Upgrading" from Win10 to Win11

[scottcmusic]

Hello to all. Been using a Sweetwater Creation Station 400 (specs below) for about four years now. It came setup with and optimized for Win10 use. But now with the impending Win10 cutoff deadline in October I'm trying to get my head around my upgrade options. Was hoping to solicit some general advice on best practices for the upgrade from you people that know way more about these things than I.  

Basically, I'm looking for any input on :

Is it best to download Win11 boot files from Microsoft and install onto a thumb drive?
Do you recommend a fresh install, or can I get away with installing win11 right over Win10?
Is Cakewalk By BandLab even compatible with Win11?
Do I need to upgrade anything to make system compatible with Win11?
Anything else I need to know or watch out for?

Thanks so much.

Creation Station 400
Win10 (64-bit)
Intel Core i7 processor
Asus Prime Z590-A board
32GB RAM DDR4
Soundcard: Focusrite Scarlett 18i20
Cakewalk by BandLab version:  2024.12 (Build 125, 64 bit)

[OutrageProductions]

If your MOBO/chipset/BIOS & boot drive format are fully compatible, it's very easy to do an in-place upgrade.

MS has a tool that will answer all your questions about upgrading to W11.

[scottcmusic]

That's great news. I appreciate your quick response. I was worried that Cakewalk By BandLab might not be compatible with Win11 since it's no longer being maintained.

Edited Saturday at 05:29 PM by scottcmusic

[OutrageProductions]

You may lose some old 32bit VSTi or DXi instruments because of W11 security issues. It automatically removed my original installation of Dimension Pro, Rapture Pro (and a couple of others), but those instruments were cr#p sounding IMO anyway. 

On identical HW with similar services disabled, I actually benchmarked minor speed improvements in W11 (~4%) countered by about 900Mb increase in idle RAM consumption. And I had to do tons of tweaks to the GUI to be comfortable, but otherwise... very satisfied. 

I'm still running some (non-musical) software from the XP/Vista era without issues under W11.

Edited Saturday at 05:45 PM by OutrageProductions

[scottcmusic]

That actually sounds like a win to me. Was really freaking out about this. It does sound like I will finally have to cough up BFD, which is a drum plugin I still have instantiated on a few older tunes that had really great drum kits and room sounds. And yes ... I agree with your take on Dimesnion and Rapture. I was really psyched about them back when they came bundled with Sonar 8 or whatever that was. So, there will be a few tunes where I need to bounce down synth tracks that used Dimension. But since I've started using the Arturia V Collection, I'm not too worried about finding compatible, if not better replacement patches.

For anybody else looking to just get the upgrade over with ... I searched for the system check utility OutrageProductions was referring to and found a great support article on the sweetwater site that I will use as reference.

Windows 11 Compatibility Guide

Edited Saturday at 06:15 PM by scottcmusic

[OutrageProductions]

The MS <PC Health Checkup> application can be DL'd & installed to check your system entirely.
I have done 3 machines here in my studios without any issues. I had to add a TPM module ($14) to one MOBO, and two machines were running MBR boot formats, one of which was a RAID1 array which made me nervous, but after complete backups, I used a 3rd party app from AEOMI (partition manager) to upgrade both to GPT and it was faster and smoother than I had feared. The same app also has a much more detailed version of the MS tool mentioned above.
Proper preparation is everything. And my entire desktop organization came up intact on all of them.
The only thing that still bugs me (and I'm working on recode) is that the Win Explorer always opens in a place where I don't want it (but I run 4 monitors) and can't yet change that. Not mission critical, but irritating.

Also HIGHLY recommend creating a W11 boot recovery drive (and learn how to utilize it) on a thumbdrive ASAP after upgrade. Saved my butt twice when I made some creative hacks to the registry... 😁

Edited Saturday at 06:27 PM by OutrageProductions

[John Vere]

Yes Windows seems to have made installation very easy for even a person who knows zero about computers. It totally guides you through the process. 
I decided to re install W11 because after a year of installing 17 different Daw’s my machine was a mess. They had sort of left behind lots of unwanted junk. Ableton and Cubase seem to install a ton of bloatware etc. As well as a bunch of plug ins that expired. 

