Simple trick to install Windows 11 on an old PC

Windows 11 hardware requirements

As you know, 11, the latest version of Windows is expected to be issued within this year, according to Microsoft. In the previous post, I showed you how to get and activate it for FREE. After that, some of you mailed me and said that they got the error “This PC can’t run Windows”. This issue is related to system requirements. Perhaps your PC is old and does not meet the minimum hardware resources, CPU and RAM in particular. It means you need to upgrade your system to be able to install Windows 11.

Simple trick to install Windows 11 on an old PC

Do not worry if you are using an old laptop or desktop. There is a simple way to install version 11 on your PC for free without upgrading the hardware. First, you need some necessary files. It includes a free file archiver like 7zip, a freeware that helps you create ISO image from a folder such as ImgBurn portable and 2 ISO images, one of Windows 10, the other of Windows 11.

7zip: https://www.7-zip.org/download.html
ImgBurn portable: https://drive.google.com/uc?id=144i8AXjwNFMQg5Y_WngeoPWzIXDQZb2k&export=download

As soon as you get them, please follow the instructions below.

Step 1: Extract the 2 ISO images you got above.
Right-click on the file and select extract. Then rename them to “W10” and “W11” for brevity.

Step 2: Replace the install.wim file in the W10\sources folder with the respective one in the W11\sources folder.

Step 3: Create a new ISO image from the W10 folder.

Open the portable version of ImgBurn then select the option “Create image file from files/folders” from the menu.

On the next window, please follow the steps in the picture below.

(1): Select the W10 folder
(2): Select the destination folder and set the name of new ISO image of Windows
(3): Select Advanced tab > Bootable Disc
(4): Put a tick in the checkbox “Make Image Bootable”
(5): Select the file etfsboot in the W10\boot folder
(6): Set the value to 8.
(7): Click it to build the ISO file

Please wait until the file is created successfully. If you do not have time to do all steps above, you can download the ISO file I built already here. After having the image file, just burn it to a flash drive. And you now have a Windows 11 bootable USB that runs great on old hardware.

If you would have any questions or concerns, please leave your comments. I would be glad to explain in more details. Thank you so much for all your feedback and support!