Question Re-installing Win 11, showing does not meet requirements.

[i6pwr]

After dealing with an issue with our Lenovo Win 11 laptop which was purchased new, we had to perform a fresh Win 11 install. Upon attempting to reinstall from a creation tool USB drive, we received an error that it was not meeting requirements.

So per the recommendation of Microsoft, we downloaded and installed Windows 10, with plans to upgrade to Windows 11... but now my Wi-Fi does not work because the hardware is set for Windows 11 so now we have a USB Wi-Fi adapter connecting us to the internet but we cannot get Windows 11 until we get the TPM.
It looks to be an issue with not having TPM and it's not showing that we have it, but we cannot find out how to download it,

Would this actually keep us from installing Windows 11?

 

[beyondlogic]

After dealing with an issue with our Lenovo Win 11 laptop which was purchased new, we had to perform a fresh Win 11 install. Upon attempting to reinstall from a creation tool USB drive, we received an error that it was not meeting requirements.

So per the recommendation of Microsoft, we downloaded and installed Windows 10, with plans to upgrade to Windows 11... but now my Wi-Fi does not work because the hardware is set for Windows 11 so now we have a USB Wi-Fi adapter connecting us to the internet but we cannot get Windows 11 until we get the TPM.
It looks to be an issue with not having TPM and it's not showing that we have it, but we cannot find out how to download it,

Would this actually keep us from installing Windows 11?

this is more board related then actual not suitable for windows 11.

contact lenovo for bios update for the motherboard had similar issue with microcode on a motherboard not being updated.

https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/solutions/ht500008-how-to-update-system-bios-windows

this is more a intel being a pain in the rear end then actual not supported.

as for wifi issue thats more board related to laptops.

i lost full use of the mouse pad and wifi on my laptop had to reinstall all the drivers from lenovo to get it functioning.

 

[stonecarver]

After dealing with an issue with our Lenovo Win 11 laptop which was purchased new, we had to perform a fresh Win 11 install. Upon attempting to reinstall from a creation tool USB drive, we received an error that it was not meeting requirements.

This is interesting.

Just for full understanding your Laptop came factory sealed with Windows 11.

And now trying to put a fresh downloaded virgin ISO from Microsoft and it now spits out an error of the TPM chip.

I would contact Lenovo and ask how you can obtain a factory restore install of windows 11 FROM THEM.

Let them know the original SSD died and than there usually are more helpful.

I bet there image restore will get Windows 11 onto the machine. Because there image is a baked finished install of Windows 11 not from ground zero.

My guess is at the factory they used slave machines to install Windows 11 onto 100's of hard drives at the same time than install those now baked drives into machines.

That would have bypassed the actual " your " laptop from ever dealing with the TPM chip while Windows 11 is being installed.

 

[beyondlogic]

This is interesting.

Just for full understanding your Laptop came factory sealed with Windows 11.

And now trying to put a fresh downloaded virgin ISO from Microsoft and it now spits out an error of the TPM chip.

I would contact Lenovo and ask how you can obtain a factory restore install of windows 11 FROM THEM.

Let them know the original SSD died and than there usually are more helpful.

I bet there image restore will get Windows 11 onto the machine. Because there image is a baked finished install of Windows 11 not from ground zero.

My guess is at the factory they used slave machines to install Windows 11 onto 100's of hard drives at the same time than install those now baked drives into machines.

That would have bypassed the actual " your " laptop from ever dealing with the TPM chip while Windows 11 is being installed.

that sounds like a total pain in the rear for end user down the line if the laptop os goes belly up.

 

[COLGeek]

The TPM is part of the CPU. Make sure the fTPM is enabled in the BIOS.

Have you contacted Lenovo at all about these issues?

 

[steveb1976]

go into bios and reset your ftpm.. .. and check "secure boot". or when in bio to to f10, and select "setup/ load defaults. it should turn in on...

you have win10 setup.. have you run the "windows 11 system requirments" check.. you could download win 11 and just run the setup from withing windows.. it should allow you to setup. even if it says you fail. it should let you setup still ..

 

[i6pwr]

Sorry for the late reply, I will try to answer all the questions.

contact lenovo for bios update for the motherboard had similar issue with microcode on a motherboard not being updated.

We did and going back a few days. they said we would likely need to reinstall windows since there was no recovery key....which is fine as the laptop had minimal on the drives, mainly used for college using cloud and local canvas.

Just for full understanding your Laptop came factory sealed with Windows 11.

Yes

that sounds like a total pain in the rear for end user down the line if the laptop os goes belly up.

It was.

Small disclaimer, we have 3 Lenovo products and love them, we have nothing bad to say about them but this was just likely an oversight on our part.

