Question What's with these prebuilt business desktop computers ?

[catherdersoflinux]

Every PC i ever built when i went to install Windows for dual booting on linux i had the option to choose a Windows Edition... Home, Pro, Educational etc.
But these business machines, HP EliteDesk G3 SFF it's hardwired to only allow core/home version and you don't get the option to select a different edition of windows from the list. This is very strange. I don't understand. Can someone please explain that?

also i have had trouble booting my linux install usb with legacy mode. My usb shows up on the list for uefi but not for legacy. I have disabled secure boot and enabled legacy mode but i can't seem to get a usb to boot in legacy mode. Also very strange. It's not just the usbs with grub in legacy mode it's my linux install grub can not boot from legacy mode.

An i7-7700 was very nice from ebay for the price but it is def a quirky machine.

Another quirk is it only has 3 sata connectors. There's a spot for a 4th but it isn't soldered on. i nstalled 2 hdd and a ssd and an nvme drive and i was out of connectors for the dvd. bought a pcie card with 2 sata connectors and installed it in the 4 lane pcie slot. Long story short theres a significant delay when running a hdd or ssd from that card, like painful minutes of waiting. even the dvd is causing some delay, less than 30 seconds when legacy mode is enabled. Never had that issue on a diy build, even with mitx board. uefi only mode seems fine. no delays at all. boots rigght up into linux in uefi only mode. again, very quirky and strange to me.

someone can explain these quirks please?

 

[Ralston18]

Not sure that what you describe are quirks....

Update your post to include full system hardware specs and detailed OS version information (Windows and Linux).

Drives: make, model, capacity, how full?

This business machine?

https://www.amazon.com/HP-EliteDesk-Desktop-Quad-Core-Processor/dp/B085ZLFSYB

It may have come with Windows Home installed (or had that installed) but you should be able to install another edition of Windows. Or perhaps upgrade.

Could be that a clean Windows install is needed. Moving drives between systems can be problematic if they work at all.

https://forums.tomshardware.com/faq/windows-10-clean-install-tutorial.3170366

[Note: One link I found stated that the HP EliteDesk did not support Windows 11.]

= = = =

As for SATA connectors etc., the system may simply not have enough power to run the additional drives. You may need a hub with its' own power source to run additional drives.

 

[catherdersoflinux]

I

Not sure that what you describe are quirks....

Update your post to include full system hardware specs and detailed OS version information (Windows and Linux).

Drives: make, model, capacity, how full?

This business machine?

https://www.amazon.com/HP-EliteDesk-Desktop-Quad-Core-Processor/dp/B085ZLFSYB

It may have come with Windows Home installed (or had that installed) but you should be able to install another edition of Windows. Or perhaps upgrade.

Could be that a clean Windows install is needed. Moving drives between systems can be problematic if they work at all.

https://forums.tomshardware.com/faq/windows-10-clean-install-tutorial.3170366

[Note: One link I found stated that the HP EliteDesk did not support Windows 11.]

= = = =

As for SATA connectors etc., the system may simply not have enough power to run the additional drives. You may need a hub with its' own power source to run additional drives.

I'm pretty sure we are not both having the same conversation.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

Well, pre-built business class machines aren't supposed to be general purpose gaming and whatnot machines. They are intended to be used in office environments where only 1 or 2 storage devices (1 HD & 1 CD/DVD) are needed for operation and few if any expansion slots are needed. They are what they are. As for restricting the version of Windows that can be installed? In over 40 years in the business I've never heard of such a thing, especially from HP or Dell. Much more detail is needed here.

 

[catherdersoflinux]

As for restricting the version of Windows that can be installed? In over 40 years in the business I've never heard of such a thing, especially from HP or Dell.

Would you like a video of the experience? Can i post that here.