So Windows gave me a choice of keeping my programs or starting fresh. I definitely wanted fresh. 
It was a simple process that took less than 20 minutes and boy did I notice a big difference right away. Well worth the effort to get a nice clean machine back with no clutter. I just installed my programs as needed. 

For Sonar I started with the 8.5 installer and grabbed the few plugs I needed. I then ran Command Centre and installed Sonar Platinum. I didn’t bother with CbB as it’s abandoned now and my membership runs out in a few months so no point in Sonar either. I’ve got Platinum if I need to open old projects. 
But I highly recommend a fresh install when you feel like a performance boost is in order. 
 

[Jeremy Oakes]

24 minutes ago, John Vere said:

Yes Windows seems to have made installation very easy for even a person who knows zero about computers. It totally guides you through the process. 
I decided to re install W11 because after a year of installing 17 different Daw’s my machine was a mess. They had sort of left behind lots of unwanted junk. Ableton and Cubase seem to install a ton of bloatware etc. As well as a bunch of plug ins that expired. 

So Windows gave me a choice of keeping my programs or starting fresh. I definitely wanted fresh. 
It was a simple process that took less than 20 minutes and boy did I notice a big difference right away. Well worth the effort to get a nice clean machine back with no clutter. I just installed my programs as needed. 

For Sonar I started with the 8.5 installer and grabbed the few plugs I needed. I then ran Command Centre and installed Sonar Platinum. I didn’t bother with CbB as it’s abandoned now and my membership runs out in a few months so no point in Sonar either. I’ve got Platinum if I need to open old projects. 
But I highly recommend a fresh install when you feel like a performance boost is in order. 
 

Thats fine …… if you only have a few apps installed. Most people do not.

FWIW, if your W11 is sluggish, you can now do an in-place “repair/install” which will freshen it up but not erase any precious data/files. See MS for details.

J

[John Vere]

Generally I would agree but in my case this computer is only used for music and video production. 
All data is on other 3 drives therefore is not deleted. 
So far after 1 month I think I’ve only had to install about 10 programs I use. I just install them as needed. 
Example is I haven’t installed Band in a Box yet because I haven’t needed to use it. I might never use it again. 

Plug ins that use installers and need authorization definitely take the most time to install. 

Bonus was  I found that the new Daw’s I now use all came with more plugins than I’ll ever need. And I think they are the biggest value when you purchase a Daw. 

I only needed to install things like Air, AD2, SS drums Melda, ample p bass. As well a few I use were included in Command Centre.  That’s why there was no need to install new Sonar as it doesn’t include any useful plugins. 
Dozens were easily dragged from the data backup drive because they don’t have installers. 
It really cleared up my plug ins folders which were a mess. 

Edited Sunday at 02:46 PM by John Vere

[msmcleod]

I upgraded all of my Win 10 machines to Windows 11 (four of which weren't "compatible" win Win 11) a couple of weeks ago.

All you need is a spare 16GB (or larger) USB stick.

1. Download Windows 11 ISO from Microsoft
2. Download "Rufus" ( a bootable USB stick creation utility)
3. Point Rufus as the Windows 11 ISO, and tell it to put it on your USB stick.
4. Rufus will detect it's a Windows 11 installation disk, and ask whether you want it to remove the TPM / CPU checks from the the install script, among other stuff like removing bitlocker / forcing online MS account etc.  Check the various options, then allow it to continue.
5. Once created,  don't reboot - simply open up the USB drive and click on setup.exe

I had zero issues with all of my machines, and they've done at least one update since then without issue.

The vast majority of software didn't need re-authorizing, with Magix / Overloud / XLN Audio being the exceptions... but all of those allow you to remove old computers online, so not an issue.

[Salvatore Sorice]

@OutrageProductions, regarding your windows issue

"The only thing that still bugs me (and I'm working on recode) is that the Win Explorer always opens in a place where I don't want it (but I run 4 monitors) and can't yet change that. Not mission critical, but irritating."

I work with 3 monitors on my music PC and 5 on my work PC. Found a utility called "Persistent Windows" that I use on both. It remembers/restores all open windows to their proper location. Works for me - maybe it will help your situation.

https://github.com/kangyu-california/PersistentWindows