Blackhood tried this and it did not work.
![[H]ard|Forum](/styles/hardforum/xenforo/logo_dark.png){kind=logo}
Windows 7 Upgrade with XP CD
- Thread starter Oswald_
- Start date
Blackhood tried this and it did not work.
The BIG question is does the previous version have to be ACTIVATED. According to MS it does, but I have a feeling it does not.
Blackhood has confirmed that it does not by doing the double install of the upgrade disk.
Yeah, I read that yesterday. What if you want to keep your XP install intact for emergency use and install 7 on a second drive?
Anybody try that yet?
He confirmed 7 on top of 7 does not. I'm asking about Vista/XP. Doesn't hurt to be completely aware of all the "options/variations".
bigdogchris
Fully [H]
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2008
- Messages
- 18,736
I would do 7 then upgrade 7. Zero reason why installing Vista first would be better.
You must of completely not read this thread because it's been all about that here.
------------
He did?
WOW is the upgrade process slow, nothing but windows on the drive. Clean install is way faster.
Got to where you enter your key. This time it accepted it!
And it activated!
So yes it does work!
Right!
You are completely taking me out of context by not quoting the previous threads I was quoting.
Blackhood did an install with the 7 upgrade disk. He tried to activate at this point. It did not work. He had to do the 7 on top of 7 "Vista" trick to get it to activate.
My next question is......does an upgrade from Vista or XP require that Vista or XP be ACTIVATED? (That is what I was referencing when I said 7 on top of 7 does not. He did not need an activated 7 to be there in the first place.....aka the Vista trick). After all....MS did say that Vista and XP needed to be activated,
Blackhood did an install with the 7 upgrade disk. He tried to activate at this point. It did not work. He had to do the 7 on top of 7 "Vista" trick to get it to activate.
My next question is......does an upgrade from Vista or XP require that Vista or XP be ACTIVATED? (That is what I was referencing when I said 7 on top of 7 does not. He did not need an activated 7 to be there in the first place.....aka the Vista trick). After all....MS did say that Vista and XP needed to be activated,
Last edited:
bigdogchris
Fully [H]
- Joined
- Feb 19, 2008
- Messages
- 18,736
The person that quoted Leo's show obviously 'mis'quoted.
Why would you want to install Vista, not activate it, then 7 when you can just do 7 to 7? Or are you simply curious. If 7 can upgrade a version of 7 that is not activated, I see no reason why it would make Vista be activated. If it does require Vista to be activated, to me it would say that Microsoft purposely designed 7 upgrade to be 'double installed' to get a clean install. I doubt they would lock Vista upgrade but leave 7 open by accident.
Of course I am curious, as well as most of this board. After all.....we heard for MONTHS that an ACTIVATED copy of Vista or XP needed to be installed....straight from MS's mouth. It's part of being [H]ard. We need definitive proof that this is not the case. Plus there were questions if the 7 upgrade was going to deactivate and NULLIFY (never to be activated again) the Vista/XP key. We have no proof of this either.
Truth be told.....it looks like MS was lying out of their teeth.
Truth be told.....it looks like MS was lying out of their teeth.
The reason for complaint is what exactly? It's pretty obvious that 7 Upgrade can be installed on a blank hard drive using the double install method. So if you're ultra paranoid, just wipe your hard drive of Vista/XP and do the double. There's no reason to have any limits on a keyless install so after the first iteration and with no more Vista/XP, the second install will never know the difference.
They said the exact same thing with regards to Vista and the double install loophole and how that would never work. Would it somehow be better to have to reinstall XP to be able to use 7 for each hard drive wipe?
They said the exact same thing with regards to Vista and the double install loophole and how that would never work. Would it somehow be better to have to reinstall XP to be able to use 7 for each hard drive wipe?
I thought people were saying you can't boot from the update disk, so how, w/ the 7 on 7 scenario, do you install the first 7 on a blank disk if you can't boot to the disk?
.
From Paul Thurrott (Paul Thurrott is the guy behind the SuperSite for Windows):
"Windows 7 Question of the Year, Answered?
I've gotten a number of emails from people who received an Upgrade version of Windows 7 in the mail and installed it on a new or formatted PC without having to resort to any tricks (like the Vista-era "install it twice" hack). If true, this does of course answer the number one remaining question about Windows 7: How do you do a clean install with Upgrade media? Apparently, with no effort at all. I will test this as soon as possible of course, but it's a very busy day so I'm not sure when I'll be able to get to it. In the meantime, it looks like we're getting some good news here.
If you have done a clean install with Windows 7 Upgrade media (i.e. there is no other OS installed on the PC at the time), please post here and let everyone know.
