Installing Win10 on an old Compaq laptop

NavyLCDR · 22 Mar 2016

I would restore Windows 7. Download an ISO file of Windows 10 using Tech Bench (preferred) or Media Creation Tool. Use a program such as UltraISO to mount the ISO file as a virtual drive, then run setup.exe from the mounted ISO file.

Fafhrd · 22 Mar 2016

You don't even need to run from a mounted drive - using a mounted virtual DVDrom is just one more unnecessary process using resources when \sources\setup.exe runs fine from the hard drive.

Since Windows 7 will not mount an ISO natively, it requires 3rd party software such as Elby CloneDrive to mount the iso as a virtual drive.

Utilities such as 7-zip will open image files such as isos as archives to allow copying folders from inside the image to the hard drive.

All that is needed is the sources folder from the iso or DVD copied to a folder on the hard drive - it can even be the drive you are upgrading or installing to ( just like the C:\$Windows.~WS\Sources\Windows\sources during update upgrade or MCT upgrade), it's just handy to store it outside if you need to reformat the intended installation drive.

Mark Phelps · 22 Mar 2016

fafhrd:

I appreciate you're taking the time for the long response, but I have already done all of those steps that apply.

I wanted a clean install, so I removed the Win7 OS partition (after doing an image backup). So, there is no Win7 crud in the way.

Also, I was unable to boot properly from the Win10 DVD, so I had to find out alternatives.

I already have the contents of the Win10 DVD copied to its own partition outside of the other partitions.

So, at this point, I'm looking for ways to do the install from inside Win7, since the clean-install approaches have not worked.

Mark Phelps · 22 Mar 2016

NavyLCDR said:

I would restore Windows 7. Download an ISO file of Windows 10 using Tech Bench (preferred) or Media Creation Tool. Use a program such as UltraISO to mount the ISO file as a virtual drive, then run setup.exe from the mounted ISO file.

I have the ISO -- which I got from the MCT.

I will look into restoring Win7 and mounting the ISO.

Will get back -- most likely tomorrow.

NavyLCDR · 22 Mar 2016

DVDs are the least reliable means of installing Windows, historically. Maybe the ISO was bad or the DVD didn't get burned 100% correctly. That's why I recommend downloading the ISO file again and using it directly.

Fafhrd · 22 Mar 2016

In the long post I noted that upgrade from 7 was the only way I managed to get the install to complete,

Whereas I managed to upgrade to 10 from Windows 7 on that Laptop, I cannot perform a clean install, a reset or upgrade. Don't ask me because I have no answers. I can only keep trying as the new builds get better.

I'd try an upgrade from 7 - it may utilize the drivers that Windows 7 has cached instead of the Windows 10 generics, which are known to cause a lot of problems, being installed in place of working, older drivers.

That's why I made the long post - I've seen a lot of other posts concerning problem installs on older laptops, and 100% CPU use/overheating/stalling during various stages of setup is a common and tricky problem probably due to chipset drivers missing.

One thing that many folk don't realize is that during much of the setup process it can be observed, either by alt-tabbing to the underlying OS being upgraded from and using the Task Manager to see what's happening in terms of resources and processes, or during WinPE parts of the upgrade using Shift+F10 to get the command prompt, and then using Task Manager as above. You can even use Technet Sysinternals Process Explorer if you have it available on the hard drive.

Task manager can browse to an installed 7-ZipFM and open it as a file manager if you want to see what's going onto the disk, and notepad and regedit are also available.

Mark, you omit to mention how much memory you have installed, unless I've missed it - at least 2GB, I'd hope.

NavyLCDR · 22 Mar 2016

So, I wonder, @Fafhrd....

First of all, can you DISM /export-driver in Windows 7? So, you get the Windows 7 drivers in a folder, we'll say DriversW7. Then you run the Windows 10 setup.exe with:

E:\setup.exe /installdrivers e:\DriversW7

Because notice this output from setup.exe /? from Windows 10:

Installing Win10 on an old Compaq laptop-capture.jpg

I wonder if that would be the way to accomplish the clean install?

Fafhrd · 22 Mar 2016

It may be a possibility, haven't tried anything like it - but I know that with older Intel systems, the right chipset drivers applied post-install make a lot of difference to CPU behaviour, from enabling sleep etc, to cooling the system down. If they could be installed at setup time it would be ideal.

In the Windows Embedded Standard 7 systems you could create an answer file based on driver information obtained from running TAP.exe on the old system and taking the xml from the Panther directory created to feed into the system builder, then automagically all the drivers would be added to your new build. The extensive Panther folder files created for Windows 10 are typically obfuscated Microsoft stuff, and so much of it!
Of course the WDDM model is so much more strongly enforced in Windows 10 than it was in 7.

However, the problem is probably a "design feature" by Microsoft - they don't want older hardware to be used for their new OSs any more than their OEM partners do - they want us to buy new kit, especially obsolescent-when-purchased mobile or portable systems. That's why the demands of WinPE 10 are much greater that those of WinPE 8.1:

Windows 10 Recovery Tools - Bootable Rescue Disk - Page 36 - Windows 10 Forums

Note the shared system video memory had gone from 256MB to 1GB for the basic display adapter from 8.1 to 10 - for Win PE, when WinPE runs as a Ramdisk - why?

I suppose I am saying that the problem is with WinPE/Setup not having the right drivers available for WinPE to run properly, let alone get the main Windows 10 drivers right. I'd like to use the windows 8 WAIK to run the setup, but there's changes in the Install.wim of 10 - it cannot be applied directly to an empty volume and run from that like was possible with 7 and 8.

Windows 10 on this Acer Laptop installed leaving an almost unusable windows 10 with continuous 100% CPU usage due to IRQ conflicts on shared IRQs between modem, Wireless adapter, ethernet adapter, and the basic display driver on the unsupported Intel integrated Graphics module and I haven't seen that since the bad-old-days of Windows 9x. Once I had disabled the non-essentials (modem, wireless) I could use the laptop.

~~Late here and I need to get up early tomorrow - continue later.~~

As you may understand, having struggled to manage to get Windows 10 running on this almost hopelessly underspecced test machine, I am loath to wipe it to try out another possible failure :), but I will do it when I have some free time. Using the switches in setup are certainly one way to go. Another may be to build a franken-install.wim or esd for Windows 10 with the Windows 8 boot.wim in place of the Windows 10 one.

Mark Phelps · 22 Mar 2016

NavyLCDR said:

DVDs are the least reliable means of installing Windows, historically. Maybe the ISO was bad or the DVD didn't get burned 100% correctly. That's why I recommend downloading the ISO file again and using it directly.

OK, understand. I'll get back after the restore and trying the install with the mounted ISO.

Fafhrd · 23 Mar 2016

You'll need to use a third party tool to mount the iso within Windows 7 - it does not allow native mounting of virtual CD/DVD-roms from Iso Files.

Just one additional 3rd party process using up resources unnecessarily.

Better to extract the files from the Iso\sources folder to a folder on the hard drive, and setup from there. You could use 7-zip to extract the sources folder from the iso - you need nothing else to run the setup contained in the folder.