I have some questions about installing windows 10 on an acer one 10 s1003 2gb model (N16H1) method.

vojtechh said:
Hello, after many long nights I have finally found the solution.

First, let me say that this computer (if you can even call it that) is terrible. I have never worked with anything worse than this. Now onto the guide:

Windows won't boot from the USB installation media at all, so you can't actually install windows on the thing. You will have to copy the installation over. For that we will use some linux magic and VirtualBox. So go ahead and download VirtualBox (https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads) on a different computer. Then you have to obtain the 32 bit Windows ISO (https://www.microsoft.com/en-US/software-download/windows10ISO).

Fire up VirtualBox and create a new Virtual Machine. The hard drive size should be about 28 GB. Then go to the settings of your VM and turn on EFI (System > Motherboard > Extended Features > Enable EFI). Then go ahead and boot your VM, select the ISO you've downloaded and proceed. Install Windows as you normally would but do not continue past the setup screen after reboot (the one where you pick your area). Press Shift+F10, cmd should pop up. Type in <b>shutdown /s /t 0</b>. The VM should shutdown.

After that go to the installation folder of VirtualBox (C:\Program Files\Oracle\VirtualBox\) and open cmd there. Type in <b>VBoxManage.exe clonehd --format RAW source.vdi Windows.img</b> where source.vdi is the virtual disk you've created when creating the VM and Windows.img is the output file that is going to be created (You can put it on the desktop so you don't have to open CMD as an Administrator). Once that is done, download Rufus (https://rufus.ie/), open it up and press the SELECT button. Select the Windows.img you have just exported using VBoxManage. Then select a USB drive (min. 32GB) you will use (this will wipe it and you will lose all your data, so backup). Get a coffee since this is going to take a while.

Meanwhile rufus is burning the img onto the USB drive, download PuppyLinux (http://puppylinux.com/index.html#download > 32bit Ubuntu Bionic). Find another usb drive (this time it can be a small one, even 1 GB should work) and wait for the Rufus to finish the previous work. Don't close it yet, since we need it to burn puppy linux. Once again select it using the SELECT button and choose your smaller USB drive. It is important to select MBR as the partition scheme, since otherwise it won't boot. Once that is burned we are ready to boot it from the laptop/tablet.

Plug both drives to your acer tablet (you need an USB OTG cabel for this) and turn it on while pressing the ESC key. A configuration screen should show up. Go to Boot From File and then find the USB drive with puppy linux. Boot from the 32bit .efi file. Click enter on all the Grub screens and you should get to the desktop. Open terminal and type in lsblk a list of storage media should show up. Then type in dd if=/dev/sdX of=/dev/mmcblk0 bs=512 status=progress make sure to replace the X with a letter of the 32 gig USB drive from lsblk (mmcblk0 is the internal storage of the laptop, if that has a different name you have to change it according to the output from lsblk). Press enter and wait. Once this command completes you have successfully installed Windows on this terrible computer!

Reboot and finish the windows setup. After that press the Windows Key+R and type in diskmgmt.msc, right click on the C: partition and extend it to the maximum size.

The only thing left is to install all the drivers. Since there is no Wifi yet, you will have to copy them over. Luckily Acer has made an automatic installation of all the drivers (https://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/support-product/6822?b=1 > Platform Drivers Installer). Once that is on the tablet, open cmd as root and cd to the Scripts folder of this driver package. Run the install file and wait for it to finish. Now all the drivers should be installed. Congrats.

This thread is open based on an older thread about the same topic, for that reason there's a quote from there in this thread, You can fin this one following this link: https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/542176/acer-one-10-s1003-doesnt-boot-from-windows-bootable-usb/p1

Hi everyone, I have some questions about this installation method, I'm new in this world of troubleshooting things. Because It seems that I have the same problem that opened this thread, I tried to install ubuntu 20.04 on my acer one 10 s1003 (N16H1) but ubuntu installer just crashed and nuked the internal storage of the device, all data was gone including drivers and the hidden recovery partition (without drivers harware doesn't work, obviously). In this moment I'm trying to install wifi drivers directly on lubuntu 20.04.2 (I actually could install this distro on the computer in fact I already asked in ask lubuntu how to do it (sort of haha): https://askubuntu.com/questions/1351858/can-i-install-windows-drivers-on-a-acer-one-10-s1003-2gb-model-that-runs-lubuntu?noredirect=1#comment2311581_1351858), If I cannot install those ones on lubuntu, I shall try to reinstall windows 10 on the device for installing the drivers. I have two questions: First, which boot drive has GPT format? I think is window's boot drive because puppy linuxe's drive has to be formatted as MBR, I'm not sure. Second. After I reinstalled windows and the platform devices and all factory drivers, Can I reinstall a linux distro (like fedora or even lubuntu) and keep those drivers on the computer? Because I read that fedora is recommended for this device due to its tochscreen support (according this reddit post: https://askubuntu.com/questions/1351858/can-i-install-windows-drivers-on-a-acer-one-10-s1003-2gb-model-that-runs-lubuntu?noredirect=1#comment2311581_1351858) or lubuntu because is very light and not demanding for this device. I know that sometimes those drivers causes problems on those distros but fortunately there's scripts that fixes the majority of those problems.