Published Oct 22 2009, 03:47 PM by pthurrott
Filed under: Windows 7"
So is this completely wrong?
.
"Windows 7 Question of the Year, Answered?
I've gotten a number of emails from people who received an Upgrade version of Windows 7 in the mail and installed it on a new or formatted PC without having to resort to any tricks (like the Vista-era "install it twice" hack). If true, this does of course answer the number one remaining question about Windows 7: How do you do a clean install with Upgrade media? Apparently, with no effort at all. I will test this as soon as possible of course, but it's a very busy day so I'm not sure when I'll be able to get to it. In the meantime, it looks like we're getting some good news here.
If you have done a clean install with Windows 7 Upgrade media (i.e. there is no other OS installed on the PC at the time), please post here and let everyone know.
Published Oct 22 2009, 03:47 PM by pthurrott
Filed under: Windows 7"
So is this completely wrong?
.
Unless there is some new way, when you try and enter the key from the install (first time) it says invalid key. Then when you take out the key and leave it blank, you continue with the install. When I got into windows I again tried to activate, and it came back with something like "You can't use upgrade key/media to do a fresh install".
Only when I ran setup again, then choosing upgrade then going through the install process again, did it accept my key and activate.
Everything you're saying is exactly the same as the Vista upgrade double install trick. Very good news, thanks for going through all that! In another thread GT98 said he installed Win 7 upgrade on top of an unactivated Vista trial so that's another option for people in case double Win 7 install doesn't work.
I bet the confusion at the Paul Thurrott site is that the people just did an install but did *not* attempt to activate it, so they were right in that it installs but it won't activate which you found out. Either that or people thought they were doing blank drive installs by deleting the old OS partition from within the upgrade installer but I bet at thtat point it's too late and the upgrade installer has already detected the old OS. When I get around to doing this I'm probably going to wipe the old partition with GParted or something.
Last edited:
I agree.....so, we've identified two Win 7 Upgrade scenarios:
1. Clean Install: Win 7 on top of Win 7
2. Clean Install: boot from the Win 7 disk (w/ the existing OS present somewhere), format that partition, and install Win 7.
There seems to be a third, that's interesting:
3. Clean Install: boot from the Win 7 disk (w/ the existing OS present), install to a second, non- existing OS partition (or hard drive?), and install 7.....thus preserving the existing OS on the original partition...then either dual boot or change the active partition.
#3 is interesting because their is the "potential" you don't loose the original OS (for example, Vista). But, I have no clue if the original OS stays "activated" alongside the Win 7 "activation".
I think you are very correct in saying "the upgrade installer has already detected the old OS"...............this allowed the installation to proceed, the key to be entered, and the activation to proceed..................this has caused confusion and miss-interpretations. I.E., if "they" had booted the Win 7 disk from a system that, at the time, had NO existing Win OS on it, then the key is not accepted and/or the Win 7 cannot be activated............this is the info I am finding on the internet.
.
Last edited:
supastar1568
Limp Gawd
- Joined
- Jul 19, 2006
- Messages
- 470
So it sounds like I could do a clean install booting the Windows 7 Upgrade disk from Vista? I don't mind using my Vista key, I just want a clean install regardless.
CyberJunk
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Nov 13, 2005
- Messages
- 4,243
win7 installs in like 20 mins doing a custom install or fresh install
doing it twice we just mean 40 mins of your time which is not bad at all to save alot of cash for a upgrade verison
doing it twice we just mean 40 mins of your time which is not bad at all to save alot of cash for a upgrade verison
Wow this thread blew up, a lot of useful information here.
So to summarize the double install method would be to install the upgrade version of win7 with no key on a fresh drive. Then install over-top that installation with the upgrade key?
Sorry if this is redundant I just want to make sure I'm understanding.
So to summarize the double install method would be to install the upgrade version of win7 with no key on a fresh drive. Then install over-top that installation with the upgrade key?
Sorry if this is redundant I just want to make sure I'm understanding.
Yup.
That guys blog was updated:
I am happy enough with the double install trick, thanks MSFT for leaving that in there for all of us with a bookshelf of OS's going back to 3.11 but not really wanting to revisit.
That guys blog was updated:
http://community.winsupersite.com/b.../windows-7-question-of-the-year-answered.aspx
I am happy enough with the double install trick, thanks MSFT for leaving that in there for all of us with a bookshelf of OS's going back to 3.11 but not really wanting to revisit.
I think it's funny how people think it's some big hassle ('Sigh.') to do a double install. It's basically hands off after pointing it to the partition until you have to set up time zone etc and it's fast on any halfway modern hardware. If it's such a big deal they could have just paid for full retail so yeah I'll say 'Thanks MS' for not messing with the workaround.
so yeah I'll say 'Thanks MS' for not messing with the workaround.
