About the operating system Windows 10 installation requires order 15 GB free hard disk space - a little, if it's normal HDD -disk and too small if it is a solid state drive SSD ... As the latter become more popular, shortly after the release Windows 8.1 Microsoft introduced new technology offering alternative way a system installation in which most of the files in the installation image remain compressed.

The new technology was named Windows Image Boot or abbreviated WIMBoot... Except for a slight, almost imperceptible decrease in performance, for the applied WIMBoot the user does not change anything, but there is an order of magnitude more free space after installing the system using WIMBoot. By the way, this technology can be used when installing Windows 10, but, as in the case of the eighth and tenth versions of the system, certain restrictions apply.

Firstly, the use of WIMBoot during the installation process is possible only on computers and laptops with modern BIOS, that is UEFI, secondly, the installation of the system using WIMBoot is performed in a non-standard way using the command line and a pre-boot environment, which can cause difficulties for users who are not well versed in such matters. But does this mean that saving space by means of compression system files on the PC is not possible with a regular BIOS? Of course not. Because with the same success for these purposes, another, more advanced compression technology called Compact OS .

Compact OS which is an improved technology WIMBoot is also good in that it can be used both on MBR -discs with normal BIOS and on disks GPT With UEFI with slight differences in markup. In this article, we will be looking at installing Windows 10 using Compact OS on the SSD-disk with markings MBR and classic BIOS.

So, we have at our disposal bootable USB drive (disk) with recorded ISO -image Windows 10 and laptop with hard disk the size 16 GB... Boot from the installation media and when the installation wizard window appears on the screen, press Shift + 10

Open a command prompt and run the following commands in it:

diskpart list disk select disk 0 clеan crеate partitiom primary format fs = NTFS quick activе assign letter W

diskpart list disk s el ect disk 0 cl еan cr еat еpartitiom prim аry format fs = NTFS qui сk activ e assign letter W

• The first command launches the disk utility.
• The second displays a list of all available physical media (we have one with index 0).
• The third sets focus on him.
• The fourth clears it.

• With the fifth command, we create a main partition on the selected disk.
• The sixth is to format it into file system NTFS.
• Seventh make it active.
• Since the operating system will be launched from it.
• Team assign letter assign a letter to the drive. It can be arbitrary, let it be W .

We continue working with the command line, one by one executing the following commands:

list volume exit dism / Get-WimInfo /WimFile:D:\sources\install.wim

list volume exit dism / Get - WimInfo / WimFile: D: \ sources \ install. wim

• The ninth command lists all sections,
• The tenth exits the utility Diskpart .

Then all the fun begins. Note that in the command dism used letter D- this letter denotes bootable media where the image file is located install.wim (it could also be install.esd) ... The command itself allows us to determine the release index of the system in the image. We have it Windows 10 corporate with index 1 ... Go ahead.

dism / apply-image /imagefile:D:\sources\install.wim / index: 1 / applydir: W: / compact bcdboot W: \ Windows

dism / apply - image / imagefile: D: \ sources \ install. wim / index: 1 / applydir: W: / compact bcdboot W: \ Windows

• With the twelfth command, we expand the contents of the image install.wim to the main disk W (future system) with compression parameter compact.
• And on the thirteenth, we create a bootloader for our operating system on it.

Ready.

This completes the command line and boots the computer in the usual way from the disk. The final stage of the Windows 10 installation will begin, during which you will be asked to specify the region, language and other settings, in a word, everything is the same as during a normal system installation.

It's easy to make sure the installation was done using Compact OS: if you open properties Windows folders, you will see that the space it occupies on disk is much less than the actual size, whereas on a system installed in the usual way, these two indicators should be approximately the same.

And the last moment.

After installation, it does not hurt to check if the recovery environment is active on the system. To do this, running as administrator command line run the command reagentc / info and make sure the state of the recovery environment is relevant Enabled .

