How to upgrade from Win10 or Win 11 to Win 11 23h2 - A guide

As many of us has already found out, Win10 21h2 or Win10 22h2 or Win 11 21h2 or Win 11 22h2 installed on an incompatible hardware doesn't upgrade by itself to Win 11 23h2.
You have to use the Repair install method or In-Place Upgrade, that is, run setup.exe from a mounted and tweaked Win 11 22h2 iso.

• Download Win 11 23h2 iso from here
• Right click on the Win11_23H2_x64.iso file and select Mount.
• On the virtual drive select ALL files and folders and select copy.
• Create a Win11_23h2 folder. Paste the files on it.
• Make sure "Hide known extensions" is NOT set under Explorer options.
• Go to Win11_23h2\Sources and rename appraiserres.dll to appraiserres.dll.orig
• On Win11_23h2\Sources, create a blank text file and rename to appraiserres.dll
• First, you must disconnect from the internet before attempting to upgrade an unsupported device to Win 11 23h2.
• Second, you must choose how Setup checks for updates as 'not for now'.
• Run Win11_23h2\Setup.exe

It will upgrade to Win 11 23h2

This is the method I described in the relevant thread. If you already have Windows 11 22H2 you can alternatively install all updates up to build 22621.2506 or higher and then install the 23H2 Enablement Package (see respective thread for download link). This will turn 22H2 to 23H2 without any compatibility check. This means you can install it on unsupported computers without any hacking and without having to disconnect from the internet. This allows you to upgrade your friends' or family unsupported computers without having to visit them, handy of they live far away.

Thanks for the contribution.
Could you please provide the links of the "relevant thread"?

Download the x64 version which is for PCs. The arm64 version is for tablets with an ARM CPU.

A note: the process described has worked for me on 3 Notebooks from 2010, 2013 and 2014, 2 Pro and 1 Home, obviously all 64-bit.

Hi, i followed this guide to go from win10 home to 11home and am on latest version 23h2 22631.3085.
It worked awesomely.
For future reverence, if i want to make a clean or reinstall w11, kan i use a usb install disk(rufus) to make a install or do i first install win 10 and use this guide again?

You can use Rufus directly or do a simple workaround on a standard Win 10 USB installation drive.

Use Rufus to create the USB directly from the Windows 11 ISO. You will be asked to bypass compatibility check, select all options you want. Boot with that USB for a clean installation or use it to upgrade other unsupported computers (make sure you also disconnect from the internet during the upgrade).

spapakons said:

Use Rufus to create the USB directly from the Windows 11 ISO. You will be asked to bypass compatibility check, select all options you want. Boot with that USB for a clean installation or use it to upgrade other unsupported computers (make sure you also disconnect from the internet during the upgrade).

Click to expand...

Hi, do i haven to use the altered iso? Or can i just download a latest win11 iso version?

You can use the official Microsoft ISO from here: Download Windows 11
You don't have to use the Media Creation Tool, if you scroll down there is an option to download the ISO directly. Use Rufus to create the USB so you can also remove compatibility check.

Quick update tip: Once you have created the USB flash drive with Rufus you have probably added drivers and other utilities for convenience. But if there is a new Windows 11 version, such as 24H2 at October or November, you have to do it all over again! Not necessarily, you can replace only the file sources\install.wim or sources\install.esd with the one from the new ISO to install the new version. If you download the ISO directly you have the .wim file and if you use Media Creation Tool to download the ISO you have the .esd file. You can replace any version with the new one from the ISO, it doesn't have to be of the same type. That is you can replace .wim with the new .esd and vice versa. In fact you can use this trick to make a hybrid Windows 10/11 USB to bypass compatibility check and install Windows 11 on unsupported computers. You create a regular Windows 10 USB flash drive from Windows 10 ISO and then you replace the install.wim or install.esd file with that of Windows 11. This uses the Windows 10 Setup that has zero compatibility check to install Windows 11 instead! Since version 22H2 the hybrid USB only works for Legacy BIOS (MBR) Windows 11 installations. It fails in UEFI mode. Been there done that.

Thanks, really appreciate this.