Zarathustra[H]
Extremely [H]
- Joined
- Oct 29, 2000
- Messages
- 38,878
So I am helping a friend with their computer (I seem to do this way too much)
The Laptop (some Acer model) originally came with a 32bit Vista Home edition, but at some point they bought a Windows 7 upgrade disk and upgraded the computer to Windows 7.
Long story short, I'm putting a new, larger, faster hard drive in it, and figured I'd take this opportunity to do a clean Windows install.
What is the best way to do a clean Windows 7 install using a Windows 7 upgrade key?
First time I tried I just installed it as a fresh install, but it didn't accept the key during activation.
Then I did some googling, and the best I've been able to find thus far is to reinstall the Win7 as an upgrade from inside Win 7, then it should accept the upgrade key...
This seems horribly inefficient, and as if it might leave a lot of junk files, and potentially messed up registry entries on the system (IMHO operating system upgrades are always bad., regardless of whether its Windows, OS X or Linux).
I mean, I guess it's better than reinstalling Vista and then installing the Win 7 upgrade, but is it really necessary?
Is there a better way to do this, and get a clean install?
The Laptop (some Acer model) originally came with a 32bit Vista Home edition, but at some point they bought a Windows 7 upgrade disk and upgraded the computer to Windows 7.
Long story short, I'm putting a new, larger, faster hard drive in it, and figured I'd take this opportunity to do a clean Windows install.
What is the best way to do a clean Windows 7 install using a Windows 7 upgrade key?
First time I tried I just installed it as a fresh install, but it didn't accept the key during activation.
Then I did some googling, and the best I've been able to find thus far is to reinstall the Win7 as an upgrade from inside Win 7, then it should accept the upgrade key...
This seems horribly inefficient, and as if it might leave a lot of junk files, and potentially messed up registry entries on the system (IMHO operating system upgrades are always bad., regardless of whether its Windows, OS X or Linux).
I mean, I guess it's better than reinstalling Vista and then installing the Win 7 upgrade, but is it really necessary?
Is there a better way to do this, and get a clean install?