Also i am not gaming. It could some though.. rx-6400 half height card should surely fit and outperform an nvidia 1050 halfheight card even with the loss of performance from using a pcie4 card on a pcie3 machine. But the new arc xe card is touted by intel to outperform even the 6400 by 25% though it's only available in china just yet.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

Why the need for a video? Simply describe in detail exactly what is preventing the installation of anything other than Windows Home. Post screenshots of any pertinent screens. I'm not going to watch a video as it's not needed.

 

[catherdersoflinux]

Specs seem irrelevant to the discussion as i understand it and likely a distraction but at any rate, here they are.

i7-7700:[catherdersoflinux]:~/Desktop$ sudo inxi -Fxzmc32
System:
Kernel: 5.17.15-lqx1-1-lqx arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 12.1.0
Desktop: MATE v: 1.26.0 Distro: Artix Linux base: Arch Linux
Machine:
Type: Desktop System: HP product: HP EliteDesk 800 G3 SFF v: N/A
serial: <filter>
Mobo: HP model: 8299 v: KBC Version 06.29 serial: <filter> UEFI: HP
v: P01 Ver. 02.40 date: 04/08/2022
Battery:
Device-1: hidpp_battery_0 model: Logitech M570 charge: 95%
status: discharging
Device-2: hidpp_battery_1 model: Logitech Wireless Keyboard K360
charge: 100% (should be ignored) status: discharging
Memory:
RAM: total: 31.12 GiB used: 12.38 GiB (39.8%)
Array-1: capacity: 64 GiB slots: 4 EC: None max-module-size: 16 GiB
note: est.
Device-1: DIMM4 type: no module installed
Device-2: DIMM3 type: DDR4 size: 16 GiB speed: 2400 MT/s
Device-3: DIMM2 type: no module installed
Device-4: DIMM1 type: DDR4 size: 16 GiB speed: 2400 MT/s
CPU:
Info: quad core model: Intel Core i7-7700 bits: 64 type: MT MCP
arch: Kaby Lake rev: 9 cache: L1: 256 KiB L2: 1024 KiB L3: 8 MiB
Speed (MHz): avg: 3601 min/max: 800/3601 boost: enabled cores: 1: 3601
2: 3601 3: 3601 4: 3601 5: 3601 6: 3601 7: 3601 8: 3601 bogomips: 57600
Flags: avx avx2 ht lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx
Graphics:
Device-1: Intel HD Graphics 630 vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: i915
v: kernel bus-ID: 00:02.0
Display: x11 server: X.org v: 1.21.1.3 driver: X: loaded: intel
unloaded: fbdev,modesetting,vesa gpu: i915 resolution: 1: 1920x1080~60Hz
2: 1280x1024~60Hz
OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel HD Graphics 630 (KBL GT2) v: 4.6 Mesa 22.1.1
direct render: Yes
Audio:
Device-1: Intel 200 Series PCH HD Audio vendor: Hewlett-Packard
driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 00:1f.3
Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.17.15-lqx1-1-lqx running: yes
Sound Server-2: JACK v: 1.9.21 running: no
Sound Server-3: PulseAudio v: 16.0 running: yes
Network:
Device-1: Intel Ethernet I219-LM vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: e1000e
v: kernel port: N/A bus-ID: 00:1f.6
IF: eth0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: <filter>
Drives:
Local Storage: total: 2.85 TiB used: 701.18 GiB (24.1%)
ID-1: /dev/nvme0n1 vendor: Western Digital model: WD BLACK SN770 500GB
size: 465.76 GiB temp: 32.9 C
ID-2: /dev/sda vendor: Toshiba model: MK5075GSX size: 465.76 GiB
ID-3: /dev/sdb vendor: Seagate model: ST1000LM035-1RK172 size: 931.51 GiB
ID-4: /dev/sdc vendor: Micron model: MT-128 size: 119.24 GiB
ID-5: /dev/sdd type: USB vendor: Toshiba model: DT01ACA100
size: 931.51 GiB
Partition:
ID-1: / size: 97.88 GiB used: 12.79 GiB (13.1%) fs: ext4
dev: /dev/nvme0n1p2
ID-2: /boot/efi size: 500 MiB used: 296 KiB (0.1%) fs: vfat
dev: /dev/nvme0n1p1
ID-3: /home size: 358.46 GiB used: 13.09 GiB (3.7%) fs: ext4
dev: /dev/nvme0n1p3
Swap:
ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 64 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) dev: /dev/sdb1
Sensors:
System Temperatures: cpu: 52.0 C mobo: N/A
Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Info:
Processes: 261 Uptime: 2h 37m Init: N/A Compilers: gcc: 12.1.0
Packages: 866 Shell: Bash v: 5.1.16 inxi: 3.3.15
i7-7700:[catherdersoflinux]:~/Desktop$