If the environment turns out to be disabled, activate it by running the command reagentc / Enabled .

Note: installation Windows 10 using Compact OS on laptops with UEFI practically no different, with the exception of a few additional commands when partitioning a disk. You can download an example of such markup from the link yadi.sk/i/amYOjGmY36tuom .

Let's consider many ways about the error " Installing Windows on this disc is not possible. The selected disk has a GPT partition style. " old system partition of the MBR disk and it could no longer operate with the new amount of data TR (terabytes). They came up with a GPT system for disks and introduced it with a new graphical bisos uefi. Let's start the presented dilemma with our own, by standard means... I want to note that some users described their actions that they just go into bios and turn off UEFI mode. It all depends on many factors, up to the windows architecture, 64 or 32 bit.

Solutions: Windows cannot be installed on this disc. The selected disk has a GPT partition style

1. Change UEFI Boot Mode

Nowadays, most motherboards support both traditional boot and UEFI Boot... Users can choose the most suitable one in bios settings. Look carefully! bios is varied for everyone.

• Change value UEFI, instead of CSM For more information, see Feature or Setup.
• In the Peripherals line, click the SATA mode: AHCI instead of IDE.
• (This item is optional, try it if it doesn't work out above). In the Key Management line of the Secure Boot function, which is located on the BOOT tab, change Other OS instead of Windows UEFI Mode.

If you are recording from a flash drive and it does not work out this way, then overwrite it. Unforgettable! Press f10 to save the settings.

2. Removing partitions when installing windows

If you do not feel sorry for the data and want to do everything quickly, then delete all partitions when installing windows, and then format the entire HDD... Then re-create the partitions that you need. This will define a new table on the hard disk.

• Remove all disk partitions.
• Recreate them.

Format ( The method will erase all data).

3. Convert or convert GPT disk to MBR

The method will erase all data.

• When the error appears, click OK to close the error message and press Shift + F10, Shift + Fn + F10 (for laptops) to invoke cmd (command line). If nothing works, then go back one step to the windows installation interface and press Shift + F10 to start cmd again.

• We enter the following commands according to the order: diskpart -> list disk -> select disk 1 -> clean -> convert MBR... Line translations: diskpart program -> list of disks -> select disk 1 (1 stands for the number of GPT disk) -> clean up -> convert MBR. The picture shows which commands were entered. You can type codes in a line based on the picture. When diskpart converts to MBR format, you can exit the program and continue with the Windows installation.

4. Apply the standard disk management utility

If another OS is available on your laptop or it is possible to create a bootable Life DVD, USB flash drive. It will be possible to use standard program in windows "disk management". You can also connect your HDD to another computer.

• To start the program, press "start", right-click on my "computer" or the icon on the desktop, select "Management" and "Disk Management" from the context menu
• Delete all partitions or volumes on the disk one at a time through the right click, "delete volume". (Delete Volume)

• When the disk becomes unallocated space, click on the disk and select " convert to MBR disk"(Convert to MBR Disk). After these steps, the original GPT disk will be converted to MBR disk and then you can proceed to install Windows to that drive.

In the process of installing clean Windows 10, difficulties can arise due to the appearance of motherboards with UEFI instead of BIOS and an ambiguous structure of hard drives such as GPT. If the motherboard runs on UEFI BIOS, we will show you how to install Windows 10 in this article.

Defining parameters before installation

First, find out which interface the motherboard uses:

• standard BIOS;
• or a new UEFI.

You can find out by finding information about the motherboard on the Internet. Also, UEFI differs from BIOS in external design - it looks like more advanced (beautifully designed, advanced settings, support for a touchpad or mouse).

• MBR (Master Boot Record);
• GPT (GUID Partition Table).

The structure of your hard drive will depend on the ability to run and install a bootable USB flash drive or DVD-R / RW.

