I'm trying to install Windows 11 on a PC with an Intel Core i7-8700K, an RTX 4070 Ti Super, 64GB of DDR4-3000 memory, and a 2TB NVMe M.2 SSD. The hardware appears to meet the published requirements, but the installer still says the computer doesn't meet the minimum system requirements. What BIOS or installation settings should I check?
3 Answers
The processor and graphics card should be fine, but Windows 11 also checks for TPM 2.0 and Secure Boot. In your motherboard’s UEFI/BIOS, enable Intel Platform Trust Technology (PTT), enable Secure Boot, and make sure the system is using UEFI mode rather than Legacy or CSM mode. An older BIOS version can also cause compatibility checks to fail, so updating the motherboard BIOS may help.
Check the boot order as well. The installer may be starting from the wrong device, especially if you created a USB installer. Put the Windows installation USB first temporarily, or use the motherboard’s boot menu to select it directly. Also confirm that the target drive is set up for UEFI/GPT rather than an older Legacy/MBR configuration.
I eventually found that the wrong drive was being selected at startup. After enabling TPM and putting the USB installer first in the boot order, the installation worked.
If you only need to install Windows 11 for testing, tools such as Rufus can create installation media that bypasses TPM, Secure Boot, and hardware checks. That’s more of a workaround than a fix, though. It’s better to enable the required firmware features and update the BIOS first, since bypassing the checks can reduce official support.
TPM wasn’t enabled initially, so I turned it on, but the installer still failed. The BIOS hasn’t been updated since I built the PC in 2017, so I’m going to look into updating it.