will help you.
The solution given in this guide will help you in installing any Windows 11 version, including the latest Windows 11 24H2 (2024 Update), on any device.
Table of Contents
- PROBLEM: Users can’t Install or Upgrade to Windows 11 on their Old Computer Systems
- REASON: Windows 11 Setup Blocks the OS Installation on Incompatible Devices
- SOLUTION 1: Install Windows 11 on Unsupported Hardware Using Rufus Tool
- SOLUTION 2: Install or Upgrade to Windows 11 on Unsupported PC Using Regedit
- SOLUTION 3: Run Windows 11 Setup Using Product Server Command-Line Parameter
- SOLUTION 4: Modify Windows 11 ISO to Disable and Bypass Hardware Requirements Check
PROBLEM: Users can’t Install or Upgrade to Windows 11 on their Old Computer Systems
If you have an old computer and you try to install Windows 11 in your device, you might receive “This PC can’t run Windows 11” error message at the installation time.
Following screenshot shows “This PC can’t run Windows 11” error message appearing while trying to upgrade an old Windows 10 device to Windows 11:
Here is another screenshot showing a similar “This PC doesn’t meet the minimum system requirements to install this version of Windows” error message while trying to fresh install Windows 11 using a bootable USB drive:
Following are a few other similar error messages that users might receive while trying to install Windows 11 on an incompatible device containing old hardware:
This PC will not run Windows 11. (by compatibility checking tool at Windows 11 website)
This PC doesn’t currently meet Windows 11 system requirements. (by PC Health Check tool)
This PC doesn’t meet the minimum system requirements to install Windows 11. (by Windows Update)
This PC doesn’t currently meet all the system requirements for Windows 11. (by Windows 11 Installation/Upgrade Assistant)
So basically, if the user has an old device that doesn’t meet minimum system requirements to install Windows 11, the setup marks it as an unsupported device and automatically blocks the installation. Thus the user will be unable to install or upgrade to Windows 11 on the device.
REASON: Windows 11 Setup Blocks the OS Installation on Incompatible Devices
“This PC can’t run Windows 11” or other similar error messages appear when a PC is not compatible with Windows 11. If your computer is old and contains some outdated hardware that is not supported by Windows 11, it can’t be upgraded to the new OS unless you apply some workarounds mentioned later in this article.
Windows 11 comes with higher system requirements. It requires TPM 2.0 (Trusted Platform Module) chip, Secure boot, a supported processor, 64 GB+ free disk space and 4 GB+ RAM. If a device doesn’t meet these minimum hardware requirements, it can’t be upgraded to Windows 11 operating system.
Following article contains details about all the system requirements for Windows 11 installation:
Windows 11 System Requirements or Hardware Specifications
Don’t worry! We are going to share a 100% working and super easy solution to bypass TPM 2.0, Secure Boot and other Windows 11 system requirements check. After following this tutorial, you’ll be able to successfully install Windows 11 in your old incompatible device. You’ll also be able to upgrade your old Windows 10 PC to Windows 11 without any data loss.
If you want to install or upgrade to Windows 11 in your unsupported PC, here are the required steps:
SOLUTION 1: Install Windows 11 on Unsupported Hardware Using Rufus Tool
This is the best and easiest method to skip the hardware requirements check and successfully install Windows 11 in any unsupported PC.
You just need to create a tweaked Windows 11 bootable USB drive using Rufus tool and boot your computer using the USB drive. It’ll automatically disable or bypass hardware requirements check and will install Windows 11 successfully on your unsupported device.
Here are the required steps in details:
STEP 1: You’ll need Windows 11 offline ISO file. If you don’t have it, you can download it for free using the official Microsoft website.
Following article will help you in downloading Windows 11 ISO file from Microsoft website:
Download Windows 11 Offline ISO File
STEP 2: Now download and install a freeware called Rufus from following article:
Download Rufus Tool
STEP 3: Attach a USB flash drive (at least 8 GB) to your computer and run Rufus tool.
Click on “SELECT” button and it’ll open a window to select the Windows 11 ISO file. Just browse to the folder containing the downloaded ISO file and select the ISO file.
Now click on “START” button given at the bottom in Rufus app. It’ll show “Windows User Experience” dialog box to turn on/off advanced tweaks.
You need to select following option to disable or bypass Windows 11 hardware requirements check:
Remove requirement for 4GB+ RAM, Secure Boot and TPM 2.0
You can also select other desired options as per your requirements.
Click on OK button and Rufus will create a ready-made tweaked USB drive for Windows 11 installation with hardware requirements check disabled.
STEP 4: Now restart your computer and press F12 or other keys mentioned on BIOS splash/startup screen to select boot device. You’ll see “Preparing one time boot menu” message on screen. When the boot menu screen appears, choose Boot from USB or similar option and select your USB drive.
STEP 5: It’ll start Windows 11 setup process using the USB drive. When you see the “Which type of installation do you want?” screen, you can select desired option to perform clean installation of Windows 11 or upgrade existing Windows 10 to Windows 11.
If you want to just upgrade your Windows 10 PC to Windows 11 and want to keep files, settings and installed apps, select “Upgrade” option.
If you want to format and clean install Windows 11 in your device, select “Custom” option as shown in following screenshot:
Once you select the desired option, the setup wizard will successfully install or upgrade to Windows 11 in your old unsupported device.
PS: Check out following article for more advanced details and information about creating tweaked bootable USB drive using Rufus:
Create Unattended Windows 11 Setup for Automatic Installation
SOLUTION 2: Install or Upgrade to Windows 11 on Unsupported PC Using Regedit
If you don’t want to create a bootable USB drive using any 3rd party tool, you can get rid of “This PC can’t run Windows 11” error message and force Windows 11 to install on your unsupported hardware using a simple Registry tweak.
