Upgrading new HP laptop to Win10

Forums › Microsoft Windows › Upgrading new HP laptop to Win10 - choices??

kiwifidget

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#198521 12-Jul-2016 15:34

Just grabbed myself a new laptop.

It has Win7Pro pre-installed but obviously that has to change soon.

It came with a DVD (all HP branded) to upgrade to Win10, but the laptop has no optical drive.

I dont have an external drive but I imagine I could faff around for a bit and create a bootable USB stick from it on my desktop.

My choice is , use the DVD with all its HP-ness included, or just use a USB stick I already have created from the Media Creation Tool.

Would there be much down-side to not using the HP-DVD?

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Geek @ Coastguard NZ
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#1590393 12-Jul-2016 15:42

Downside will be potentially missing drivers, and all their bloatware :) Windows 10 is pretty good with drivers tho.

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kiwifidget

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#1590396 12-Jul-2016 15:52

The documentation also recommends changing from BIOS to UEFI before installing Win10, but doesn't mention how to do that.

I had a look in the setup (press Esc furiously to stop Win7 from starting) but nothing looked obvious in there.

But then again, I suppose nothing would, I've never dealt with UEFI before. Wouldn't know it if I fell over it.

All my other Win10 machines (all 3 of them) dont have UEFI and they seem OK.

Is UEFI really necessary?

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nathan

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#1590442 12-Jul-2016 17:12

UEFI is potentially more secure as you can enable Secure Boot and Additional features in the OS like Credential Guard and Device Guard

Probably the HP machine is UEFI already and there is a thing turned on called CSM to make it fool the OS that it is a BIOS. You should be able to see something like that

kiwifidget

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#1592603 14-Jul-2016 15:06

@nathan

I cannot see anything that will tell me if the laptop is UEFI already or not.

In fact, here I am 2 days later, and I've reached breaking point with it.

I have updated to the latest BIOS (from v1.06 to v1.12) and that does not look any different.

The documentation says to go into BIOS Setup / Boot Options / Boot Mode / set to UEFI Native, but on the laptop I dont have Boot Mode as a menu option.

There is UEFI Boot Order and Legacy Boot Order., both are ticked.

Would that imply that UEFI is already enabled?

------------------

I googled how to tell if your PC is running in UEFI or BIOS mode. There were 2 methods mentioned.

1. Check this either of these strings in c:\windows\panther\setupact.log

Code:Callback_BootEnvironmentDetect: Detected boot environment: BIOS
Code:Callback_BootEnvironmentDetect: Detected boot environment: UEFI

Mine says BIOS.

2. In msinfo32 look for BIOS Mode and see whether it says BIOS or UEFI.
On my laptop there is no entry for BIOS Mode.

----------------------

On the other hand, in BIOS Setup I do have an option for Secure Boot Configuration which gives me 3 options:

1. Legacy Support Enabled and Secure Boot Disabled (default selection)

2. Legacy Support Disabled and Secure Boot Enabled

3. Legacy Support Disabled and Secure Boot Disabled

----------------

End result = total confusion.

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nathan

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#1592606 14-Jul-2016 15:09

These are really questions for HP or whoever they pay to write their UEFI firmware

The fact it says UEFI would imply you have UEFI not a BIOS

Surely they have support documentation on HP website that explains how to enable disable CSM

kiwifidget

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#1592609 14-Jul-2016 15:16

nathan: These are really questions for HP or whoever they pay to write their UEFI firmware

The fact it says UEFI would imply you have UEFI not a BIOS

Surely they have support documentation on HP website that explains how to enable disable CSM

Well, was rather hoping an HP person would be lurking in here.

There is documentation but it doesnt match what I see on my screen. Ergo the Boot Mode options.

The Windows 10 installation instructions also mention performing steps that dont match what I see on the screen.

I've been cancelling out at the part where you can select and delete partitions because it mentions partitions I dont have.

Are there HP people who lurk here?

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andrew027

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#1592629 14-Jul-2016 15:42

Where are you based? If you're in Wellington I have an HP USB optical drive I'm happy to lend you to do your install from the CD.

Edit: That doesn't help with your UEFI question - just offering an option for the upgrade.

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gzt

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#1592635 14-Jul-2016 15:58

Call the HP support 0800. It's free.

