Installing 10 on an old BIOS system but Media Creation Tool failed

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  1. alienboy
    Posts : 10
    Windows 10
       New #1

    Installing 10 on an old BIOS system but Media Creation Tool failed


    Happy new year, everyone!

    I want to install Windows 10 on a new SSD on an old system, I used Media Creation Tool 22H2 to create a bootable USB, but it failed on booting. When booting, I could see the Windows 10 logo on screen but it just hanged at that stage for 50+ minutes, no loading icon (those dots in rotating a circle). My motherboard is quite old and pre-UEFI. I tested the bootable USBs on a newer UEFI system and they all works.

    I've tried many different ways but no success so far. Here are what I've tried:
    • Made sure my system RAMs are good, using MemTest86.
    • Used Media Creation Tool 22H2 to create an ISO and copied it with Rufus. However, Rufus only makes NTFS USBs when copying an ISO. The result is the same—booting hanging at logo

    Here are what I'm going to try, not sure if they make sense:
    • Use a different ISO to USB tool to burn the ISO to a FAT32 USB, hopefully my BIOS can boot with it.
    • Clone the Window 7 partition from my current working HDD to the empty new SSD -> boot with the Win7 on the SSD -> run the setup.exe on the install USB -> upgrade the SSD Win7 to Win10. Not sure if this works? I'm also concerned that this won't be a clean installation.
    • Burn the ISO to a DVD+R or DVD-R and install from there. I'm trying to avoid this because I don't know if my very old DVD RW drive still works and I don't have any DVD+/-R discs at hand.


    Any thoughts on how I can successfully install Windows 10 on my decade-plus old system? Any help is appreciated and I thank you in advance!

    My specs:
    OS: Windows 7 Ultimate, SP1
    CPU: Intel Core i7-990X
    MB: ASUS P6T SE
    Target Install Drive: Crucial MX500 1 TB SATA SSD
    Last edited by alienboy; 01 Jan 2024 at 21:20. Reason: add more info
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  3. Berton
    Posts : 14,022
    Win10 Pro and Home, Win11 Pro and Home, Win7, Linux Mint
       New #2

    I've had no issues using the MCT/Media Creation Tool provided by Microsoft to create the Bootable USB Thumb drive, 8GB or larger. It wipes the drive and formats to FAT32 and copies the same files as in the .iso used to burn the Bootable DVD+R/DL disc.

    The MCT will not use the full size of a Thumb drive if over 32GB, a limitation of FAT32 in Windows which also has a single-file-size limit of 4GB.

    I went through all this just today installing an empty HDD on a Dell Precision from 2013.
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  4. alienboy
    Posts : 10
    Windows 10
    Thread Starter
       New #3

    Berton said:
    I've had no issues using the MCT/Media Creation Tool provided by Microsoft to create the Bootable USB Thumb drive, 8GB or larger. It wipes the drive and formats to FAT32 and copies the same files as in the .iso used to burn the Bootable DVD+R/DL disc.

    The MCT will not use the full size of a Thumb drive if over 32GB, a limitation of FAT32 in Windows which also has a single-file-size limit of 4GB.

    I went through all this just today installing an empty HDD on a Dell Precision from 2013.
    Thanks for your reply. I tried using MCT on both a bootable USB and an ISO, but they failed to boot into the setup program. Like I said in my post, it works on one system but not on my older system.
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  6. Berton
    Posts : 14,022
    Win10 Pro and Home, Win11 Pro and Home, Win7, Linux Mint
       New #4

    I also have a 2010 Custom desktop with a Gigabyte motherboard with an AMD Phenom II running Win10, no issue. I had Win10 on a Gigabyte motherboard with an Intel Core i7-4770 for awhile but repurposed it to Linux Mint.

    Some pages found about installing on MBR:
    install windows 10 on mbr disk at DuckDuckGo
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  7. Megahertz
    Posts : 6,343
    Windows 11 Pro - Windows 7 HP - Lubuntu
       New #5

    If you used MCT to build the Win 10 USB installation drive it should boot as UEFI and Legacy.

    If you never installed Win 10 on it you will need a Win 10 license as the free upgrade from win 7 and 8.x are no more valid.

