Windows 10: Windows 10 To Go Image not booting on Computer with UEFI

Hi,

I'm trying to make a Windows To Go image for my PC repair business using Rufus and a Windows 10 Pro ISO from MS Techbench. It boots perfectly fine on most computers except one. The computer I am trying to boot off is running Windows 8.1 with a UEFI bios. It's got a weird "EFI File Navigator" which is a pain in my rear end. When I try booting from it, it gives me an error. A picture of which is attached.




Any ideas?

Thanks.

:)

 

Unable to upgrade to Windows 10, Error message: A system image created using UEFI cannot be restored on a computer using legacy BIOS.

I have recently upgraded three Dell's and one Lenovo to Windows 10. I have found that all four of them will not boot to to a USB or CD. These drives were made in Windows recovery or with Macrium Reflet. They all are running in UEFI mode with USB's formatted
to FAT32. Apparently the only way to get these machines to boot with a USB or CD is to change the Bios to legacy and disable "secure boot". I found a note regarding Windows backup that said

"A system image that was created on a computer using UEFI cannot be restored on a computer using legacy
BIOS. It can only be restored on a computer using UEFI."

So if the above is true- The images I have made in UEFI mode will not work on these systems for I can not access the USB drives to get to a boot. True ? Should my Windows and Macrium backup images be made in Legacy mode ?

Is there a down side to always having these computers set to legacy instead of UEFI ?

The Win10 install does not seem to play well with Dell's "one key recovery" or Lenovo's recovery. I am not sure it can see the backup partitions so I thought best to use Macrium for an image backup rather than relying on the OEM software.

Any help appreciated.

Original title: Windows backup media and UEFI?

 

Computer will not boot up; screen just flashes

Am I supposed to have some kind of disc in the disc drive?

The available boot options are:

UEFI OPTIONS:

Windows Boot Manager

UEFI: Network Card

UEFI: Network Card

OTHER OPTIONS:

Diagnostics

Enter Setup

Change Boot Mode Setting

I am going to be really ticked in Microsoft has ruined my computer with this Windows 10 stuff. So please try to help.

 

Convert the partition to FAT32?

 

Rufus creates a FAT32 partition (which includes a Linux NTFS driver and IIRC both x86 and x64 versions) for booting on EFI and an NTFS partition that contains the installation files. Seems that the firmware on that PC may not support that driver.

Perhaps try creating WTG with WinToUSB

 

I looked into the issue, going as far as communicating with the developer of Rufus himself, and apparently the HP UEFI BIOS doesn't sit well with NTFS bootable drives, and he's looking into the issue. I will otherwise attempt to use WinToUSB, but I'm not sure if it would be affected by the issue as well.

 

Again, why not just convert the existing NTFS partition to FAT32?

 

In order to use WTG you have to be able to boot the USB in Legacy Mode (Not UEFI)
May have to enable legacy support in BIOS

Unless you purchase an Sandisk Extreme USB which supports partitioning
it supports partitioning because unlike a standard USB it is not flagged as removable, but rather as a fixed disk usb..

the other way and a better option in my view - is the use an external HDD and an adapter...

 

Actually Sandisk Extreme drives no longer support partioning like an official WTG drive.

You can use EasyUEFI - The EasyUEFI Development Team to install windows 10 for UEFI PCs if a WTG flash drive or any external USB harddrive/ssd.

 

FAT32 made no difference on the machine. It worked on other machines though

 

I guess that has changed since they where about a third of the price as certified sticks...

 

Michael, your error is directly related to Rufus...use a different method and if you still get one then we can handle those as generic - The Rufus dev is good but I don't think he will be able to solve this issue as it's a bit unique...

 

Yeah - WTG drives are a ripoff. Cheaper to simply buy an SSD and usb caddy.

 

Ironically, he has fixed the issue. The issue was that the framework that Rufus for bootable drives was having compatibility problems with HP's UEFI BIOS (specifically their laptops).

After conversing over GitHub, he was able to fix the issue and I now can boot WTG drives normally, so I'm going to go ahead and mark this solved then.

Also, WinToUSB didn't work for my drive for some reason.