Upgrade Veriton X4610G to Windows 11

Marty11

You have been comfortably running Window 10 and booting it from an SSD on your Veriton X4610G for while by following this guide.

Now Microsoft starts bothering you with update to Windows 11 notifiers, whereas Windows 10 was supposed to be the last Windows update because the future is "Windows as a service.".

They start stirring up old daemons again by pushing you to upgrade to Windows 11.

This topic is to investigate if that is feasible for the Veriton X4610G.

The following questions need to be answered:

1. How long do you have before Windows 10 will be EOL?
2. Won't Windows 11 be a crappy in between version of Windows, better to be circumvented.
3. How big is the adoption of Windows 11?
4. Is the Veriton X4610G capable of UEFI, Secure Boot?
5. Can the Veriton X4610G be expanded with a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) version 2.0 ?
6. Where can one buy a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) version 2.0 for the Veriton X4610G?
7. It the integrated graphics card compatible with DirectX 12 or later with WDDM 2.0 driver?

Feel free to add any additional questions and concerns.

[​//Edited the content to add model name]

Marty11

The first three answers:

1. Windows 10 users have until October 2025 to update
2. History tells us most good versions have been followed by a[Sensitive Content] one...
3. Just 0.52% of devices are running the latest Windows 11 [Jan 2022].
   

[Edited the thread to hide sensitive content]

Marty11

I downloaded and executed the PC Health check app from Microsoft and this is what it output to my surprise:

Your PC does not meet the necessary requirements. Windows 10 will be supported8 until 14 October 2025.

New question:

 8. Why would the Intel i5 processor not meet the requirements???

The Microsoft processor requirements state:

Processor 1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster with 2 or more cores on a compatible 64-bit processor or System on a Chip (SoC).

I found a supported processor list at Microsoft, that doesn't contain the i5-2320 and doesn't explain why it doesn't contain it?

Marty11

Answer finding to question 8. Why would the Intel i5-2320 processor not meet the requirements???

I found the following:

Power users of Windows, and IT admins alike, have built up an expectation of being able to upgrade to the latest OS, regardless of what hardware they’re running. It looks like that’s about to end with Windows 11.

Microsoft is struggling to explain its new hardware requirements. Windows 11 will officially support Intel 8th Gen Coffee Lake or Zen 2 CPUs and up, leaving behind millions of PCs.

Microsoft’s decision to force Windows 11 users into TPM, Secure Boot, and more comes at a pivotal moment for Windows. It’s Microsoft’s operating system that’s always caught up in ransomware and malware attacks, and things are only going to get worse if the level of Windows hardware security doesn’t go up a notch.
There will be some exceptions to Microsoft’s new rules, though. “Windows 11 does not apply the hardware-compliance check for virtualized instances either during setup or upgrade,” notes a Microsoft document (PDF) on minimum hardware requirements for Windows 11. That means if you run Windows 11 as a virtual machine, you can ignore the CPU and security requirements. That flies in the face of Microsoft’s big security push here, but the reality is that most consumers and commercial customers won’t be running Windows 11 in a VM.

Source: the Verge

So the newer processors offer some obscure more resilience against ransomware and malware attacks?!

Linux does not suffer from those same insecurities on identical hardware...

Maybe it's time to leave Windows behind with Windows 11 and make life a little simpler by getting out of the forced HW update train.

Lets not scrap perfectly viable computers and burn the planet.

ttttt

@Marty11

You seemed asked and answered your own questions.
You know that hardware wise the 2nd gen Intel CPU will not qualify for Win 11.

Personally, I don't like the Win 11 that much, just upgraded one laptop for it and put all other PC's upgrade on hold until absolutely needed.

Anyway, it is not a bad thing replacing the old PC with a modern one, at least you can use the modern techologies such as Wi-Fi 6E, gen 3 or gen 4 M.2 NVMe SSD that can be as much as 30-60 times faster than old style spinning HDD. That is something the Veriton X4610G cannot utilize.

How about forget about Windows and just use Linux versions for substitution?

StevenGen

Just to put my bit into this, the Veriton X4610G is NOT Win-11 compatible as its 5 Gen CPU below the minimum compatible Intel Gen 8 CPU. With the Win-11 I find it that its just a disorientated and botched up and messed up Win-10, yes it has a few changes that are welcomed but the oveall is nothing new. As  usual Microsoft has made these changes just to make changes and as my motto is "if it isn't broke don't fix it" the do this all the time and use us a their testers! Very disappointing but I think that MS is doing the same trick as they did with Win-8 and 8.1 as they then updated to a streamline Win-10 and that is what I think Win-11 is, as its not the final product. 

billsey

Your X4610G is way, way too old for W11 support. You need to have at least an 8th gen CPU and chipset (I believe yours is 3rd gen), along with TPM 2.0 security hardware. Stick with W10 on your system (though Microsoft shouldn't be even offering you an upgrade, since it's not supported with your platform).

