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I need to install win 10 on a relatively old computer. Its got a Gigabyte p965DS4 motherboard, Core 2 Duo E8400 processor, 3gb of DDR2 and a 320gb SATA2 hdd.

All the components are still functional, despite their age. The same system currently has win xp installed and functions well.

I also know the installation usb stick is good, I used it on another (but much newer) computer just yesterday.

Also I tried inserting a win 7 install stick and that ones installer came up just fine asking me my region and time format and whatnot.

When I hit 'any' key to boot the win 10 installer stick though, it just shows the logo and hangs there (i've been waiting for over an hour). The usb's activity indicator LED also seems to be off (instead of blinking which is what i'd expect when loading files or whatever).

So I'm just wondering here, is there some hardware incompatibility or something that is too old in the system that would prevent the installer from continuing?

The system should certainly have enough performance at least, I've put win 10 on computers with 2gb of ram and integrated single core processors.

EDIT: stumbled on another thing, I unplugged the win 10 installer stick while it was stuck on the logo and instantly it displayed an error screen saying the device was unplugged.. when I put it back in and hit enter to confirm, it went back to the logo thing. Ok so its responsive at least.. I guess but what is it trying to do?

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  • Did you create an MBR or EFI compatible bootable disk? Your system would only support legacy mode due to its age. Additionally, you might have other issues, Windows 10 wouldn't work. Typically, only Windows Vista and later devices, are compatible with Windows 10 due to the processor compatibility requirements.
    – Ramhound
    Jan 31, 2018 at 22:04
  • the sticks were created as MBR with "legacy support" whatever that means, in rufus.
    – user81993
    Feb 1, 2018 at 2:16
  • I had a similar issue with my old-ish i7 930. I had to disable VT-X virtualization (I believe) in BIOS for it to finally boot. Worth a try.
    – mtone
    Sep 2, 2018 at 12:03

2 Answers 2

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Your processor is of the Wolfdale family: https://ark.intel.com/products/33910/Intel-Core2-Duo-Processor-E8400-6M-Cache-3_00-GHz-1333-MHz-FSB

This processor's driver is not compatible with Windows 10: https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000006105/processors.html

This does not mean it won't work, but it means there may be issues, and "Your Mileage May Vary".

At the very least you should make sure your BIOS is updated to the latest available firmware to begin with.

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  • I made sure the BIOS was up to date but that didn't change anything. I ended up installing win 7 on it and running win 10 installer from there, the setup said "the processor doesn't support a critical feature CompareExchange128" so I guess thats it...
    – user81993
    Feb 1, 2018 at 2:14
  • @user81993 According to cpu-world.com/CPUs/Core_2/… the processor does support that instruction ("CMPXCHG16B"). It seems that some motherboards are the culprit as well: pcworld.com/article/2058683/…
    – Andreas
    Oct 30, 2019 at 23:41
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My first attempt resulted like yours but with E4500 the screen passed and I was able to install Windows 10 multi 1703.

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