[Paul R.]

It looks like I'll be giving my wife my small laptop / netbook for a trip overseas, which merely pushed up my consideration of upgrading to Win 11 Pro on our other machines where practical. The budget is still very tight, with multiple machines involved, so, we need to hold costs down. We've been saving pennies for 3+ years so wifey can go see some of her family! While my old "netbook" should be fine for her travelling, e-mail, etc., I'll need a replacement / upgrade soon enough anyway, hopefully at minimal cost. And then once in that "mode" & having accumulated some Win 11 Pro experience on a machine with an 8th gen processor (I purchased it as a great / & somewhat lucky deal as a "trial"), I accelerated thinking about our other machines too, both business and personal...)

Any thoughts / input?

Thanks!

P.S. Please refrain from making this thread a referendum on Win 11. Maybe someone else can start a dedicated thread on that. (I find it "ok".) Thanks again. :-)

[Paul R.]

Sorry about run on sentences and any typos: I’m trying to get this posted quickly before this day runs me over with “honey do’s” from wifey and lots of springtime chores too...! :-)

[E. Pluribus Unum]

You need to check supported processors.

None of mine were, so I had to buy a couple of new laptops.

https://www.tomsguide.com/news/these-are-all-the-intel-and-amd-cpus-that-can-run-windows-11

[Rurudyne]

From long ago but not far away.....

Nine-tenths of a gig,
Biggest ever seen,
Gosh, this program’s big— MS Word 15!
Comes on ten CDs,
And requires—damn!
Word is fine, but jeez—
60 megs of RAM?!

Oh! Microsoft, Microsoft,
Bloatware all the way!
I’ve sat here installing Word
Since breakfast yesterday!
Oh! Microsoft, Microsoft,
Moderation, please.
Guess you hadn’t noticed:
Four-gig drives don’t grow on trees!

[Bob434]

Maybe buying used, or cheap new with windows 11 already installed would be the way to go? Computers are something you will use all the time for years, so while the initial expense is a bit tough to handle, the bang for the buck in the long run works out well. Maybe get one win 11 computer now, let wife use it, then save for another down the road a bit? Do,you need to upgrade all of them right away? Win 10 will still be usable for a number of years to come perhaps?

[red-dawg]

Windows 11 "requires" a Trusted Platform Module on the mobo before it is installed. Older ones don't have that.
I put requires in quotes because I've seen workarounds for it.

[Melinda in TN]

My older Dell, that isn’t that old, can’t be upgraded.

For Christmas, I bought myself a new Lenovo Ideapad laptop for $200 that has Windows 11-S. It works fine for a home user, but the S version controls what you can download and install. All apps have to be approved from the Windows Store. It came with a 64GB card since it doesn’t have a lot of storage built-in.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0BLCG2KQ9/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1

[rarestia]

Intel 6 series procs are VERY old and vulnerable to Spectre/Meltdown. As other FReepers have pointed out, you’ll need a TPM (Trusted Platform Module) as part of the security requirements for Win11.

RAM is cheap enough nowadays, as long as you have 8 GB, you’ll be fine. Definitely recommend 16 GB if you’re going to be doing anything other than email and light web browsing.

[dayglored]

Windows 10 -> 11 Update... PING!

You can find all the Windows Ping list threads with FR search: just search on keyword "windowspinglist".

[Poser]

Bring back Wordstar!

[BikerJoe]

I’ve done about 10 upgrades on machines that are unsupported, using the tricks. Works fine. The updates don’t check for compatibility, so once you have it installed, you’re good to go.

[Opathehagrid]

Ditch Windows.....all versions...you are supporting psycho bill gates....go linux

[fretzer]

Evidently you can install win11 on older hardware with some hacks. I’ve not tried it yet.

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-install-windows-11-on-older-unsupported-pcs/
https://www.theverge.com/22715331/how-to-install-windows-11-unsupported-cpu-intel-amd-registry-regedit

[mountainlion]

I upgraded form Bill Gates and went to Apple. They do not update and disrupt my settings. I like WP until a virus destroyed it. 8.1 was a disaster.

[ProgressingAmerica]

This is not that great of an idea.

The best thing you could do is upgrade to Linux, and get out of the big tech quagmire altogether. Especially since you said you are saving money, and on top of that this laptop is likely not supported either.

Everything is telling you to get off of big tech it seems.

[Paal Gulli]

Asking for IT advice in this place is about as useful as asking for romance advice in a brothel. The majority of the answers won't contain any actionable information and what few that do leave you with the problem of winnowing the pepper from the fly specs.

I usually am loathe to recommend visiting Microsoft.com, but in this case it might be the best place to start.

Can my PC run Windows 11?

[Enlightened1]

I upgraded one machine from a Windows 10 to 11, and it went very smoothly. I would say it was about a 3 relatively easy.

Get a thumb drive, and copy the files she would like to keep in the old computer your wife has, and then paste it into your C drive of your new computer.

Make sure it has at least 16g of Ram (get 32 if you can) and 1TB of hard drive.

You do not want a pre 7th generation intel core.

[Enlightened1]

One more thing. Make sure the new machine is completely updated before installing any files from your wife’s previous machine. This might take a while.

Then I would update your wife’s machine, back it up and copy and paste files to the new machine.

[daniel1212]

Build your own? https://pcpartpicker.com/user/PBJ/saved/#view=7yQGJx Total: $376.46 (W/O OS)

AMD Ryzen 5 4600G 3.7 GHz 6-Core Processor $101.99

Arctic Silver Ceramique 2 Tri-Linear 2.7 g Thermal Paste $3.85

MSI B550 GAMING GEN3 ATX AM4 Motherboard $109.99

Silicon Power XPOWER Turbine 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory $49.97

TEAMGROUP MS30 512 GB M.2-2280 SATA Solid State Drive $20.99

Case
Thermaltake Versa H21 ATX Mid Tower Case $54.99

Power Supply
Enermax CYBERBRON 500 W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply $29.99

Case Fan
Xigmatek XAF 90.3 CFM 140 mm Fan $4.69

[jdt1138]

Microsoft has gone full tracking along with controlling the news (MSN MSNBC) and they hand over all of that data to the government.

Best to get Ubuntu or some form of Linux. You probably won’t notice the difference after a few weeks.

[usconservative]

Click here to see how to install Windows 11 on unsupported hardware.

Well documented, easy to understand and it works.