    Did you try to boot a Win 7 USB installation drive?
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  8. Torquemada
    Posts : 373
    Linux/W10
       New #6

    For something different try Ventoy. Ventoy Create a bootable flash drive using Ventoy, copy a W10.iso to it and boot off it. Worth a try.
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  9. dalchina
    Posts : 43,002
    Win 10 Pro (22H2) (2nd PC is 22H2)
       New #7

    Used Media Creation Tool 22H2 to create an ISO and copied it with Rufus
    Just to check - did you first create a bootable disk DIRECTLY using the media creation tool?

    Can you boot that PC successfully from ANY bootable USB drive?

    Did that PC only come with 32 bit Windows, or is 64 bit also supported?

    Noted your mobo seems to be from around 2009. I hope the CMOS battery is ok.
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  10. alienboy
    Posts : 10
    Windows 10
    Thread Starter
       New #8

    Megahertz said:
    If you used MCT to build the Win 10 USB installation drive it should boot as UEFI and Legacy.
    I think the issue probably lies in my BIOS, as the USB boots into the install program successfully on newer system, but not on my system.

    Megahertz said:
    If you never installed Win 10 on it you will need a Win 10 license as the free upgrade from win 7 and 8.x are no more valid.
    I do have a Win 10 license key.

    Megahertz said:
    Did you try to boot a Win 7 USB installation drive?
    No, my Win 7 was installed through a DVD. I was trying to boot a Win 10 install USB create by MCT.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Torquemada said:
    For something different try Ventoy. Ventoy Create a bootable flash drive using Ventoy, copy a W10.iso to it and boot off it. Worth a try.
    Thanks for the suggestion, another user on Reddit also mentioned Ventoy. I'll definitely give it a try!

    - - - Updated - - -

    dalchina said:
    Just to check - did you first create a bootable disk DIRECTLY using the media creation tool?

    Can you boot that PC successfully from ANY bootable USB drive?

    Did that PC only come with 32 bit Windows, or is 64 bit also supported?

    Noted your mobo seems to be from around 2009. I hope the CMOS battery is ok.
    Yes, I created the bootable USB using MCT directly. Also tried different USBs (one 128 GB and two 8 GBs)

    I have booted my PC successfully with the USB created by MemTest86. Other than that, I have no recent memory of.

    My PC didn't come with any OS installed, I assembled it from scratch and installed a 64-bit Windows 7.

    It was indeed from 2009 (with first gen Core i7!), the CMOS battery is fine, all my BIOS settings and RTC kept after unplugged for hours. It died once and I replaced it.

    All valid questions and thank you!

    - - - Updated - - -

    In the meantime I'm trying to clone my Win 7 to the SSD and run Win 10 upgrade from there (using a Win 10 key, not the free upgrade). I'm wondering if choosing the "keep nothing" option in upgrade comparable to a clean install?

    I think the only difference is upgrade will create a Windows.old folder, but other than that it's almost the same with a clean install (other than a brand new partition)?
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  12. dalchina
    Posts : 43,002
    Win 10 Pro (22H2) (2nd PC is 22H2)
       New #9

    No, my Win 7 was installed through a DVD. I was trying to boot a Win 10 install USB create by MCT.
    You might consider creating a DVD to install Win 10 - you'll need a dual layer (8GB) DVD.

    There is also a more complicated way to clean install Win 10 without a bootable medium, but using a DVD would be preferable:
    Clean Install Windows 10 without DVD or USB Flash Drive
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  13. Megahertz
    Posts : 6,343
    Windows 11 Pro - Windows 7 HP - Lubuntu
       New #10

    I don't see any reason why it isn't booting from the Win 10 USB installation drive, unless you have corrupted files on it.
    Are your current HDD healthy?
    Open a CMD window as administrator and type:
    chkdsk c: /f
    It will say your disk is in use and ask if you want to schedule to next start = yes
    Restart
    Pay attention on the results, specially bad blocks, bad clusters, bad sectors etc

    Back to Windows lets make the Win 10 USB installation drive a different way.

    Open a CMD window as administrator and type:

    diskpart
    list disk (it will list all drives. Identify the USB drive number)
    select disk n (replace n by the USB drive number obtained with list disk)
    clean
    convert mbr
    create part primary
    select part 1
    format fs=fat32 quick
    assign
    active
    exit (to exit diskpart)

    - Download the Win 10 iso file using MCT
    - On Win 7 use 7Zip to extract all files and folders from the Win 10 iso file to the USB drive.
    On Win 10, mount the iso file and copy all files and folders to the USB drive.

    Now try to boot from the Win 10 USB installation drive created above.
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