Preparing windows 8.1 for install

[Mr_Magoo]

@imakeyper

Can I download rufus and dowload zorin os pro onto it directly and wipe windows out? The latter with a thumb drive and would I wipe windows out first?

Rufus can be problematic. I use Ventoy. It lets you download the .ISO file, drop it onto the thumb drive without 'burning' it or extracting it or anything, and it'll boot that .ISO.

I have the Zorin OS 16.3 .ISO file and the Win10PE .ISO file.

The Zorin .ISO file is for booting to when I want to do a backup (clone) of the drives, so the drives aren't mounted. And it's used to do a reinstall when I irrevocably break something.

The Win10PE .ISO file is for updating the UEFI / BIOS (since HP only provides the firmware updates in Windows-specific file formats).

The full procedure is here:

HP Computer Owners - update your UEFI

If you own an HP computer, you know that HP doesn't generally use the Linux Vendor Firmware Service (which is the application fwupdmgr) except for certain servers. They instead provide a .EXE file that is specific to the computer model and the UEFI version... this computer is on its third UEFI version since it was new, hence there are three .EXE files available for it. Well, .EXE files are Windows-specific. In this case, you can't even run them under Wine or PlayOnLinux to update your UEFI. Y…