Windows help needed

[Hawkmoon]

I may have mentioned that back in the summer I started looking ahead to the end of support for Windows 10. I have a bunch of computers that don't meet Microsoft's minimum requirements to run Windows 11, and I'm not able or willing to give them all up and just buy a new Windows 11 computer.

So I wanted to investigate Linux, to see if I could make that my solution. Didn't want to risk screwing up any of my current computers, so I bought a used (more like "abused) Toshiba laptop for 50 bucks to use as my test bed for Linux. Then I found another abused laptop, an HP (Pavilion, I think) for $25 and I couldn't pass it up. I've put SSD drives in both of these things, and upgraded both from Windows 7 to Windows 10.

The Toshiba in now chugging along merrily in Linux LMDE6. I've managed to install SoftMaker Office, and I've replaced Firefox with Firefox ESR. I'm not crazy about any of the file managers, and I'm having trouble wrapping my head around the fact that Linux doesn't just assign letters as drive identifiers, but my biggest issue is that I can't find anything that's even remotely a work-alike for AutoCAD LT. Still looking.

Then I read that Rufus, which is what I used to create the USB installation media for Linux, can also take a Windows 11 .iso and create bootable media that will bypass the hardware check. That sounds interesting, so I want to try that on the HP test laptop. Rather than risk trashing the completely functional SSD drive that's in it, I have an unused el cheapo SSD so I wanted to clone the drive in the computer to this spare drive, put that in the laptop, and then see if I can install Windows 11.

Two problems:

• The drive in the computer is 480 GB. The spare drive is 128 GB. Macrium Reflect won't clone the larger drive to the smaller drive. I found a free utility that says it can do this: DiskGenius. Has anyone heard of DiskGenius? If so, is it safe to use?
• When I open the drive in the computer using any partition manager, I have three partitions: I C:, which is marked "Boot", NTFS, 76.89GB used out of 446.83GB available; D: is marked "None", FAT32, 14.19MB used out of 103.02MB available; and F;, which is marked "Active/System", NTFS, 36.51MB used out of 199.00MB available. What are all of them? If I look at them in File Explorer, it reports that drive F: is empty. Do I need these partitions? Can I eliminate either the D: or F: partition without trashing the system?

Thanks.
[/list]

[WLJ]

Be aware starting with 24H2 MS started hard code enforing the SSE4.2 requirement which Rufus can not bypass. Some talk they will be in the future hard enforcing the TPM 2.0 requirement which Rufus can for now currently still bypass.

[Hawkmoon]

Well, that shoots down that idea, I guess. What's the end of life for Win 11 23H2?

[WLJ]

Well, that shoots down that idea, I guess. What's the end of life for Win 11 23H2?

Nov 2025

What CPUs do those PCs have? SSE4.2 support goes back a ways. Still an open question if MS will hard enforce TPM 2.0 anytime soon but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if they did but I think more than likely when the next big feature update is rolled out. 25H2 maybe?

[WLJ]

MS may have reversed course and relaxing their stance on the TPM 2.0 requirement. They're now saying you can do it but be aware of possible issues.
I'm assuming the recently hard coded enforced SSE4.2 requirement still stands though

Microsoft Now Allowing Windows 11 on Unsupported Hardware
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfUjB7k59kE

[Hawkmoon]

Update: I'm still evaluating options, using an older (Windows 7 era) Toshiba laptop I bought expressly for messing around. The nice thing about this one (which I didn't fully appreciate when I bought it) is just how easy and quick it is to swap the internal drive. I now have three configurations, on three SSD drives. First up was the install and activate Wows 10 on the original HDD, then I cloned that to an SSD drive. Then I swapped in a used, reformatted SSD and installed LMDE6 (Linux Mint Debian Edition). I have been playing with Linux. I can learn to live with it, but there are many things I do in Windows that don't seem to have easy analogs in Linux. Plus, I have AutoCAD, and although there are CADD programs for Linux, I haven't found any 2D CADD programs that are even close to being work-alikes for AutoCAD.

So the next step was to try Windows 11. I downloaded an .iso for Windows 11 23H2 and used Rufus to create a bootable USB for installation. I put a blank SSD in the Toshiba and installed Windows 11. I had to manually enter the activation key, but it seems to have worked. That was just last night, so I haven't had time yet to do much of anything with Windows 11. Initial reaction is that I don't like it, but I can learn to live with it (if I can get Open Shell to work with it).

But the end of support for 23H2 is November of 2025, which is only a month later than Windows 10 end of support. When I initially tried to make an installation USB I got an error when I used the 24H2 .iso. Once I had 23H2 up and running, late last night I tried again and this time I think I have a USB for 24H2. Later today I'll see if I can use that USB to update 23H2 to 24H2. If that works, next up I'll try updating Windows 10 22H2 directly to Windows 11 24H2.

[WLJ]

What CPU does the Toshiba have?

[Hawkmoon]

What CPU does the Toshiba have?

Core i3-2310M

It's a Satellite L655

[WLJ]

Core i3-2310M

It's a Satellite L655

That supports SSE4.2 so you should be able to straight install 24H2 with Rufus no problem.