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The computer I have with the oldest installation of windows (i.e. the one it's been the longest since I've reïnstalled Windows on) is the HP AIO. It's a good machine, with some quirks, as all computers have, especially as they age.
This one, like all Windows machines, has suddenly decided it needs Microsoft's copilot on it, which is a waste of everyone's time, so I looked up how to disable copilot. It's fairly straightforward in Group policy editor, so I attempted to run gpedit.msc on the computer… and…
It's not on there. WTF?
This is weird, so I check what version of windows I've got: Windows 10 HOME??? How the fuck is it the Home edition? Surely, surely, Shirley I installed Pro on there, all those years ago. Right…?
Anyway, I tried a Reddit\majorgeeks workaround for getting gpedit to work on Home, but (predictably for me), it didn't work, so I guess it's about time to reïnstall Windows.
Just in case it all goes to shit and the Pro license key doesn't work any more, I thought I should image the current setup using Macrium Reflect.
At first I tried doing it onto a 500gb disk, but it turns out the 500gb system SSD is bigger than the 500gb HDD I'm trying to clone it to.
Next, tried a 1tb HDD: still fails; same weird error.
Tried the same 1tb HDD but used fdisk and diskpart to completely get rid of all partitions before commencing the clone: still failed. Macrium is dog shit.
I'll just image it for now and hope for the best.
A few hours later…
Shitting Macrium couldn't even manage that simple task; why do persist in using it…?
A little googling later led me to a Reddit post suggesting DiskGenius. Downloaded it, ran it, cloned the system disk to a slightly smaller HDD and it worked fine (despite spitting out an error at the end about the boot not working). Tried booting from it and I think it worked, but because it was an identical clone of the SSD, I'm not sure where I was running windows from. I'll try it again later.
Anyway, it was time to reïnstall Windows, so I booted from the old multiboot USB and went down the familiar road, until…
I did the usual thing of deleting all the partitions on the target disk, but when I clicked next to begin the installation, it gave me error 0x80300024. Never seen that before…
A little googling later led me to a golden Reddit post:
https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/comments/156rrmo/fix_for_0x80300024_for_windows_install_with/
I simply went into the BIOS and moved the target drive to be first in the boot order, booted back up with the USB and tried again. It worked! Amazing.
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