Windows 11 was recently announced and like any other enthusiast I was excited to try it when it was available but I was tied by work commitments. So I found a break and decided to jump in on it but shock on me when I learned that my custom pc ticked all the requirements except the CPU, for those who have been around long enough know that I acquired the intel i7-7700k sometime back, yap Microsoft in its wisdom decided to exclude it. In my estimation, this is a decent chip and they decided well fuck you! So I went out digging and somewhat managed to get it to work and here is the procedure for those who would want to give it a try…
Disclaimer: Microsoft has their reason as to what minimum requirements are required to get their software working. So you are on your own and should you fuck up (boot loops, render your computer inoperable, etc,) you will just have to unfuck yourself !!
Check your system compatibility by downloading and running the pc health check app here
If you are good then well done if not proceed to step 3
Download the windows 11 iso and create a bootable USB (recommendation use Rufus)
Download also the windows 10 iso (but am assuming you have it laying somewhere on your drives)
Go inside the win11 bootable drive you created locate the file folder called sources and locate a file named appraiserres.dll and delete it this is the file responsible for checking and enforcing compatibility requirements.
Click on the setup file and it will launch windows installation You will be confronted with two choices either install windows keeping your files and settings (basically upgrade) and clean install, choose the first option ie keep files and settings, be patient as it works its magic and if all goes well you are home.
For those of us who what fresh and clean install then start here going forward,
Go inside the windows 10 folder/Iso and locate the appraiserres.dll as I have indicated above and delete it.
Go inside the windows 11 folder and locate the install.wim its domiciled in the sources folder also.
Next step is converting the install.wim to install.esd by using command prompt in administrator mode use this code dism /Get-WimInfo /WimFile:C:\Path\To\install.wim and press enter.
This will provide you a list of all windows editions contained in the wim note the index of the one you are interested in.
12.Next is to convert and provide the destination folder of the install.esd file use the code dism /Export-Image /SourceImageFile:E:\Downloads\OSes\install.wim /SourceIndex:INDEX /DestinationImageFile:E:\Downloads\OSes\install.esd /Compress:recovery /CheckIntegrity
This is an intensive conversion and resource hungry and I hope your CPU will be able to handle it …mine took around 15 minutes at 100% CPU usage.
After the conversion is done take the converted install.esd and replace the one already in the sources folder of the win10 folder or iso.
What you have just done is create a hybrid Win 10 folder/iso that bypasses compatibility checks…Tricks the computer its installing win10 while in essence installing Win 11.
Switch off your computer and directly boot into the usb and install kama kawaida.
Further reading here and good video explanation by LTT here
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Some footnotes:
Its smooth and clean af am yet to give a full-throttle testing na games.
I have already received updates though I will turn that off.
Since Friday when I got it to work it has crashed several times just like my win 10 would do.
If after sometimes am not impressed am finally jumping to linux with windows like feel Garuda linux and parting with microsoft after over 15 years together.
Not worth it really at this point, even if your machine is compatible. Especially if you are windows power user. Bugs will annoy you big time. My recommendation is that we wait till Q3 of next year before switching to 11 completely. I tried it a little and switched back to 10. I don’t feel like I am missing anything.
hii ni version 21H2 but I get your reservation the reason I was quick to jump is that win 10 ilikua imenichosa na microsoft 360 controller freezing mid game hope its addressed in this though sijajjaribu hopefully by then they would have ironed out compatibility issues on chips.
Core i7 zinakuanga expensive for nothing. Just buy the latest generation of i5 and you will be good.
The latest i5 and i7 performance difference ni kidogo sana yet the i7 will cost almost double the price.
GPU also helps so just look for an i5 with 4 GB graphics and you’ll avoid a lot of hustles related to upgrading… Usiangalie processing speed na hyper threading peke take…
Chunga Windows 11 hardware compatibility issues znaezarudi tena in the future ju at a security hardware requirements zake ni ngori… Wakiongeza patch unaezapata shida za OS…
Buy a Secured-core PC kama hutaki mashida za Windows 11…
But bugs ziko one you cant change the account profile pic takes the one from the Microsoft account and sticks to it and two search freezes intermittently mpaka ufanye registry fix
Afadhali ungebaki ama ununue a skylake CPU .That i-7700K kaby lake had only maginal improvement over the predecessor .You only got slightly higher clock speeds .