Win7 w/ Vista OEM upgrade question

[Ryom]

Here is what is going down:

There is a Dell computer with the OEM Vista license key stuck to the top.
The hard drive when kaput.
Installed an SSD, installed Win7 ultimate fresh without entering a key to put it in trial mode.

Can I get the upgrade version of Win7 Home Premium or do I need the full version? When I go to enter the key, I assume I put the Win7 upgrade key in, will it then ask for a previous Vista key... and will an OEM key work?

 

[W.Feather]

To use your upgrade you need a previous version of windows installed:......in otherwords put vista on then Win 7

 

[bigdogchris]

There's some huge misconception out there.

You can do a clean installation of Windows 7 Upgrade with zero previous installations. It will not ask for a disc of Vista/XP and it will not ask for the old key. Since you 'obtained' a 7 Ultimate Edition without actually having they key, keep in mind the Upgrade key you activate with may only work with "Upgrade" media. I suggest you buy the product first, then install that, rather than just downloading or whatever you did because the key may not match.

There are a few methods to activate an Upgrade copy after a clean install. You can easily find them online but I suggest using SLMGR in the command line.

SLMGR /ipk <key>

then ..

SLMGR /ato

/done.

 

[Ryom]

I just used my disc of Win7 ultimate to get the computer running (not my computer). It's a legit copy, I just didn't put my key in because I'm already using it and I knew it would run in trial mode until I could get to the store to get another copy of win7 (we've gotten 35" of snow the past couple of days here)

I just didn't want to spend the extra 70 bucks on the full version of Win7 if the upgrade works.

 

[Ryom]

Uggh, more help please. I was under the DISTINCT impression you could run any version of Win7 in trial mode (for, you know... A TRIAL) until you got a valid key. When you put a key in it would enable or disable any features that come with the version of win7 the key is for, no re-installation necessary.

What it is saying however, is that it won't "downgrade" win7 ultimate trial to win7 home premium registered. It says to install fresh, which would be a PITA because everything was already setup... just waiting on a key.

Any workarounds? This seems especially retarded, all Win7's are the same, save for certain features locked out by the key version.

edit: may have found something here http://www.unawave.de/installation/downgrade-en.html?lang=EN

 

[bigdogchris]

Once you install Windows 7 Ultimate, you've installed Ultimate.

What you can do is copy your disc over to a folder, edit the file that determines what version it is (Ultimate, Premium, etc.) and then burn that to a disc or thumb drive.

However, I still don't know if Upgrade/Retail/OEM keys are the same or not. They were not in XP, i.e., you could not use a Retail key on an OEM disc.

 

[Ryom]

All I had to do was change the registry values to read HomePremium and then it would let me use the new key. Microsoft just made it difficult for reasons I'm having trouble fathoming.