Windows 8 who's buying/upgrading

[pgi947]

Hope you guys can help me out with this as my head is starting to hurt from hitting dead ends.

As it is at the moment I have a modified/streamlined version of windows 7 pro using a corporate key provided by a friend (runs IT in a school, single key multiple activation deal).

What I need to know about the £24.99 windows 8 upgrade option:

1. Will it give me a key + OS image so I can perform a clean install?
2. Does it look at your current OS install/key in any great depth? I don't want to spend £25 to find it doesn't like my install or the origin of my key. Its running a little rough atm so I'd rather do a clean install on Windows 8.
3. I have the majority of my games installed to a secondary drive, shouldn't expect any conflicts from this?

Thanks in advance fellas

 

[sir-les-mp]

Well i was just going to stick with win 7 ultimate untill i was told Microsoft were doing a deal on the upgrade for £24.99 so at that kind of money i thought why not.
And if i find it dosent work too well for me on my gaming system i can always reboot back to win 7 and put it on my backup system

 

[feck199]

Key + os which can be made into USB or ISO image.

It does something, but more likely it looks at your hardware and makes you a key for your current system. I've had it where someone switched harddrives during install and it failed to activate they pressed f8 and did refresh install which seemed to fix everything.

if games require installing, you'll need to install them again. Quite a few games require to actually be installed, unless they are all steam. You can trick origin into re installing games too.

 

[pgi947]

phew, just purchased and its now downloading via the upgrade assistant thing. Clean install is the way I want to go too

I had to almost re-install games when re-installing windows 7, for steam just check game integrity then double click and it does the rest with the game files already, origin just direct to games install folder and re-install origin (some network features wouldn't work without this).

Thanks for the info ****199 - Seriously it auto-blanks out that part of your username

 

[feck199]

Indeed, it does make me giggle a little.

There is another thread in this section, pretty easy to find showing a way quicker way to rearm upgrade to full install if you do run into any issues.

I have done three installs for friends, and only one did gave us the upgrade image the others gave us normal pro installs. You'll find out on restart if it lets you change your background or not! (unactivated windows cannot change backgrounds!)

 

[pgi947]

Saw a pretty decent video on it, basically install windows 8 as I would any other OS, once in edit the media thing in the oobie folder in regedit, rearm then reboot and I'm golden

Edit: All sorted, didn't even need to bother with the regedit, was already down as 'activated' as soon as I entered windows 8

 

[Tomsk]

As it is at the moment I have a modified/streamlined version of windows 7 pro using a corporate key provided by a friend (runs IT in a school, single key multiple activation deal).

Saw a pretty decent video on it, basically install windows 8 as I would any other OS, once in edit the media thing in the oobie folder in regedit, rearm then reboot and I'm golden

Edit: All sorted, didn't even need to bother with the regedit, was already down as 'activated' as soon as I entered windows 8

Your PC might be OK. The school might not be since you've upgraded the licence for the schools PCs.

 

[V F]

Whats going on with the uptime when it's not even been on for 6 hours? 6 days, 14 hours, 33 minutes...

 

[nightmare99]

Whats going on with the uptime when it's not even been on for 6 hours? 6 days, 14 hours, 33 minutes...

I would guess it is to do with the new way it shuts down, mine is on 3 days at the moment. I wonder if it reflects the last time updates were installed?

EDIT: I just noticed I had an optional update pending which I think my PC has been struggling to install so it tried to install promptly BSOD recovered and now the uptime has reset (and the optional update is now not listed in windows update?)

 

[V F]

Yeah, I was having a discussion about this on another forum. It's not what I was once used to. Reboots/shutdowns reset the statistics. Which to me just seems daft, because shutdown or reboot is a fresh start. You're effectively ending the session.

Yet here was me thinking my clock is running away every hour for the uptime.

Shut down doesn't reset the up time count due to fast boot.

It's a Windows 8 feature. Rather than completely shutting down it effectively logs off all users and hibernates the system.

 

[theheyes]

The way it displays uptime in Windows 8 might seem unintuitive, but it's correct. As pointed out shutting down is no longer the same as a reboot and therefore shouldn't reset the stat.

 

[MeatLoaf]

Im going to install this tonight, but rather than blitz my Win 7 install or bual boot im going to take my Win7 drive out and use a spare SSD i have lying about. Gives me chance to check the few programs i may have issues with plus i can easily go back to my Win 7 install then

 

[theheyes]

Best way really, there's always a small chance of a showstopper with any OS change.

 

[MeatLoaf]

how do I change my desktop picture? I don't really want the flower

 

[cu3ed]

The usual way, bring up settings in the charm bar.

 

[Mr Joshua]

how do I change my desktop picture? I don't really want the flower

Right click - personalise.

Do yourself a favour, click on the "get more themes online" button and download the Spectacular Skies theme. I have this set to change the picture every thirty minutes .

As you can probably guess I went for the upgrade and have it installed on my new build.

From some of the comments online I was wondering if this was going to be a lemon like Windows ME or Vista but I'm very happy with the purchase.

 

[Logsi]

I'm looking to just upgrade install and take advantage of this offer while it's still there. Got a quick question, I'm installing on a small partition that I use solely for gaming as my main partitions are for work and under OS X.

The requirements say 20GB free but I only have 13GB at the moment. Has anyone installed from a USB with a small amount of free room?

Also, i know i should probably clean install but i really don't want to faff about setting it up all again so is a upgrade an ok route for a secondary OS?

 

[rossiboy001]

I'm looking to just upgrade install and take advantage of this offer while it's still there. Got a quick question, I'm installing on a small partition that I use solely for gaming as my main partitions are for work and under OS X.

The requirements say 20GB free but I only have 13GB at the moment. Has anyone installed from a USB with a small amount of free room?

Also, i know i should probably clean install but i really don't want to faff about setting it up all again so is a upgrade an ok route for a secondary OS?

Upgrade install worked for me , the only hassle I had was it wanted me to remove USB drivers first , of course once thats done , the mouse connected to the USB wont work , which can be a bit non intuative when it asks you to click on a button to proceed .
But after a couple of reboots and starting again , something in the bios made it work , enough to start the reinstall from the begining again , of course with all the things now removed and ready to go at that stage . from there straightforward . re installing everything and setting up is a hassle . If it works this way as did for me , its much easy"r even with the earlier hassle .

 

[DiCe!]

quick question guys, I am probably going to buy windows 8, not the pro version, to throw on my n40l server so i can use the storage spaces, will it interact ok with my windows 7 desktops?

Many thanks!

 

[AH.Tempest]

yeah i picked up the upgrade, for the price you couldnt really not do it... taken awhile to get the thing how i want it and i did cave and install the shell start menu but all things considered i'am still useing the metro screen and getting more used to it... its ok.