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Switching a Windows 10 Template from Legacy to UEFI Boot

Should you have a DaDesktop machine that you plan to use for GPU pass‑through or similar hardware acceleration, you'll first need to convert it to UEFI boot mode.

Our recommendation is to start from win10‑template‑v53 or later; however, if you decide it's more practical to perform the upgrade yourself, here are the steps to follow:

  1. Turn on the Defrag service
  2. Generate boot files on the C: drive
  3. Mark the C: partition as active
  4. Convert the system to UEFI
  5. Adjust the KVM configuration for UEFI
  6. Correct the DaDesktop BIOS boot option
  7. Update the virtio‑win drivers
  8. Deactivate the Defrag service
  9. Optional: move the partition ahead of the system partition to enable automatic disk resizing
     

1. Turn on the Defrag service

  1. Open a Command Prompt as administrator
  2. Run:
    sc config defragsvc start= demand

2. Make the C: drive bootable

  1. In an elevated command prompt, type:

    bcdboot.exe c:\windows /s c:

3. Mark the C: partition as active

  1. Launch Disk Management
  2. Right‑click the C: partition
  3. Select "Set Active"
     

4. Convert the system to UEFI

  1. From an administrator Command Prompt, execute:
   mbr2gpt.exe /concver /allowFullOS

 

5. Adjust the KVM configuration for UEFI

  1. SSH into the ddnode
  2. Make sure you run the commands as root

  3. Copy the OVMF_VARS.fd and qemu.conf files from a UEFI‑enabled template, for example:

    cp /var/lib/kvm/win10-template-v51/OVMF_VARS.fd /var/lib/kvm/yourimagename/
    cp /var/lib/kvm/win10-template-v51/qemu.conf /var/lib/kvm/yourimagename/

6. Correct the DaDesktop BIOS boot option

  1. Stop and then start the machine through the dd4t.dadesktop.com web interface or API
  2. The system will boot into the UEFI Shell
  3. Type: "exit"
  4. Navigate to Boot Management (TODO: complete this step)
  5. Press F10 to save
  6. Exit the BIOS
     

7. Update the virtio‑win drivers

Some templates may contain an outdated VGA driver that can cause problems like being unable to change the screen resolution. To fix this:

  1. On your desktop, download the latest driver version from: https://fedorapeople.org/groups/virt/virtio-win/direct-downloads/archive-virtio/virtio-win-0.1.240-1/virtio-win-0.1.240.iso
  2. Install the driver (TODO: specify exact file name)
  3. Reboot
     

8. Deactivate the Defrag service

  1. Open Command Prompt as administrator
  2. Run:
    sc config defragsvc start= disabled

 

9. Optional: move the partition ahead of the system partition to enable automatic disk resizing

 

  1.  Boot the system into Rescue mode
  2.  Use gparted to reposition the partition before the system partition
  3.  Reboot

10. Install the Idd drivers

  1. https://github.com/ge9/IddSampleDriver
  2. Download the driver from the releases page: https://github.com/ge9/IddSampleDriver/releases
  3. Extract it to C:\ (otherwise it will not work)
  4. Install the certificate (run as administrator)
  5. Install the driver by right‑clicking the .inf file and choosing Install