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Turning a Legacy Boot Windows 10 Template into a UEFI One

If you’ve got a DaDesktop system and you’re looking to take advantage of GPU or other pass‑through features, the first thing you’ll need to do is switch it over to UEFI boot.

While we still suggest sticking with win10-template-v53 or a newer version, if you’d rather handle the upgrade manually, follow these steps:

  1. Turn on the defragmentation service
  2. Generate the boot files on the C: drive
  3. Mark the C: disk as active
  4. Change the system to UEFI mode
  5. Adjust the KVM configuration to work with UEFI
  6. Correct the DaDesktop BIOS boot entry
  7. Update the virtio-win drivers
  8. Turn off the defragmentation service
  9. Optional: shift the partition ahead of the system partition so automatic disk resizing can work
     

1. Enable the Defragmentation Service

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

2. Making the C: Drive Bootable

  1. From an admin Command Prompt, execute:

    bcdboot.exe c:\windows /s c:

3. Set the C: Disk as Active

  1. Open Disk Management
  2. Right‑click the C: partition
  3. Click Set Active
     

4. Convert the System to UEFI

  1. From an admin Command Prompt, run:
   mbr2gpt.exe /concver /allowFullOS

 

5. Tweak the KVM Config for UEFI Support

  1. SSH into the ddnode
  2. Run all commands as root

  3. Grab OVMF_VARS.fd and qemu.conf from any template that already boots with UEFI, for instance:

    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. Fix the DaDesktop BIOS Boot Option

  1. Power off and then start the machine via the dd4t.dadesktop.com GUI or API
  2. The system will land in the UEFI Shell
  3. Type exit
  4. Navigate to BootManagement (TODO: FINISH IT)
  5. Press F10 to save
  6. Then exit the BIOS
     

7. Upgrade the Virt-io Drivers

Some templates ship with an older VGA driver that can cause issues—for example, you might be unable to adjust the screen resolution. To resolve this:

  1. On your desktop, download the latest drivers 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: TODO exact file name
  3. Restart your machine
     

8. Disable the Defrag Service

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

 

9. Optional: Move the Partition in Front of the System Partition for Automatic Disk Resizing

 

  1. Boot into Rescue mode
  2. Use GParted to shift the partition so it sits ahead of the system partition
  3. Restart

10. Install the Idd Drivers

  1. Visit https://github.com/ge9/IddSampleDriver
  2. Download the latest release from https://github.com/ge9/IddSampleDriver/releases
  3. Extract the archive to C:\ (otherwise it won’t work)
  4. Install the certificate (run as root)
  5. Install the driver (right‑click the .inf file and choose Install)