This Registry method has been officially provided by Microsoft to install or upgrade to Windows 11 on old incompatible devices.
STEP 1: Close the Windows 11 installation wizard and press WIN+R keys together to launch RUN dialog box. Now type regedit in RUN box and press Enter. It’ll open Registry Editor.
PS: If you are using a bootable USB drive to install Windows 11, you can access regedit by using a hidden secret method mentioned below in “IMPORTANT NOTE for Clean Installation” just after STEP 3.
STEP 2: Now go to following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup\MoSetup
Select MoSetup key and in right-side pane, right-click on empty area and select “New -> DWORD (32-bit) Value” option.
Set the new DWORD name as AllowUpgradesWithUnsupportedTPMOrCPU and double-click on the DWORD and set its value to 1 to bypass TPM and CPU requirements check.
STEP 3: Again go to following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup
Right-click on Setup key and select New -> Key option. Set new key name as LabConfig and press Enter key.
Select LabConfig key and in right-side pane, create following 3 new DWORDs:
BypassTPMCheck
BypassSecureBootCheck
BypassRAMCheck
Set their values to 1 to disable or bypass TPM 2.0, Secure Boot and RAM amount check respectively.
Now try again to install or upgrade to Windows 11 using Windows Update or official Windows 11 installation tool and it’ll no longer show any error message. Now you’ll be able to install or upgrade to Windows 11 without any problem.
IMPORTANT NOTE for Clean Installation: If you are using a bootable USB drive to install or upgrade to Windows 11, you will not have access to Windows Desktop to apply the Registry tweak. Don’t worry! You just need to press SHIFT+F10 or Fn+SHIFT+F10 keys together at installation time to launch Command Prompt window. Now you can type regedit in Command Prompt window and press Enter and it’ll open Registry Editor.
Now follow the above mentioned steps to apply the Registry tweak. After applying the tweak, close Registry Editor and Command Prompt window and click on Close button present in setup wizard window titlebar. Windows Setup will show confirmation message “Are you sure you want to quit?”, click on Yes button. You’ll see the “Install Now” window again. Click on the install button and this time you’ll be able to install Windows 11 without any issue.
PS: For your convenience, we are also providing ready-made Registry script to create above mentioned key and DWORD automatically in Registry Editor. Download following ZIP file, extract it and run extracted REG file:
Registry Script to Install or Upgrade to Windows 11 on Unsupported Hardware
It’ll automatically apply the required Registry tweak in your computer system and you’ll be able to install or upgrade Windows 11 on unsupported devices.
SOLUTION 3: Run Windows 11 Setup Using Product Server Command-Line Parameter
This is another quick and easy way to install or upgrade to Windows 11 on any unsupported device. We can run Windows 11 setup using a hidden secret command-line parameter or argument that automatically skips hardware requirements check and installs Windows 11 in any device.
The secret parameter is “Product Server” that is used with Setup.exe executable file. Setup.exe is the main file that is used by Windows 11 installer to install the operating system in a device.
The “Product Server” parameter is used to run the setup in server devices but we can use the same parameter to install Windows 11:
STEP 1: Right-click on Windows 11 ISO file and select Mount option. It’ll mount the ISO file as a new drive in File Explorer.
If you can’t mount the ISO file, you can extract it using 7-Zip or other file archive programs.
Now open the mounted drive or extracted folder.
STEP 2: You’ll see setup.exe file inside the folder. Now press and hold SHIFT key and right-click on empty area inside the folder. Now select “Open PowerShell window here” option from the context menu.
STEP 3: It’ll open a PowerShell window. Type cmd inside the window and press Enter key to change to Command Prompt mode. Now execute following command:
setup.exe /product server
It’ll start Windows 11 installation with all system requirements checks disabled. Now you can select “Keep files, settings, and apps” option to upgrade existing OS to Windows 11 or select “Nothing” option to perform a clean installation of Windows 11 as per your requirements.
PS: You’ll see “Windows Server” mentioned inside the setup wizard window. It’s a part of the trick so you can safely ignore it. It’ll successfully install Windows 11 in your device.
Here is an exclusive video highlighting the above mentioned method live in action for your convenience:
SOLUTION 4: Modify Windows 11 ISO to Disable and Bypass Hardware Requirements Check
Following are a few other workarounds that can also be used to forcefully install Windows 11 on old incompatible devices. These workarounds modify Windows 11 ISO file to remove the hardware requirements check functionality and force Windows 11 to complete installation on unsupported devices.
METHOD 1: You can delete two files Appraiser.dll and Appraiser.sdb present inside “Sources” folder in Windows 11 setup folder. It’ll deactivate the hardware requirements check mechanism in Windows 11 setup. Thanks Robert.
METHOD 2: This methods requires offline ISO files of both Windows 10 and Windows 11. Extract both Windows 11 ISO and Windows 10 ISO file. Now copy Install.esd file present inside the setup folder of Windows 11 ISO and paste it in Windows 10 ISO’s setup folder. In this way, we are replacing Windows 10’s Install.esd file with Windows 11’s Install.esd file to use Windows 10 setup installer to install Windows 11 in our system. Install.esd file is the main setup image file that contains Windows 11. Thanks Chaitanya.
Also Check:
Tip: Install Windows 11 Without Internet Using Local Account
TIP: How to Install Windows 11 Without Microsoft Account (MSA)
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