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HP Recommended
  • This PC is an HP p6210f. I realize it's old, and HP would probably like to sell me a new computer, but it still works great, so please don't tell me to just to buy a new computer.
  • This PC was manufactured in August 2009, right after Windows 7 was released to manufacturing. It does NOT have TPM, it ONLY has LEGACY BIOS and boot, and has none of the other BIOS settings that computers newer than this have. No BIOS updates for this PC, that I know of, have been put out since April 2010.
  • I have had Windows 7 64-bit (clean install from Microsoft), Windows XP 32-bit, and of course, the stock HP Windows 7 64-bit it came with installed on this machine, as well as some Linux distributions. All these installed fine.
  • I recently tried to CLEAN install Windows 11, to a separate physical wiped blank hard drive, by making an iso of it with restrictions removed. It came back saying, "Your device ran into a problem and needs to restart. Inaccessible boot device.", then it would restart over and over, saying the same thing.  So, I then tried to install Windows 10 64-bit. Same problem, even though Windows 7 kept nagging me to upgrade to it for years.
  • After this, as a test, I downloaded Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows 10 32-bit, and some of these stripped-down versions of Windows, such as Tiny10, and tried to clean install them to this wiped blank hard drive. Same problem every time. You've read it right, even Windows 8 64-bit, which came out only three years after this PC was manufactured, gave me the same error.
  • I have tried absolutely everything I've found online to try to install anything above Windows 7. Such as, using GImageX to directly apply the install.wim file to this blank drive (which doesn't seem to also apply proper boot information to that drive as well), installing Windows 7 and then trying to upgrade from there, which also fails, and then undoes changes made to computer and goes back to Windows 7, disabling NX at install, putting the install.wim from Windows 10 into the Windows 7 64-bit ISO and attempting to install, etc. Nothing has worked.
  • When I plug my regular hard drive back in and boot my regular Windows 7 (which I am using with 0patch and a good anti-malware program), I can look at that drive and see that these other Windows installations made the two partitions like they're supposed to, and have installed all the programs. I don't know how to tell whether or not they wrote proper boot information to the drive, however.
  • Because nothing above Windows 7 64-bit will install on this PC, I have to wonder, did HP do something to this PC to make it not install anything thing above Windows 7, namely in the BIOS? I have to ask this, because I also have one of those old HP Intel Atom netbooks, which states right in the BIOS setup, that the operating system is Windows 7. Even though I have AntiX Linux running on it currently.
  • Does this PC need some sort of rom flash in order to make it install newer operating systems?

Please advise. Thank You!

2 REPLIES 2
HP Recommended

Hi

 

Newer Window's versions like to use GPT but can be installed on a Legacy PC. The older W7 PC is probably using Legacy MBR.

 

The installation media you have created probably can't see the disk. You could wipe the disk after backing up data. Try a new disk or a different empty disk.

 

W11 requires a 64 bit system and has other security restrictions but you can bypass the security roadblock. W10 can run on a 32 bit or a 64 bit system. You PC may support 64 bit operating systems. Can't say for sure because I can't find your PC's specs. W7 supports 64 bit hardware.

 

The W10 installation media should be downloaded for use on other PCs if you are downloading this on a 64 bit PC.

 

Try a W10 "in place" update (start the update within W7) using W10 installation media that supports 32 and 64 bit operating systems and MBR. 

 

W10 or W11 may not install due to insurmountable hardware issues given the age of your PC.

HP Recommended

Bill_To, are you a real person, or an AI text generator?

 

>>The older W7 PC is probably using Legacy MBR<<

Yes, that's what I said.

 

>>The installation media you have created probably can't see the disk. You could wipe the disk after backing up data. Try a new disk or a different empty disk.<<

I didn't "create" the media (except the ones where I put the install.wim file from one ISO into another.) I downloaded them straight from Microsoft (Windows 10 and 11 versions.) And if they can't see the disk, why are there partitions and files present on it after the failed installations? And there can't be a problem with the disk, because Win7, WinXP, and Linux all install just fine to it.

 

>> You PC may support 64 bit operating systems. <<

Yes, that's what I said. It came with Windows 7 64-bit installed.

 

>>The W10 installation media should be downloaded for use on other PCs  if you are downloading this on a 64 bit PC.<<

Yes, Microsoft will not allow Windows 7 users to directly download the ISOs. So, I downloaded them on my phone. Also, the Windows Media Creation tool won't run on Windows 7.

 

>>Try a W10 "in place" update (start the update within W7) using W10 installation media that supports 32 and 64 bit operating systems and MBR.<<

I tried that. That's what I said.

 

>>W10 or W11 may not install due to insurmountable hardware issues given the age of your PC.<<

This may be true, but Windows 8 isn't installing correctly either, and it is absolutely NOT too new for my PC.

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