How to install Windows 11 on any unsupported hardware – Smartprix

After a long while, Microsoft announced their newest version of Windows which is Windows 11. The minimum requirements however to be able to upgrade to Windows 11 are stricter and not all hardware can meet these requirements. “Your PC does not meet the minimum hardware requirements for Windows 11,” says the Microsoft warning when any device does not support Windows 11. However, if you have a computer that does not meet these new conditions, you can still try to run Windows 11 with a workaround and/or a virtual machine. Let us see how this can be done.

Windows 11 Hardware Requirements

The main issue with running Windows 11 is the lack of Trusted Platform Module version 2.0 on PCs running Windows 10. But, TPM isn’t the only requirement to install Windows 11 on existing PCs. The other requirements are

1. 1 gigahertz or faster with 2 or more cores on a compatible 64-bit processor or System on a Chip (SoC)
2. 4GM RAM
3. 64GB or larger storage
4. UEFI, Secure Boot capable system firmware
5. DirectX 12 compatible graphics/WDDM 2.x
6. >9” with HD Resolution (720p)
7. Microsoft account and internet connectivity required for setup for Windows 11 Home.

There are mainly 4 methods to install Windows 11 on unsupported devices.

Note: These methods can’t bypass every requirement, and your unofficial Windows 11 install may not work properly.

A. Join Windows Insider Channel

Those who were already enrolled in Windows insider have gotten an update to Windows 11 irrespective of meeting system requirements but if you missed it, there is a way you can still get it. For this method to work, you will have to enroll yourself in the Windows Insider program and have to join the release preview channel. To join release preview channel –

1. Open the settings app and select update and security.
2. From the sidebar menu select Windows Insider Program and click on the ‘get started button.
3. Sign in with your Microsoft account. Create one if you don’t have it.
4. Select the Release Preview Channel and click on confirm.
5. You will be asked to confirm if you want to join the insider program. Click on confirm.
6. Go ahead and restart your PC to let changes take place.

Now make changes to registry files by following the given steps –

1. In the start menu type in ‘regedit’ to open the Registry Editor.
2. Towards the left sidebar locate the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftfolder
3. On the right side there will be a few values that you will change to move from the release preview channel to the dev channel.
4. On BranchName double click and change it to Dev. Do the same for ContentType but set value to Mainline, and on Ring set the value to External.
5. Now head back to the insider program and take a look at what channel you are now part of.
6. It should show that you are an insider for the Dev Channel which will now grant you an insider preview of the update to Windows 11 on your system.

ALSO READ: Here’s the complete list of Windows 11 shortcuts to make your work/life easier!

B. Enrolling in Dev Channel using a script

You can use the script to join the Dev channel if the above method didn’t work for you. There could be many reasons as to why the change didn’t take place.

1. Download the Offline Insider Enroll script from the GitHub page.
2. When the download gets completed, right-click the script and run it as an administrator.
3. It will open a command prompt.
4. Simply type in number 1 and hit enter. The script will complete its work.
5. Press any key to close the command prompt.
6. Now, head over to the Insider program and see your system has been enrolled into Dev Channel.

C. Using Rufus Installer

For this method, we need both Windows 10 ISO and Windows 11 ISO as well as Rufus setup. We will be using this Rufus program to burn the Windows 10 ISO to a USB pendrive.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Run Rufus Portable
2. Ensure your pen drive is shown under Device tab in Rufus
3. Select the ISO file from your download location
4. Press Start

This will take some time and wait until the status is shown as Ready. Once it shows so, close the Rufus window and eject the pendrive.

1. Now, double-click the Windows 11 ISO file and a new drive would be mounted on the Navigation pane of Windows Explorer.

2. Open the drive and then the Sources folder. Inside it scroll down until you find ‘install.wim’ or ‘install.esd’ file. Copy this file to another place in the Windows Explorer. I pasted it in Documents folder, for instance.

3. Now, insert the Windows 10 bootable pendrive. Inside it too, there will be a Sources folder and within which you’ll find a similar named ‘install.wim’ or ‘install.esd’ file. Delete that and in its place paste the file we earlier kept in other place. In my case, it was Documents folder. So, what we have done is to replace the Windows 10 install.wim or esd file with the newer Windows 11 one.

4. Once it is pasted, the setup is ready and now you just have to restart the PC/Laptop with the bootable Windows 10 pendrive still connected.

5. While the system restarts, press F9 or the key that gets you into boot options. Here choose the bootable pendrive.

6. Then go through the Windows installation setup like you normally do. Don’t worry as it would look like Windows 10 setup process only. The installer identifies the setup as Windows 10 but we will be installing Windows 11 only. You just have to follow the on-screen instructions and if required format the drive into which Windows 11 will be installed. Once the installation is done, the system will reboot. You can remove the pendrive as it’s not required anymore.

7. The system will now boot into Windows 11 startup screen. Again follow the on-screen commands and make certain choices that would tailor the experience to your preferences.

Voila now you have Windows 11!

D. Upgrade by replacing the compatibility check file

This is kind of an addition to methods 1 and 2. If there were issues with those methods, try this one out. This can be done by-

Obtaining an older Windows 10 ISO- Download a copy of Windows 10 October 2018 (build 17763).

Try to update to Windows 11 through Windows update- setup can be fully downloaded this way. If it isn’t use UUP Dump to manually download Windows 11 ISO.

Extract the file from Windows 10 ISO – once windows 10 iso is downloaded simply double click it to mount it as a drive. Navigate to the sources folder and find appraiserres.dll. Copy that file somewhere convenient, like the desktop. Use File Explorer to navigate to sources. Rename the appraiserres1.dill. Copy the appraiserres.dll file you extracted earlier into this folder. Navigate to C:$WINDOWS. -BT. Double click setup.exe. file.

Copy the file to Windows 11 setup-

1. Burn the windows 11 ISO to a USB drive using a tool like Rufus.
2. Navigate to the USB drive and open the sources folder.
3. Find appraiserres.dll and rename it to something like appraiserres1.dll.
4. Copy the appraiserres.dll file you extracted earlier into this folder.
5. Navigate to the USB drive again and double-click the setup.exe file.

Always disable checking for updates before upgrading process as they may cause the setup to crash.

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Have you installed Windows 11?

Now you can try all these 4 methods to run Windows 11 on your unsupported hardware. Let us know which method did work for you. And once successfully installed, do not forget to try these Windows 11 features.

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