Upgrading desktop PC's from Windows 7 to Windows 10

[_Larry_]

I have a large number of Windows 7 PC's which need to be upgraded to Windows 10.

Most of the devices are HP DeskPro 400 G1 MT (& similar).

The spec of the PC's are all reasonable with i3 & i5 processors, 8Gb Ram, 1Tb drives etc.

The current OS is Windows 7 Pro (64bit) and I'm trying to upgrade to Windows 10.

I would prefer to upgrade as opposed to trash the hard disk & build from scratch because of all the other software we have installed on each device.

I've tried rebuilding (upgrade) five of the PC's without success. (I've got about 50 to do)

For each of those 5 PC's, I've tried building from a USB stick (created from another device) as well as logging each one in directly to upgrade from the HP site which downloads windows directly each time.

I've even factory reset two of the devices to see if I could build them from that state, but that failed also.

I've also tried using Windows 10 media to build from scratch, but I only get a message to say I must do it from within the current OS.

So far, I've spent 6 weeks trying to upgrade these, sadly.

It works OK for non-HP brand machines. Thankfully, not all our PC's are HP, therefore I've had a little success.

Can anyone offer some simple sound advice why HP machines will not upgrade to Windows 10 please?

For info: The build (upgrade) normally went well right up until the last operation (applying the build).

This means it spends a couple of hours downloading and upgrading, and then reboots to 'apply' the new build, but then fails and brings up Windows 7 and the error(s) it produces include:

0x8007025D - 0x2000C

The installation failed in the SAFE_OS phase with an error during APPLY_IMAGE operation.

0xC19 00101 - 0x4000D

The installation failed in the SECOND_BOOT phase with an error during MIGRATE _DATA operation.

I've lost count the amount of times I've tried upgrading these and just about the will to live as well!

Any assistance is welcome that doesn't simply give a link to a whole load of dross that I have probably already read a thousand times.

[WAWood]

@_Larry_ 

I only have a few comments ...

First, here is a quote of MS response on the second error:  

"Configuring settings" is the final phase and failures codes look like c1900101 x400xx. The most common failure here is 40017, which means we failed to boot. Since this is the first time we boot into Windows 10 with all of the drivers in place, again, drivers are usually the cause of the crash. These issues tend to be less transient than the 30018s, so a second try is less likely to solve the issue. Still, it never hurts to try.

Which means, this is almost certainly a Driver issue -- and since MS doesn 't bother to tell you WHICH driver is involved, that ranges from very difficult to impossible to fix.  They recommend disconnecting external devices and removing the associated drivers -- in the hopes that one of those drivers is the culprit.  If you have already tried that, then sorry to be redundant.

Second, I saw you mentioned spending hours doing downloads for each PC and that you tried using Win10 media created from the MS MCT. It reads like you tried to do a Clean-Install -- by booting from the media. Is that correct?  And then when you did that, you got a message saying you needed to do the Update from Inside Windows. Is that correct?

If so, did you try the in-place upgrade -- using media created from the download from MS?  And, did it fail, as well?

I've personally updated several Win7 PCs to Win10 -- with mixed results.  Of the seven I did, five went OK but two presented serious issues and required clean installs.  Both of these two were older HP PCs (2010 and 2011).

Also, of the seven upgrades, three have since been returned to Win7 because Win10 performed very poorly and/or there there driver problems due to lack of proper Win10 drivers for those PCs.

MS touts Win 10 as their Miracle Cure -- but that is only true for brand-new equipment that was designed to work with Win10.  Older equipment, especially that in Win7-era PCs, struggles.

Wish I had better news for you, but I don't.

[_Larry_]

Hi WAWood

Thank you for your response. I appreciate your assistance.

You've confirmed a lot of my thoughts and given me reassurance I'm on the right track.

For info, when I booted from the media to rebuild, this was the message I got:

"The upgrade option if you start your computer using windows installation media

If a copy of windows is already installed on this computer and you want to upgrade, remove the installation media and restart……"

I will now try & uninstall Windows updates and such like to see how I get on.

If I have any good news, I'll re-post here.

Thanks again for your input.

Larry.

[WAWood]

@_Larry_ 

What that message is telling you is that if you BOOT from installation media (which is what you appear to be doing), then you can NOT perform an in-place Upgrade.  And that is correct.

To do an in-place Upgrade, you have to boot into your existing Windows, insert the installation media, find the setup.exe file in that media, right-click it, and select Run as Administrator.

[_Larry_]

Latest update for anyone looking at this.

I tried a number of attempts again at rebuilding again, including trying to upgrade from a factory reset of one of the machines (HP 280G1 MT).

Then making sure all updates are done, and trying again.

Then installing all optional updates and trying again.

Then uninstalling non-critical drivers (i.e. video & network) and trying again.

ThenI thought I'd try a bios update, so I got the latest Bios (SP95909) and proceeded with that.

That killed the PC.

Tried recovering by putting a previous Bios on there (from a USB Bios build) but the PC isn't having any of it!

I now think I've spent enough time on this, but what would be satisfying would be to pile all these up in the car park with a lump of C4 explosives, forget the ear defenders, I wanna hear the BANG!

Does anyone know where I can get some? 🙂

For all you left wing do gooders, That was a joke! (Maybe!)

Also, Thanks you your advice WAWood, I gave you a thumbs up.

Larry.