To find out the style, go to:

1. RMB My Computer → Office.


2. RMB By disk → properties.
   
3. Volumes tab → If the values ​​are empty, click Fill.
4. Defining the section style hard disk.
5. A GPT-style section looks like this.
   

Installing Windows 10

After finding out which BIOS the motherboard uses and what structure of the hard drive, we will distinguish 3 ways to install Windows:

1. Using the classic BIOS, to a disk with an MBR partition style.
2. Using UEFI (EFI) to an MBR style disk.
3. Using UEFI, to a disk with a GPT partition style.

If you use the Rufus program to create a bootable USB flash drive, below is an example for creating a USB flash drive with the necessary settings.

With classic BIOS, MBR

This is the classic way to install an OS. Insert the disc / USB stick into the drive / USB connector. When the computer boots up, enable BIOS:

UEFI, MBR

When using modern UEFI with graphic design, choosing to boot from USB / DVD-R is even easier than with the old BIOS interface. The UEFI interface supports installation on MBR and GPT disks, you just need to specify the boot priority correctly (see figure).

Having pored over the MBR partition table on the hard drive, the developers decided to pamper us with a practical novelty in the form of the GPT style. The advantages of this innovation, it would seem, are obvious: faster loading system, more convenient BIOS, support for bulk external storage... However, despite these advantages, a GPT disk is not suitable for every user. The fact is that it is not at all easy to install an OS on such a hard drive without errors. Somewhere in the middle of the process, an unexpected notification may pop up on the screen: Windows cannot be installed on this disk - the GPT partition style is selected.

What's the catch? The fact that the GPT section has several restrictions on its use. In addition to the fact that the activation of the operating system on it is very problematic, so to work with it you will also need:

• BIOS installed on the computer in the UEFI version;
• Windows 7/8 / 8.1 64-bit release system.

Note that if you omit at least one of these parameters, you will not be able to get rid of the above error. However, if the motherboard gets along well with UEFI and at the same time you yourself are not averse to installing a 64-bit Windows 7/8 system on your PC, then it is not difficult to deal with the problem when installing the system: you just have to set required settings GPT partition.

Step # 1: Prepare a bootable USB stick

Basically a GPT partition can be formatted with standard disc with a Windows distribution. However, in practice, it is still easier to install and in the future to adjust the operation of the system using a conventional flash drive. The only thing worth considering is its volume. Ideally, it should be at least 8 GB, so as not to lose the data we need during the recording process.

In any case, to create a flash drive distribution, you will have to download (copy) the image file from the OS, and then write it using the command line, UltraISO program, Windows 7 USB / DVD Download Tool or any other utility. You can read in detail how to do this. Naturally, it is better if Windows is licensed, since a problem with activation may appear in the future.

Step # 2: Configure UEFI BIOS

After the bootable USB flash drive is ready, without removing it from the USB port, we restart the computer and, upon restarting, by pressing Del or F2 on the keyboard, we enter the UEFI BIOS. But then there are 2 possible options for action.

Method number 1: Simplified configuration of BIOS parameters

You can use this method when you need to immediately load the distribution and debug the GPT partitions.

After the UEFI BIOS menu appears, you need to enter the "Boot Menu" section and set the option for starting the system from the installation flash drive in the list of devices that appears:

As a result, the computer will automatically restart and the system will start from the flash drive.

Method number 2: Full debug UEFI BIOS

For advanced BIOS settings, after getting into it, the first thing you need to do is enter the "Additional" section. You can find it in the lower left side of the open UEFI BIOS window, although simply pressing F7 on the keyboard is enough. Next, you need to open the "Download" menu, select the " USB support”And set this parameter to Full Initialization:

The next step - in the same section, select the CSM item and set the Enabled option as the launch parameter for it:

As a result, a window for additional options should appear. You can work with it in accordance with the following plan:

1. enter the "Boot Device Options" and set it to "UEFI Only";
2. select the item "Boot from storage devices" in the offered list, register the second option for it from the menu - Both, UEFI first;
3. go back by clicking the Back button:

Now in the "Boot" menu we need to set the value of Windows UEFI mode for the "Secure Boot" option. To do this, go to the appropriate section, click "OS Type" and select the required parameter in the presented menu:

After that, it remains to set the priority of the download:

Have you coped with this step? Let's move on to the next one!