Hopefully this will help others and answer some questions...long-winded backstory, we purchased from Lenovo new back in Aug '24, haven't had any issues. It was powered up 3 days ago and performed it's scheduled Windows updates, and we were greeted with the bitlocker screen. I have never seen this before, but we made no changes to the laptop, the laptop was recognized by the Microsoft account, matching serial #, but no recovery data, secure boot enabled, so we contacted Lenovo and they said we would likely need to reinstall Windows. The person we spoke with didn't say we needed to use THEIR download file so I did the normal media creation tool from Microsoft and it wouldn't load due to not meeting specs.

So Microsoft suggested to use Win 10 then upgrade after the install. Once running on Win 10, we had no internal Wi-Fi and had to use an adapter. Then we tried the Win 11 tool and upon initialization, we had the same result, does not meet specs. Finally on my 3rd call to Lenovo, I spoke with a very knowledgeable person and they walked me through their own re-install procedure which after they "verified the laptop was ours" they sent us the Win 11 file that included all our drivers that were used to initially setup the laptop from the factory. Now it's up and running, still no recovery key in our Microsoft account but we have secure boot disabled for the time being and the bitlocker is off. Maybe during summer break we can try to secure it more as I will have it physically in front of me for a length of time

The TPM is part of the CPU. Make sure the fTPM is enabled in the BIOS.

Have you contacted Lenovo at all about these issues?

Yes, they said the TPM is a Microsoft issue but that was only one person who said that, maybe the hardware is Lenovo and the software is Microsoft?

go into bios and reset your ftpm.. .. and check "secure boot". or when in bio to to f10, and select "setup/ load defaults. it should turn in on...

We currently have secure boot off. It was turned on originally when this mess happened so for now we have it off. The Lenovo rep said to wait a few days after this last install to see if we have the recovery data in our Microsoft account, but I said we had secure boot on, and was 5 months and still no recovery key in our account so with college starting back up, I don't want to run into any issues until summer, then I can try again to add the TPM....this has been quite a show the last few days.

I get it that we need it enabled to see the key but maybe we missed a step before when we first set it up back in Aug?

To sum up this post, our Lenovo laptop seemed to want the "creation tool" from Lenovo and not Microsoft, once we had it, all went smooth.

 

[beyondlogic]

Sorry for the late reply, I will try to answer all the questions.


We did and going back a few days. they said we would likely need to reinstall windows since there was no recovery key....which is fine as the laptop had minimal on the drives, mainly used for college using cloud and local canvas.


Yes



It was.

Small disclaimer, we have 3 Lenovo products and love them, we have nothing bad to say about them but this was just likely an oversight on our part.

Hopefully this will help others and answer some questions...long-winded backstory, we purchased from Lenovo new back in Aug '24, haven't had any issues. It was powered up 3 days ago and performed it's scheduled Windows updates, and we were greeted with the bitlocker screen. I have never seen this before, but we made no changes to the laptop, the laptop was recognized by the Microsoft account, matching serial #, but no recovery data, secure boot enabled, so we contacted Lenovo and they said we would likely need to reinstall Windows. The person we spoke with didn't say we needed to use THEIR download file so I did the normal media creation tool from Microsoft and it wouldn't load due to not meeting specs.

So Microsoft suggested to use Win 10 then upgrade after the install. Once running on Win 10, we had no internal Wi-Fi and had to use an adapter. Then we tried the Win 11 tool and upon initialization, we had the same result, does not meet specs. Finally on my 3rd call to Lenovo, I spoke with a very knowledgeable person and they walked me through their own re-install procedure which after they "verified the laptop was ours" they sent us the Win 11 file that included all our drivers that were used to initially setup the laptop from the factory. Now it's up and running, still no recovery key in our Microsoft account but we have secure boot disabled for the time being and the bitlocker is off. Maybe during summer break we can try to secure it more as I will have it physically in front of me for a length of time



Yes, they said the TPM is a Microsoft issue but that was only one person who said that, maybe the hardware is Lenovo and the software is Microsoft?

We currently have secure boot off. It was turned on originally when this mess happened so for now we have it off. The Lenovo rep said to wait a few days after this last install to see if we have the recovery data in our Microsoft account, but I said we had secure boot on, and was 5 months and still no recovery key in our account so with college starting back up, I don't want to run into any issues until summer, then I can try again to add the TPM....this has been quite a show the last few days.

I get it that we need it enabled to see the key but maybe we missed a step before when we first set it up back in Aug?

To sum up this post, our Lenovo laptop seemed to want the "creation tool" from Lenovo and not Microsoft, once we had it, all went smooth.

glad you got it sorted bitlocker is microsoft but the processor has its own lock down feature in bios. lenovo has basicly a batch software of windows and it probly goes by the physical motherboard for the account key.