Windows 8.1 Upgrade -Steam/Origin/UPlay Question

PhysicsMan94 · 6 Jul 2014 at 13:59

I'm going to upgrade to Windows 8.1 at some point in the next few days and I was wondering if the Steam/Origin/UPlay games I have installed on my mechanical HDD will continue to work once I have installed 8.1 and re-installed Steam etc onto my SSD?

Or will I have to re-install all my games on each drive for them to work?

Cheers

~>Dg<~ · 6 Jul 2014 at 14:02

there is no benefit in really going to 8.1 why do you want to ?

PhysicsMan94 · 6 Jul 2014 at 14:04

~>Dg<~ said:
there is no benefit in really going to 8.1 why do you want to ?

I need to for DirectX development with Visual Studio, at the moment I'm stuck with using the June 2010 DX SDK which is now considered legacy so I want to move onto 8.1 for up to date DX developing.

nuzik · 6 Jul 2014 at 14:07

i like 8.1 its nice. Not had an issue and i didnt went i upgraded initially. Although i didnt have uplay which is the worst thing ever so that may need reinstalling and games downloading!

RumbleBee · 6 Jul 2014 at 14:12

PhysicsMan94 said:
I'm going to upgrade to Windows 8.1 at some point in the next few days and I was wondering if the Steam/Origin/UPlay games I have installed on my mechanical HDD will continue to work once I have installed 8.1 and re-installed Steam etc onto my SSD?

Or will I have to re-install all my games on each drive for them to work?

Cheers

As long as the files remain, at worse you'll only have to start the installation (or download) then Steam will recognize the game is already installed and validate the files.

'Wes · 6 Jul 2014 at 16:08

~>Dg<~ said:
there is no benefit in really going to 8.1 why do you want to ?

Because it's the latest update and there's nothing wrong with 8.1.

spoffle · 6 Jul 2014 at 16:14

All Steam games will work, I don't know about Origin or Uplay though, but I've had the same Steam folder Since HL2 came out, I've just moved it to different drives over the years.

DaleTheWhale · 6 Jul 2014 at 16:44

Might need to do the trick with origin, copy game files out of 'Origin Games' start the download for a minute, pause the download and close Origin & then overwrite the started downloaded files with the moved ones. Restart the download it'll be done.

Steam should pick the folder up automatically on the other HDD.

varkanoid · 6 Jul 2014 at 17:02

I did an upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 8.1 and Origin, Steam, Uplay already installed and didnt have any problems. Uplay did update itself but this could be as I had not used it for a while. All my games played fine.

PhysicsMan94 · 6 Jul 2014 at 17:36

Cheers for the info guys.

But, I'm slightly confused - some of you seem to be saying that you upgraded from 7 to 8.1 without having to install Steam etc again, did you upgrade using the Windows compatibility tool over an Internet connection then? As I will be using a bootable USB for upgrading, so I assume that with this method I shall have to re-download all the programs again anyway as my SSD with Windows 7 on will be wiped using this method.

nuzik · 6 Jul 2014 at 17:42

No I did win 8 usb then the market place to Windows 8.1

Witcher1979 · 6 Jul 2014 at 19:32

You should really install win 8 fresh then 8.1 from the store section. Upgrading is never a good idea imo.

PhysicsMan94 · 6 Jul 2014 at 20:37

Witcher1979 said:
You should really install win 8 fresh then 8.1 from the store section. Upgrading is never a good idea imo.

Why?

spoffle · 6 Jul 2014 at 20:44

A fresh install makes for less issues/teething problems from upgrades where some things might not work too well due to some differences in how Windows 8 and Windows 7 work.

You can find Windows 8.1 ISOs online to make the process even quicker though.

Witcher1979 · 6 Jul 2014 at 21:57

Witcher1979 said:
You should really install win 8 fresh then 8.1 from the store section. Upgrading is never a good idea imo.

PhysicsMan94 said:
Why?

Always do a fresh install as you can run into some issues.

PhysicsMan94 · 6 Jul 2014 at 23:03

Oh, ok nevermind, I am doing a fresh install using an ISO anyway (using a bootable USB with 8.1 ISO on from DreamSpark Premium)

Devrij · 6 Jul 2014 at 23:10

I upgraded from 7 and it was fine. Still is a year later.

oldestgregg · 7 Jul 2014 at 00:30

Devrij said:
I upgraded from 7 and it was fine. Still is a year later.

It works fine but whenever possible a clean install is always best. Saves potential trouble later on. If you have an 8.1 key then download the ISO and clean install it or install the .1 upgrade from the store.

PhysicsMan94 · 7 Jul 2014 at 00:52

oldestgregg said:
If you have an 8.1 key then download the ISO and clean install it or install the .1 upgrade from the store.

Indeed, I have a "Windows 8.1 Professional with Update" ISO file downloaded from DreamSpark which is now properly installed onto a correctly formatted bootable USB drive (hopefully) which I'll use for the fresh install. Just waiting on a response from Kaspersky as to what to do about transferring my license across from Windows 7 to 8.1 before beginning the process!

Bubo · 7 Jul 2014 at 09:22

I that Win 8.1 mouse lag in games thing fixed 100% now? i.e. without having to do anything special after installing windows, or having to make changes per game as I seem to remember to had to do before?