Step # 3: Editing the GPT disk

After the PC boots from the installation flash drive, in order to avoid the appearance of a message from the category "installation is impossible", " this section does not fit "or" selected GPT style instead of MBR ", when starting Windows Installer, open the" Full Installation "tab:

It does not open immediately, of course. When loading a flash drive, you will initially need to configure the installation language, then click "Install", and then agree to the terms of the Windows license. Only then will access to the "Installation type" tab be opened.

One way or another, after selecting the desired item, a list of disk partitions will be displayed on the screen. We skip it for now, press Shift + F10 (Shift + Fn + F10) and alternately drive the following tasks into the command line, alternating with pressing Enter:

1. diskpart
2. sel dis 0
3. clean
4. convert gpt

Wherein replacing the convert gpt command with convert mbr, you can get a disk partition in MBR format(OS activation is easier in it):

In any case, all information from the hard disk will be deleted! Now, after exiting the command line to complete the configuration, go back to the list of sections, click "Update" and select "Next":

As a result, the standard Windows installation starts (details). We are waiting for its completion and move on.

Step # 4: Check disk information

After successfully installing Windows, it is worth checking the current partition data. In this case, the procedure will be as follows:

1. right-click on the "Computer" shortcut on the desktop and select "Management" in the list;
2. in the new window, click the "Disk Management" tab;
3. in the list of partitions we find the C drive, right-click on it and enter the "Properties";
4. select the "Volumes" tab and check the information for the section:

If you have gone through all three steps without problems before, no surprises should arise.

Step # 5: Activating the system from the GPT disc

And the last, perhaps the most heartbreaking moment - the activation of the operating system installed on the GPT disk. It should be admitted that most of the problems often arise at this stage. Why? The fact is that activating Windows with GPT without license key almost impossible. In this case, you will have to opt for one of the following options:

1. format the GPT disk to MBR format (see step # 3);
2. perform activation using special programs;
3. buy a license for the OS;

Ideally, of course, activate the operating system using the license key received from the developer. It is worth, however, such a pleasure is not cheap, but this is the only way to ensure the full operation of the computer while maintaining the advantages of GPT.

If this is not possible, for Windows activation try your luck with activator programs, for example, KMSPico 10.0.3, or ordinary cracks. Naturally, in this case you have to act at your own peril and risk. The question arises, is it not more efficient to replace GPT with the MBR format and forget about the pain of activation? The answer, of course, is different for every user.

Today we will figure out how to install any modern version Windows (including including Windows 7 or Windows 10) to a hard drive with a GPT partition table on a legacy computer with a BIOS that does not support a modern one. The need to perform such a trick arose when trying to install Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 on an HP DL380 G8 server (HP DL servers do not support EFI yet) with local disks, the total capacity of which in RAID 5 exceeds 4 TB. At standard installation Windows to a disk with MBR markup, only 2 TB is available in the system. Windows cannot mark up or access the remaining 2 TB of disk space. The only way to take advantage of all the available disk space is to convert the disk layout to GPT.

This article describes how to configure Windows to boot from a GPT partitioned hard drive on a computer with a classic BIOS (which does not have UEFI) or Legacy BIOS mode. Operating room Windows system cannot boot from GPT disks on old BIOS system X. To get around this limitation, we use the BCD transfer technique Windows bootloader to a separate small USB flash drive (or HDD disk) with the MBR partition table. This flash drive will only be used to start the Windows bootloader, which must then transfer control to the main Windows image located on a GPT disk. The instructions are universal and should work both in Windows 7 and Windows 10 and any other supported 32 and 64 editions of Windows.

