Windows 11 experience

So far, my Windows 11 experience has been, oh, let’s say interesting.
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I installed some beta versions on a couple of computers a few weeks back. Surprisingly, they worked fine. They did not fit the minimum requirements yet they installed. Windows 11 was much nicer to look at, and it ran fast. When Win 11 was officially released, the installation no longer worked on these computers. Neither of the 2 computers I was using were up to snuff, and so, I did what everybody else in this situation does, I looked for a workaround.

There are a couple of places I know of that offer a solution to install Windows 11 without the TPM, or CPU requirements. I used Rufus, a program that creates a bootable thumb drive for installing. Last weekend the good folks at Rufus made a version available that takes the MS Windows 11 regular install, and it removes the TPM and CPU requirements. This worked great for a clean install, i.e. an installation that removes everything on the hard drive and installs a fresh copy of the OS.

I had been trying to install 11 on my actual computer as an upgrade and kept getting the TPM error, which my computer should have, and seems to have. So I tried using the Windows install upgrade feature. Unfortunately, though I chose the upgrade option, it wiped my drive anyway and installed.

I had a backup, so it was OK, but at this point in time, I can’t recommend upgrading to 11 unless you have a really good backup. I do know someone whose laptop offered the upgrade, and it installed fine, with no data loss. Perhaps that is the safest option right now, to wait till they offer it to you. Still, make sure you have a backup of whatever data you don’t want to lose.
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Last thing, my audio doesn’t work anymore. Not a big deal for me. Perhaps MS will provide a fix one of these days, but for now, I have no sound.