 

[catherdersoflinux]

Why the need for a video? Simply describe in detail exactly what is preventing the installation of anything other than Windows Home. Post screenshots of any pertinent screens. I'm not going to watch a video as it's not needed.

the video would show what is missing thats why. the setup skips the step where you choose to the version you wish yo install and inserting your key or skipping it and goes straight to agree to license terms. It literally drove me nuts. I thought i had a bad pen drive a bad download a bad copy to pen drive. I used mintstick, rufus, etcher, ventoy, and the microsoft tool to install it. Then in a virtualbox to a bare metal drive with virtualbox's tool i installed to a hdd in virtualbox and in virtualbox the exact same iso would give me the step to select between home, ed, pro and the other options at install time and since efi is impossible for windows in a virtualbox i installed with bios boot. Finally I think i'll just run core/home with efi. Never buying one of these machines again.

 

[catherdersoflinux]

And THEN the cooky mess with thinking i had a bad hdd because the delay in booting when i used legacy boot. OI! troubleshooting that was nuts. I assumed my 14 yr old 2.5 inch toshiba 500 gb was finally failing me. The laptop it came from is half a decade gone or more. the msata i used in it also is still kicking it in the sata case long after the lappy died. That's 128 gb. Never ran up against these issues before so the learning curve was painful and caused sleep loss. Sticking to diy builds from now on. This is more than even my patience can bear. Pfft. recycled pc's are not my joy.

 

[catherdersoflinux]

No bios version allows for the windows installer to give the option to insert a license key or select to bypass that and choose a fresh install of whichever version of windows you wish. I rolled back every version to the very first and none effects a change in the installer from windows 10. Core/home is hard baked into the system and it is not possible to fresh install any other version.

 

[DRagor]

Quoting from other thread, sounds like possible explanation:

OTOH this stored BIOS license key can be a problem if you're trying to do a clean install of a DIFFERENT edition of Windows (like Pro while the machine came with Home). Windows install bypass the Edition selection when it finds that key in BIOS storage, the workaround for this is to edit one of the file on the install media which forces it to always ask.

Note that it does this (install "wrong" edition) even if it later in the process shows that Microsoft will find and use the license for the other edition without logging in on an MS account, it does it by looking up various hardware serial numbers but this happens much later in the install process and only works if you've forced it to the right edition.

 

[catherdersoflinux]

The other issue i have had is that no bios version will recognize a linux grub while the bios is in legacy mode, meaning you can't install the linux of your choice while the pc is in legacy mode, aka bios boot. It's fine with uefi though. Annoying.

 

[catherdersoflinux]

Quoting from other thread, sounds like possible explanation:

you know any way to erase that key from the machine so one can do a clean install?? I mean i guess on the one hand this machine will always have a windows 10 license no matter what but on the other hand i'm still tied to the business model of the manufacturer who didn't take into account that in a few years of use it would become recycled ewaste for a consumer to reuse. Clearly this is shortsightedness on HP's part. I bet there are many who are the same.

 

[Deleted member 14196]

You can fresh install home and then use a valid key to upgrade to pro

 

[catherdersoflinux]

That may be true but it is surely an annoyance to me.

Home/core requires the use of a m$ account to sign in with. Even though you can create an offline account after that it's kinda pointless. The creep factor of windows is really something else.