Marty11

@ttttt , @StevenGen, @billsey, Thank you for your replies.

ttttt said:

@Marty11

You seemed asked and answered your own questions.

@ttttt This topic is to share the found answers, so everybody can benefit from them.

ttttt said:

You know that hardware wise the 2nd gen Intel CPU will not qualify for Win 11.

I found out that the i5-2320 isn't on the hardware list for Windows 10 either (I wasn't aware that there was such a list),

but Windows 10 runs peachy on the i5-2320.

ttttt said:

Anyway, it is not a bad thing replacing the old PC with a modern one, at least you can use the modern techologies such as Wi-Fi 6E, gen 3 or gen 4 M.2 NVMe SSD that can be as much as 30-60 times faster than old style spinning HDD. That is something the Veriton X4610G cannot utilize.

Why would you want to replace all your hardware every two years? Intel drops support after 2 years, Acer drops BIOS update support after two years, now Microsoft also drops support for their OS. Life is just too short to be constantly buying new and scrapping old hardware and configuring and tuning new computers / OS'es, whilst the old hardware is perfectly viable to keep running all the same software I always have been using (text processing, email reading, coding, etc.). 

Moore's law has broken down, single thread performance doesn't increase by pi any more every pi years.

There simply is no reason for it any more. The old hardware is still more than capable.

(Of course Microsoft, Acer and Intel like to be selling at the same pace, that they always have been doing.)

ttttt said:

How about forget about Windows and just use Linux versions for substitution?

There will be some exceptions to Microsoft’s new rules, though. “Windows 11 does not apply the hardware-compliance check for virtualized instances either during setup or upgrade,” notes a Microsoft document (PDF) on minimum hardware requirements for Windows 11. That means if you run Windows 11 as a virtual machine, you can ignore the CPU and security requirements.

So if all else fails you can still be running Win 11 as a virtual machine under Linux. )

ttttt

@Marty11

I am not suggesting replacing PC hardware once every couple years, and that will not be economical and environmental friendly at all. Most of my PCs had an average service life of about ten years before disposed/retired.

However, it is unkind for the PC user still using badly obsoleted hardware if the user can afford new hardware. For example, if you like to spend 3-6 minutes of bootup time vs. 20 seconds, a task can be accomplished in 10 seconds with modern hardware vs. 2-5 minutes with old hardware, feel free to do it continuously.

I agree with you that life is too short, and that is why we people should spend less time in front of the PC waiting for something to be done. On the contrary, the PC awaiting for your next command or tasks after the previous task finished in almost at the blink of the eyes with the modern hardware.

Feel free to use badly obsoleted hardware if you have sufficent time to spare, but not me.

Trust me, you will appreciate how much time you save every year with modern hardware.

Marty11

billsey said:

Your X4610G is way, way too old for W11 support. You need to have at least an 8th gen CPU and chipset (I believe yours is 3rd gen)

@billsey

Old not obsolete. Performance wise there's no problem and with the new (boot-able) SSD it performs great and is up to par to do everything I want with it and snappy at that too. It's not the fastest machine around, but fast is fast enough.

The  only things holding it back are SOFTWARE wise: OS Support, BIOS update support and Intel driver support. All these factors show the commitment by the parties behind them. They all benefit from dropping their software support, because then they can push new: OSes, Computers and Processors.

How long can we still afford to scrap hardware every two years before we deplete the natural resources at an alarming rate? (Why not provide repair and update kits and ongoing software support?) Besides by the time you've got things tuned and running again to your likings, you can scrap and redo it all again. What a waste of time.

Secure boot is also a BIOS software thing, that should be fixable with an update to the BIOS code.

billsey said:

Stick with W10 on your system (though Microsoft shouldn't be even offering you an upgrade, since it's not supported with your platform).

Sticking with Win 10 is certainly the easy option and advisable for now, but there will come's a point where your hand will be forced by the vendors. They are certainly harassing me already to upgrade in Windows Update all the time. I'm just trying to find out here if it's doable and what it would take to get it ready for Win 11 and also for others to know what's possible and how easy it will be and at what cost.

billsey said:

along with TPM 2.0 security hardware.