I apologise for my english, the extention of this comment. And thanks for your comments, drink water, take care of yourself.

Accepted answers

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Immaplane

There is a answer that I received

JackE said:

Immaplane

This is an old thread so it's best to post your own by clicking on the ask a question button. Your s1003 is very limited as to what you install by a 32GB emmc storage chip that can't be changed. It is best left in UEFI mode with GPT partitioning. If you changed it to MBR partitioning, then yes the original factory Win10 installation is gone. So I suggest that you consider installing a streamlined debian version like Q4OS that can use this laptop much more efficiently with a very nice desktop very similar to WinXP and Win7.

This is

Immaplane said:
Well thanks, I will consider installing debian. But In my case If I manage to install windows on this tablet and installing the drivers, I won't be able to keep those drivers, will I?

JackE

Windows drivers are incompatible with Linux. In order to re-install Windows, you will probably need an 16GB NTFS formatted sdcard to store temporary files that the Windows installation USB needs to complete on the emmc chip. You can make the Windows USB installation by using the Microsoft media creation tool at this link.

billsey

IIRC the S1003 models are also setup for 32bit Windows (and 32bit Linux), not 64bit. You should boot from a 32bit install image and the rest will sort itself out.

Immaplane

billsey said:

IIRC the S1003 models are also setup for 32bit Windows (and 32bit Linux), not 64bit. You should boot from a 32bit install image and the rest will sort itself out.

So, Are you telling me that I ougth to install a 32 bits linux image If I want to fix mi issue?

billsey

Yes, the EFI environment loads signed 32bit images, not 64bit or unsigned. You can get around the signed/unsigned by disabling secure boot, but the 32/64bit is pretty much hard wired in. They didn't support 64bit on machines with under 4GB of maximum memory on the machines from that era.

Immaplane

Ummmm I'll try that, thanks, excuse me but, which linux distro would you recommend for me? Well I'm pretty new in this world of linux and I was reading that debian has a tricky installation. And I'm pretty interested in learning how to use all functions that linux offers

JackE

You heard wrong about debian. Try installing Q4os 32-bit trinity desktop at this link. Preprare the bootable usb iso using Rufus if you don't know how to use DD command in the linux terminal prompt. The trinity desktop default installation has the same look feel and function of WinXP & Win7 only it should be must faster on you machine.

Immaplane

Excuse me, I scared a little bit only for hearing debian

Immaplane

Well, I tried already installing q4os, and I have some graphic issues, the graphic enviroment doesn't charge correctly, I guess this is a issue for other thread

JackE

>>> the graphic enviroment doesn't charge correctly>>>

What do you mean by graphic environment doesn't change correctly? The s1003 screen and graphics resolution is quite limited and aspect ratio is also unusual. It cannot achieve resolutions and aspect ratios much higher than 1280 x 720 which is normally used for budget laptops that must also use stripped down 32-bit Linux distros. Sorry, but It's unlikely that you will find any Linux distro with quite the same screen rendering on this particular laptop as 32-bit Win10.

Immaplane

Excuse me, I mean, when I installed q4os and the computer rebooted, the os didn't boot there was just a black screen but when I rebooted again the computer It seems that q4os booted but like the picture shown below. The characters didn't appear. I tried rebooting the computer one, but the system doesn't boot up and that black screen appeared again.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/mu/q6dahrmjz96o.jpg

JackE

I think you should focus on installing 32-bit Windows using Microsoft USB intallation creation tool . Then update to the latest BIOS firmware at this link.

Immaplane

Well, I think, I have to do that and other thing, actually my computer has the latest bios version.

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/6029997/uploads/editor/9z/0ddq5qib3uw9.jpg

JackE

Then you should be all set for running 32-bit Windows.

Immaplane

There is a answer that I received

JackE said:

Immaplane

This is an old thread so it's best to post your own by clicking on the ask a question button. Your s1003 is very limited as to what you install by a 32GB emmc storage chip that can't be changed. It is best left in UEFI mode with GPT partitioning. If you changed it to MBR partitioning, then yes the original factory Win10 installation is gone. So I suggest that you consider installing a streamlined debian version like Q4OS that can use this laptop much more efficiently with a very nice desktop very similar to WinXP and Win7.

This is how I answered to that

Immaplane said:
Well thanks, I will consider installing debian. But In my case If I manage to install windows on this tablet and installing the drivers, I won't be able to keep those drivers, will I?

billsey

My thought is to just ignore Linux for now and get everything working again on Windows. Boot from a 32bit Windows 10 install flash drive to start the install procedure (I believe you'll be installing Windows 10 Home to match the key embedded in the computer). When you get to the point where it's asking you where to install delete any partitions that are on the eMMC drive then tell Windows to install to the unallocated space. When it's done installing log in and let Windows Update install any drivers that are old or missing. When that's all finished then look in Device Manager to see what still needs to be dealt with and install matching drivers from the Acer support site.

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