Benefits of GPT over MBR

What are the advantages of using GUID Partition Table (GPT)- a new format for placing partition tables on a hard disk. The GPT partition table overcomes some of the limitations of the classic MBR partition table. Let's list the main points:

• Support hard drives over 2.2 TB(the maximum available disk size for GPT is 9.4 ZetaBytes (9.4 × 1021 bytes))
• Supports up to 128 partitions on disk (MBR has only 4 partitions)
• High reliability achieved by duplicating the partition table in multiple locations on the disk and checking the partition table using a cyclic redundant parity check (CRC). Thus, the structure of the disk partition will not be lost if the first sectors of the disk are damaged.
• No need to use logical partitions error prone

Booting Windows from GPT disk

According to the official Microsoft documentation http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/gg463525.aspx, all its OS, starting with Windows Server 2003 SP1, support volumes with GPT markup as data disks, however, boot with GPT volumes can only be 64-bit versions of Windows installed on motherboards with support for the new UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) specification. Thus, you will not be able to install or boot Windows from a GPT disk on older computers with a classic BIOS.

Advice... There are several workarounds allowing you to boot Windows 10/7 x64 on BIOS systems from a GPT disk. To do this, you need to use boot disk containing a UEFI development environment emulator - DUET (Developer's UEFI Environment) that mimics EFI. In this configuration Computer BIOS starts booting from the installed SYSLINUX which loads the UEFI emulator (DUET). DUET, in turn, calls the standard Windows boot loader - bootx64.efi. It is also possible to transfer the disc to hybridMBR mode (hybrid mbr) using the Linux utility gdisk. However, in both cases, the procedure is rather complicated and requires a good knowledge of Linux OS from the user.

Once again, we note an important fact that should be learned forever: booting Windows x64 from a GPT disk is possible only on a system with UEFI.

Thus, if your computer runs on BIOS, and you need its disk to contain a GPT partition table, the easiest way is to add another hard disk (regular or SSD) with MBR markup to the system, install Windows on it, and then boot into the system. from him.

We will try to modify this technique a little. For this we need USB flash drive or a small SD card (at least 64 MB) with MBR markup, on which we will place the dispatcher Windows boot- bootmgr. This bootable USB stick will provide the initial system boot and transfer control to the main system bootloader located on the GPT volume.

Important... The system must support booting from a USB flash drive or SD card at the BIOS level.

Thus, we will be able to boot any (both 32 and 64 bit versions of Windows !!! ) from a GPT disk on a non-EFI BIOS system.

Installing Windows to a GPT disk on a BIOS computer

Let's say we have a BIOS (non-UEFI) computer that uses a new GPT partition table on its hard drive. When trying to install Windows on a gpt disk such a computer, the Windows installer will give an error:

Windows cannot be installed to this disk the selected disk is of the GPT Partition Style

In the Russian version, the error is:

Advice... You can convert a disk from MBR to GPT with the loss of all data by clicking on the installation screen Windows combination Shift + F10. And by executing the following commands on the command line:
Diskpart
select disk 0 (if the system has one hard disk)
clean (clean the contents of the disk)
convert gpt (convert partition table to GPT)

Installing Windows 10 / 8.1 / 7 directly on a GPT disk in such a situation is possible only in UEFI mode through emulating this environment with DUET. But in this mode, it is possible to install only 64 bit Windows versions, and the procedure itself, as we said above, is rather complicated.

In this case, it is much easier to install Windows on an MBR disk in normal mode, and then convert it to GPT using the utility gptgen.

Gptgen - convert disk partition table from MBR to GPT without deleting partitions

Windows Console “Disk Management” allows you to convert a disk from MBR to GPT only “blank” unpartitioned disks. The console will not allow converting partitions on a disk on which the OS is already installed.