There is an unpopulated TPM slot on the MB! Do you know if there are TPM 2.0 modules available for it and where to get them?
Are TPM modules universal or platform / MB specific maybe even vendor proprietary?

billsey

Yes, Microsoft says they will be dropping support for updates to W10 in 2025 (timed with the spring update IIRC), so three plus years from now. Your system was released in Q1 2011, so is already more than ten years old and will be 14 years old when  the OS support goes away. There will be nothing stopping you from continuing to use at that point, albeit with a higher risk of malware and such, since no more security fixes. I'm running Windows 10 on two laptops here from 2006 (they are driving my CNC router and my 3D printer, so low impact applications), so it is possible to keep on going well beyond the normal lifespan.

As I said before though, Microsoft should not even be offering you a W11 update, Windows update should only be giving you Windows 10 stuff, since your machine is well past the cutoff design hardware.

Mike102

Interesting comment from ttttt

My Veriton VX4620G with Windows 10 boots in 17s and shuts down in 8s with the SSD i installed a couple years back. Hardly slow. This is with only 4GB of Ram which i can easily upgrade with a lot more. If i want yet more speed, I easily upgrade the graphics card. I agree with Marty, this CPU is plenty snappy.

I have a 1year old small laptop with Windows 11. Its Celeron N4020 has a benchmark of 1550, has 2 cores/2threads and runs at 1.1GHz. My Veriton by contrast has a benchmark of 4091, has 4 cores/4 threads and runs at 3.0GHz. Does not appear that there is any good reason why Microsoft shouldn't support the processor. My 2 cents.

Puraw

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/661411/upgrade-veriton-x4610g-to-windows-11

I am on W11 23H2 with 3 different laptops (2019-2023) and would not dream using a W10 system again, better security, faster and fluent updating/recovery from a "glitch", no hanging/BSODs anymore. You can disable some W11 features that you don't like. I am also using daily one (Outlook MAPI 2013-x32) W10 app and that syncs flawlessly with my yahoo mail server and new Outlook 2023 (free Edge app) on the other 2 laptops. Best and most robust Windows version and OS I ever used in 35 years. 😊

Puraw

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/661411/upgrade-veriton-x4610g-to-windows-11

I am on W11 23H2 with 3 different laptops (2019-2023) and would not dream using a W10 system again, better security, faster and fluent updating/recovery from a "glitch", no hanging/BSODs anymore. You can disable some W11 features that you don't like. I am also using daily one (MAPI 2013-x32) W10 app and that syncs flawlessly with my yahoo mail server and new desktop mail 2023 (free Edge app) on the other 2 laptops. Best and most robust Windows version and OS I ever used in 35 years. 😊

Marty11

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/comment/1257591#Comment_1257591

@Puraw I'm happy for you that you like W11. I wish you all the best with your machines. But the time will come that W11 becomes unsupported. Your processors will be pushed off the requirements list and effectively your 3 laptops become unsupported. Your 2019 laptop is well on its way already. Because 2 years after release (which mostly is earlier than purchase) BIOS updates stop. They have already been stopped. Driver updates from Intel also have been dropped 2 years after release (your processors are likely (much) older than the laptop release date). That leaves W11 that is still supported. So you see, that your hand is already being slowly forced to start looking for a new purchase. Just to be able to continue doing the same things that you always did.

Personally I think we need a new perspective now that Moore's law seems to be reaching its physical limits and stopped working (mr. Moore passed away last year at the age of 94).

A snipped from the article "We can't make transistors any smaller, is this the end of Moore's law?":

What would it mean to have the same iPhone for 30 years? Obviously, we
could simply deal with that as a society. There is nothing in our DNA
that mandates we have a new iPhone every two to three years and an
entirely new computer every five. We’ve simply become accustomed to that
pace of progress, and if that pace changes, we would acclimate
ourselves to that as well. 

This might also indirectly be what lies at the core of holding back adoption of W11.

W11 adoption according to digitaltrends.com article https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/researchers-urge-businesses-to-faster-windows-11-adoption/ :

The article says:

However, this still leaves 32% of devices that are not compatible with the Windows 11 update.

The old machines are plenty snappy, they are only held back by lack of driver updates, BIOS updates and OS support. Those are all software / support issues. Speed-wise, they are still viable.

Marty11

I already have devised a possible update path after W10 becomes unsupported:

1. Install Linux. XUbuntu Long Term Support version, which will get you 5 years of (security) support.
2. Optionally activate a free for personal use Ubuntu Pro subscription, which will extend (security) support to 10 years.
3. Run W11 in a container (Virtual Machine) inside Linux.

This hasn't been tested yet, but seems to be a possibility.

Larryodie

Save your money for a new one and enjoy the smoothness of today's computing.

Computers are cheaper than yours was when new.

I remember buying desktops for $2000 using the TV as a monitor, dial up card was $99 extra. 3 b of memory, maybe 100 Mb of hard drive. Sound Blaster and speakers were $200.

Now you can get an awesome machine (laptop) for like $329.