Windows 7 upgrade

[BenDoro]

hi there lads basically i bought a pc from oc about a month ago and had a free upgrade to windows 7 64bit premium ... but i went for the safe bet and installed vista. Now i want to go to windows 7 (which i just did at the start ) just wondered if there was any way i could upgrade without losing my data on hard drive.

As far as i no you can just upgrade straight over vista but a mate also suggested entering bios and making another partian and installing windows 7 on that just wondered what the best option would be or if you have any other alternatives, or if u simply think i should stick with vista

many thanks for your time

 

[Skeeter]

Your upgrade to 7 would have been a voucher to send of and get it when its released next month. You had no option to install it at the moment.

Anyway, technically the 'Upgrade' version of 7 is just that, an Upgrade, meaning you will HAVE to install it over the top of Vista, which will retain all your stuff.

But... the Vista 'Upgrade' versions worked perfectly well in installing as a brand new clean install. If your not interested in dual booting then dont bother with partitioning, just install a single install of whatever you want (likely 7). Many people here will encorage installing a clean install rather than upgrading, as upgrades can cause issues and are generally messy. Id get the upgrade sorted so Microsoft send you the copy or 7, and then see if you can install it clean (the internet will answer this soon). Then just copy all your stuff to an external drive, and wipe your pc and install a clean versin of 7

 

[BenDoro]

thanks for the reply m8, im not totally sure what partianing (excuse my spelling) actually will do helping me clarify would be appriciated. Also you mentioned having to export all my documnets to any external drive and then to clean boot is they no other way to mayb install a fresh version of windows 7 with vista also on (possibly another partian or w/e) and then put the files across and remove vista ?

thanks again

 

[Skeeter]

Partitioning your hard drive would mean splitting your harddrive up into 2 (or more) parts. Effectively it will then look like 2 seperate hard drives to Windows, while still only being one device. You can do it by shrinking your Windows Vista drive down to half the size of the hard drive in your machine, then creating another partition on the other half so you have 2 drives. Then you can install Windows 7 onto that other drive and when you turn the PC on you will be asked which version of Windows to boot. You can see both drives from whatever version of windows you are in and as long as security is set right you can then just copy everything accross.

This would depend on the Windows 7 upgrade actually being able to be installed clean onto a blank hard drive (or partition) rather than having to just be installed over the top of Vista as an upgrade.

 

[niko]

i think because of the eu ruling ms aren't selling an upgrade win7
i think its fresh install only ,something to do with if you use an upgrade product ie would be included so would break the eu ruling

 

[Skeeter]

i think because of the eu ruling ms aren't selling an upgrade win7
i think its fresh install only ,something to do with if you use an upgrade product ie would be included so would break the eu ruling

This was what was originally announced yes, but the ruling has since been lapsed and they are now selling Windows 7 full and upgrades both including IE in the EU.

 

[niko]

This was what was originally announced yes, but the ruling has since been lapsed and they are now selling Windows 7 full and upgrades both including IE in the EU.

thats good to know thank you