Let's run Win10 on really really old hardware

Most motherboards have colored RAM slots. As long as you put same size modules in pairs on the same color slots you have dual channel. It doesn't need to be 4 modules of the same size, if you populate all 4 slots. You can use 2x 8GB and 2x 2GB, or 4GB but they must be all of the same speed and same size on same color for dual channel to work. However, the difference between 16GB and 20GB or 24GB is usually hard to see, unless you do heavy multitasking and use too many resources. For benchmark you can use PassMark Performance Test

Tip: For old systems with limited resources use Task Manager to change process priority to low for non-critical applications. This way you can multitask and keep your system responsive. For example I could render two different standard definition videos using two different applications on low priority and at the same time capture an episode from a series using a third application for my TV tuner card. All these at the same time on a Pentium 4 3GHz with 2GB RAM running Windows XP!

I have three PCs that run Win10. My oldest is a Dell XPS410 DXP061 that I bought back in March, 2007. It had Vista which I readily replaced with Win7Pro as soon as it was available in 2009. I will say that Remote Desktop was something good that came from Vista. Win7Pro provided about six years of reliable service. The integrated video/audio card died and with it Windows Media Center. Windows 8 apparently could not be installed.

I was very excited that a free upgrade to Win10 would be available and that many PCs that could not run Win8 would be able to run Win10. The only actual problem upgrading to Win10 that I had was the video adapter. Somehow, I stumbled upon a driver that was supposedly compatible with Win8 and I was back up and running.

The 2020 and 20H2 releases have the transparency effect in the colors turned on by default. This is not compatible with older video adapters. The system windows such as Update and Security will flicker. You may need to do it in Safe Mode, but do turn the effect off. Doing that has given me:

A 14 year old PC with 6gb RAM and an Intel Dual Core CPU @ 1.86gHz running
Win10 Pro 64-bit 20H2 build 19042.928. I can access it with Remote Desktop from my other devices and it runs Oracle VMBox in its virtualization mode. It's really amazing that Win10, Remote Desktop, OneNote, Teams and MeetNow were all free!

Perhaps not a *very* old PC, but I think about as old as any running 64-bit and Pro.

August 2009:
I built this computer and downloaded the free Windows 7 beta.

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 955
MBD: ASUS M4N82 Deluxe (NVIDIA nForce 980a SLI chipset)
RAM: Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 (1333MHz)
GPU: PNY GeForce GTS 250 (1GB)
O/S: Windows 7 Release Candiate beta (32-bit)

October 2009:
Purchased Windows 7 Ultimate Upgrade (32-bit & 64-bit)

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 955
MBD: ASUS M4N82 Deluxe (NVIDIA nForce 980a SLI chipset)
RAM: Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 (1333MHz)
GPU: PNY GeForce GTS 250 (1GB)
O/S: Windows 7 Ultimate (32-bit)

July 2011:
Computer was hit with lightning. Ironically its computer name was Lightning! it was down a number of months.

December 2011:
Purchased Windows 7 Home Family (32-bit & 64-bit).

March 2012:
Replaced motherboard and RAM and renamed computer Phoenix.

April 2013:
What I didn't realize was the CPU must also have been damaged because it gradually failed. I had to replace the CPU.

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 960T
MBD: ASUS M4N82 Deluxe (NVIDIA nForce 980a SLI chipset)
RAM: Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 (1333MHz)
GPU: PNY GeForce GTS 250 (1GB)
O/S: Windows 7 Home (32-bit) *

* Windows 7 Ultimate was used on different computer by that time.

August 2014:
Windows 7 Home also came with a 64-bit disk so I did a clean install with it. I also doubled the RAM.

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 960T
MBD: ASUS M4N82 Deluxe (NVIDIA nForce 980a SLI chipset)
RAM: 2 of Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 8GB (4x2GB) DDR3 (1333MHz)
GPU: PNY GeForce GTS 250 (1GB)
O/S: Windows 7 Home (64-bit)

January 2020:
Upgrade of Windows 7 Home 64-bit to Windows 10 Home 64-bit:
* In place upgrade failed
* Booting Win10 flash drive and upgrade failed
Clean install of Windows 10 Home 64-bit succeeded.

CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 960T
MBD: ASUS M4N82 Deluxe (NVIDIA nForce 980a SLI chipset)
RAM: 2 of Corsair TWIN2X4096-6400C5 8GB (4x2GB) DDR3 (1333MHz)
GPU: PNY GeForce GTS 250 (1GB)
O/S: Windows 10 Home (64-bit)

I have just installed 20H2 on an old Toshiba Satellite with 2GB RAM (Vista era). It runs quite well.

Ghot said:

I still have that motherboard and CPU. It's in the closet, taken apart, but I still have it, and it still works.

Right next to it, in the same condition...

AMD FX-8350 Vishera 4.0GHz
ASUS SABERTOOTH 990FX R2.0


And this one as well, but it's still assembled. Still has XP on it.

ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe Wireless Edition AM2 NVIDIA nForce 590 SLI MCP ATX AMD Motherboard (1603 BIOS)
AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+

I forgot to mention that after the old computer was hit by lightning in 2011 I built a new computer. Some parts moved between them until things stabilized in 2013.

July 2011:
CPU: AMD Phenom II 955 x4
MBD: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3
RAM: G.SKILL RIPJAW-X 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600
GPU: Asus Nvidia GTS250
O/S: Windows 7 Ultimate (32-bit)

February 2012:
CPU: AMD Phenom II 955 x4
MBD: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3
RAM: G.SKILL RIPJAW-X 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600
GPU: Asus Nvidia GTX560
O/S: Windows 7 Ultimate (32-bit)

March 2012:
New CPU. Old CPU failed.

CPU: AMD Phenom II 960T x4
MBD: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3
RAM: G.SKILL RIPJAW-X 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600
GPU: Asus Nvidia GTX560
O/S: Windows 7 Ultimate (32-bit)

April 2013:
New CPU. Old CPU moved to old computer Phoenix

CPU: AMD Vishera FX-8350
MBD: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3
RAM: G.SKILL RIPJAW-X 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600
GPU: Asus Nvidia GTX560
O/S: Windows 7 Ultimate (64-bit)

January 2020:
Upgrade of Windows 7 Ult (64-bit) to Windows 10 Pro (64-bit):

CPU: AMD Vishera FX-8350
MBD: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3
RAM: G.SKILL RIPJAW-X 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600
GPU: Asus Nvidia GTX560
O/S: Windows 10 Professional (64-bit)

======================================================================

This really old computer made it to Windows 7

November 2002:
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2800+
MBD: ASUS A7N8X Deluxe
RAM: Corsair XMS 1GB (2x512MB) DDR 333
GPU: PNY GeForce 4 ti4600 (128MB)
O/S: Windows XP Professional (32-bit)

February 2004:
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2800+
MBD: ASUS A7N8X Deluxe
RAM: Corsair XMS 1GB (2x512MB) DDR 333
GPU: PNY GeForce 5 FX5900 (128MB)
O/S: Windows XP Professional (32-bit)

December 2011:
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2800+
MBD: ASUS A7N8X Deluxe
RAM: Corsair XMS 2GB (2x1GB) DDR 400
GPU: PNY GeForce 5 FX5900 (128MB)
O/S: Windows 7 Home Premium (32-bit)

March 2012:
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2800+
MBD: ASUS A7N8X-E Deluxe
RAM: Corsair XMS 2GB (2x1GB) DDR 400
GPU: PNY GeForce 5 FX5900 (128MB)
O/S: Windows 7 Home Premium (32-bit)

Hi folks
Anybody running an Raspbian W10 system. I think these are ARM CPU's but there is a W10 version for ARM.

Cheers
jimbo

eLPuSHeR said:

I have just installed 20H2 on an old Toshiba Satellite with 2GB RAM (Vista era). It runs quite well.

that should also be able to run 21H1 (build 19043.x) when it officially comes out soon since 21H1 is another small feature update contained in a newer enablement pack similar to 20H2