Edit: about the bios uefi thing

kiwifidget

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#1592639 14-Jul-2016 16:05

andrew027:

Where are you based? If you're in Wellington I have an HP USB optical drive I'm happy to lend you to do your install from the CD.

Edit: That doesn't help with your UEFI question - just offering an option for the upgrade.

Thanks for the offer @andrew027, but I have managed to create a bootable USB stick from the DVD.

Had to use Rufus, the Win7 tool didn't like the HP ISO.

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kiwifidget

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#1592648 14-Jul-2016 16:06

gzt: Call the HP support 0800. It's free.

I think I will have to try that tomorrow.

I dont have the energy to call them now.

Is that 0800-441147?

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gzt

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#1592674 14-Jul-2016 17:25

That's the one.

aschteev

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#1592760 14-Jul-2016 19:55

kiwifidget:

@nathan

I cannot see anything that will tell me if the laptop is UEFI already or not.

In fact, here I am 2 days later, and I've reached breaking point with it.

I have updated to the latest BIOS (from v1.06 to v1.12) and that does not look any different.

The documentation says to go into BIOS Setup / Boot Options / Boot Mode / set to UEFI Native, but on the laptop I dont have Boot Mode as a menu option.

There is UEFI Boot Order and Legacy Boot Order., both are ticked.

Would that imply that UEFI is already enabled?

------------------

I googled how to tell if your PC is running in UEFI or BIOS mode. There were 2 methods mentioned.

1. Check this either of these strings in c:\windows\panther\setupact.log

Code:Callback_BootEnvironmentDetect: Detected boot environment: BIOS
Code:Callback_BootEnvironmentDetect: Detected boot environment: UEFI

Mine says BIOS.

2. In msinfo32 look for BIOS Mode and see whether it says BIOS or UEFI.
On my laptop there is no entry for BIOS Mode.

----------------------

On the other hand, in BIOS Setup I do have an option for Secure Boot Configuration which gives me 3 options:

1. Legacy Support Enabled and Secure Boot Disabled (default selection)

2. Legacy Support Disabled and Secure Boot Enabled

3. Legacy Support Disabled and Secure Boot Disabled

----------------

End result = total confusion.

To boot in UEFI mode, untick the legacy boot order option, and select option 2. Legacy Support Disabled and Secure Boot Enabled. At the moment, it sounds like the Windows Boot Manager is a legacy boot device, so this will prevent the current operating system from booting once these changes have been made.

Download a Windows 10 iso using the Media Creation Tool https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/software-download/windows10. Make sure to choose the option to create an ISO file, not USB flash drive.

Once the iso has been created, use Rufus https://rufus.akeo.ie/ to create a bootable USB drive using the downloaded iso image. Make sure that the partition style you select is GPT for UEFI.

Once this has been created, you should be able to boot from the USB drive and install Windows 10 in UEFI mode.

I used this method to upgrade to Windows 10 from Windows 7 on two HP Z440 workstations at work this week.

kiwifidget

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#1592995 15-Jul-2016 11:14

Have just spent 30 minutes on the phone to HP-India.

They confirm @aschteev method to disable Legacy Boot Order and enable UEFI Boot Order.

They did not mention changing the Secure Boot Configuration.

@aschteev , why did you suggest setting Rufus to GPT for UEFI?

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yitz

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#1593178 15-Jul-2016 14:25

Honestly I think it would be easier to do an in-place upgrade from within Windows through your USB stick or GWX/ESD. Windows 10 Setup checks device driver compatibility.

It is not even certain that all the specific drivers and 'value added' bloatware for your notebook model is included on what is likely a generic HP operating system recovery DVD.

aschteev

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#1593198 15-Jul-2016 14:48

kiwifidget:

Have just spent 30 minutes on the phone to HP-India.

They confirm @aschteev method to disable Legacy Boot Order and enable UEFI Boot Order.

They did not mention changing the Secure Boot Configuration.

@aschteev , why did you suggest setting Rufus to GPT for UEFI?

This ensures that the USB drive will be formatted with a GBT partition table, and make it a UEFI bootable device. This will load Windows Setup in UEFI mode, and subsequently format the hard drive where Windows is installed with a GPT partition table, and configure the hard drive to boot as a UEFI bootable device.

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