Today we have an interesting reader question/piece of feedback.
This is from John M from Queensland Australia.
He was writing in to ask about the difficulty of upgrading Windows 10 with a smaller hard drive.
His email:
Hi,
Probably like many I made the mistake of buying a lap to with a 30Gb hard drive. By the time normal operating system and Microsoft 365 loaded there is not enough room to allow Windows 10 updates. Consequently I now have a laptop that is running Windows 10 Home Version 1610.
Occasionally, during an update, it asks if I have another disk connected and to use it. I currently have another dik which has 44.7Gb free. It never, ever allows an update to continue.
These laptops with 30Mb hard drives have been sold by the 1,000s as they were reasonably priced and ideal for students.
Therefore there are a large number of users that cannot ever update their Windows 10 operating system.
I am amazed that Microsoft has not solved this problem. I have been with Windows since the first Windows version but am struggling to understand this lack of support. I currently have a PC All-in-One, a Tower PC, 4 laptops and one Netbook.
I use this particular 30Mb laptop while I am moving around because of its physical size. All except the Netbook run Windows 10 which is still on Windows 7
Regards
John
John is making the point that there are thousands of hard drives that only have 30GB or smaller and these hard drives will have a hard time upgrading their OS.
Keep in mind that Windows 10 System Requirements are only 16GB to 20GB.
Let us know – are any of you facing the same problem? Use the comments below to let us know.
All Comments
I googled several websites that discuss how to upgrade Windows 10 from an external USB drive. That includes the original upgrade as well as regular upgrades. Is he not aware of this capability now? He would need one computer that can be the one to upload the upgrade to the USB, then use the USB on other computers without space capacity. One website mentioned he needed a USB drive with 8 gig or more free space to accomplish this.
Hi Rug Ratz, In the past I have searched and been led all over the place but still have not found an easy solution to download Windows 10 Update to an external drive. I have 42Gb on an external drive. Can you help by providing a link that could solve my problem?
Cheers
John
How about this one?
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/can-you-update-windows-10-on-a-32-gb-laptop-using/9523a82e-7e78-4fa8-ade1-bcec31e225a9
I have an Acer W510 it has an Intel Atom, running windows 10 no problems except for when it gets an update it says it has a problem with the Atom and will not upgrade it, this tablet is only 32 gig but it runs and updates everything else, I use a 128 gig micro sd card in it. I know that MS did not support the Atom and I also remember they were going to address that issue but still have not, all my other gear have large capacity hard drives so no problems, the only way to upgrade a small hdd is by usb ut then again depends if windows is compatible with the cpu, if it is indeed an Atom unless MS comes up with a solution or Intel then we will have to put up with it not upgrading which is a real pain.