For online hard disk conversion from MBR to GPT, you can use a small utility that allows you to convert the partition table format on the fly without having to delete all partitions (without losing data).

Important... Before performing the conversion, it is highly recommended copy all critical data to external media... And although, I have not yet encountered incorrect work utilities gptgen, which would lead to a complete collapse of the file system, I recommend that all users still save their important data before converting the partition table, so that later there will be no complaints about the author of the article 🙂.

Download the gptgen utility, and unpack it to an arbitrary directory (for example, c: \ tools \ gptgen-1.1).

So, the conversion of the partition table to GPT was successful!

Transferring the Windows bootloader to a USB flash drive

We reboot the computer and make sure that the BIOS cannot boot from the hard disk with the GPT table. It should be so! We connect a small USB flash drive or SD card to the system. Boot from the installation CD / USB disk with Windows (suitable as installation disc with Windows 10 and Win 7, as in our case) and on the installation screen, click Shift + F10 by opening the command line console:

1. Run the command: diskpart
2. Let's list the disks in the system: list disk. V in this case the system has two disks: Disk 0 - a 40 GB hard disk (* in the Gpt column indicates that this disk contains a GPT partition table) and Disk 1 - a 1 GB USB flash drive.
   
3. Let's figure out the partitions on the disks and the letters that are assigned to them. Let's select a hard disk: select disk 0 and display a list of partitions on it: list volume
   Based on the size of the partitions, it can be understood that the system is installed on partition 2 (Volume 2), to which the letter D is assigned :( given letter may not match the letter system disk which is displayed in Windows itself)
4. Let's create the necessary partitions on the flash drive:
   select disk 1 (select a flash drive)
   clean (cleaning the contents of the disk)
   create partition primary size = 1000 (create a primary partition on the USB flash drive, in this case 1 GB in size)
   format (we format it in the FAT32 file system. Do not use the NTFS file system for a USB flash drive, since it will not work from such a partition)
   select partition 1 (select the first partition on the flash drive)
   active (mark the section as active)
   list volume (we will display the list of partitions again. In this example, you can see that the partition we created has an index of 3)
   select volume 3 (select it)
   assign letter = G (assign it a free drive letter, for example G)
   
   
   list volume (make sure the letter G is assigned to the partition on the flash drive)
   
   exit (Exit diskpart utility)
5. Let's copy the boot environment files from the system disk to the USB flash drive: bcdboot d: \ Windows / l en-us / s g:
6. Let's write the boot code to the USB flash drive to load bootmgr (Windows Boot Manager): bootsect / nt60 G: / mbr / force
7. Reboot

Go to BIOS and set the maximum boot priority for your USB (SD) drive. Save your changes. If you did everything correctly, the system should boot correctly. You can make sure that your Windows is on a GPT disk in Disk Manager ( diskmgmt.msc) by opening the properties of the system drive. The Volumes tab indicates that the type of the partition table is GPT (Partition style - GUID Partition Table)

This method of transferring the bootloader to a separate USB flash drive will allow you to take full advantage of the GPT partition table and use the entire hard disk capacity (over 2.2 TB) on systems with BIOS (without UEFI environment). A similar trick can be done with the following (even 32 bit versions) Windows:

• Windows 10 / Windows Server 2016
• Windows 8, Windows 8.1
• Windows Server 2012/2012 R2
• Windows 7
• Windows Server 2008/2008 R2
• Windows Vista
• Windows Server 2003 SP1 / 2003 (64-bit)
• Windows XP x64

Disclaimer... The article is offered as is. All specified operations have been tested for virtual machine- not tested on real machines. If someone tests a similar configuration and system operation on physical gland and will write about the results - I will be very happy. According to the available information, some old computers with BIOS do not in principle allow working with GPT disks; such disks are simply not detected.

You also need to understand that every time you turn on / reboot the system, your USB flash drive with the MBR table and the bootloader on it must be connected to the computer, otherwise Windows will simply not boot.