CyberJunk
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Nov 13, 2005
- Messages
- 4,243
I think it's funny how people think it's some big hassle ('Sigh.') to do a double install. It's basically hands off after pointing it to the partition until you have to set up time zone etc and it's fast on any halfway modern hardware. If it's such a big deal they could have just paid for full retail
yea i agree it was worse with vista kinda of a pain in the ass but now with win7 it installs in about 20 mins so doing 2 is not such a hassle anymore
Paul Thurrott found a work around for the "install twice" scenario. Apparently, you active an "upgrade" installation on a clean drive with a registry hack.
http://community.winsupersite.com/blogs/paul/archive/2009/10/23/clean-install-windows-7-with-upgrade-media-the-answer.aspx
http://community.winsupersite.com/blogs/paul/archive/2009/10/23/clean-install-windows-7-with-upgrade-media-the-answer.aspx
Oh nice. Anyone here tried and confirmed this?
To throw a little mud on this picture.
I just received my windows 7 update and installed the 64 bit version on a clean drive (quick formatted only) I put an old XP disk in my 2nd DVD drive like you did with the XP upgrade. Windows 7 installed and activated without any problem. I did not have to do a double install or use a registry hack. The Window 7 booted and gave me the option to upgrade or custom install. I did the custom install and it installed without any problems. I entered the Product Key during installation. After installation I went to the activation page and it activated without any problem. The drive previously had XP pro and I booted on another HDD to do the quick format. When I did the installation I only have the HDD that I was installing on.
I don't really understand this as I expected to have to either do a double install or the registry hack. Did the 7 install read the disk that had been quick formatted or did it look at the disk in the 2nd DVD drive. I don't have the answer, but when I do the install on my other computer I may try a full format instead of the quick format.
I just received my windows 7 update and installed the 64 bit version on a clean drive (quick formatted only) I put an old XP disk in my 2nd DVD drive like you did with the XP upgrade. Windows 7 installed and activated without any problem. I did not have to do a double install or use a registry hack. The Window 7 booted and gave me the option to upgrade or custom install. I did the custom install and it installed without any problems. I entered the Product Key during installation. After installation I went to the activation page and it activated without any problem. The drive previously had XP pro and I booted on another HDD to do the quick format. When I did the installation I only have the HDD that I was installing on.
I don't really understand this as I expected to have to either do a double install or the registry hack. Did the 7 install read the disk that had been quick formatted or did it look at the disk in the 2nd DVD drive. I don't have the answer, but when I do the install on my other computer I may try a full format instead of the quick format.
Last edited:
It has been shown or reported in this thread that you can perform a clean install to *replace* a previous Vista or W7 *after* using the 'format' utility on the upgrade disc.
Does this setup form disc take a "mental note" that a previous install was present before the 'format'?
Or, do I have it wrong in that you *cannot* format, you can only custom (clean) install over the existing system partition, where the previous install will be renamed Windows.old?
Does this setup form disc take a "mental note" that a previous install was present before the 'format'?
Or, do I have it wrong in that you *cannot* format, you can only custom (clean) install over the existing system partition, where the previous install will be renamed Windows.old?
CyberJunk
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Nov 13, 2005
- Messages
- 4,243
i think it sees the previous windows when you enter setup
so you can format your drive with previous windows partition on it and do a clean install and it will activate
but to do a clean custom install on a brand new hardrive you would have to use the registry hack to activate it
so you can format your drive with previous windows partition on it and do a clean install and it will activate
but to do a clean custom install on a brand new hardrive you would have to use the registry hack to activate it
Parmenides
Supreme [H]ardness
- Joined
- Apr 25, 2006
- Messages
- 6,578
Well, I can attest to the fact that method #1, Install and activate on a bare naked disk without touching the XP disk described here worked for me. No tricks nor double install.
I had another disk with XP install, but I'm not sure how that makes a difference.
I had another disk with XP install, but I'm not sure how that makes a difference.
Pretty much what I did, but I did not have another disk with XP installed. I had previously quick formatted the HDD before I started the install procedure. I am going to do another clean install tomorrow on another system and I may do the full format just to confirm this process.
Updated:
Also this might help some looking for info.
http://www.winsupersite.com/win7/clean_install_upgrade_media.asp
Last edited:
To further confuse this issue, I installed Windows 7 (upgrade) on a new hard drive last night. Here's my experience:
I inserted one new hard drive purchased specifically for Windows 7 clean install. I removed two file storage only hard drives and moved my previous OS hard drive (Windows XP Pro) to a secondary slot. Curiously, neither BIOS nor the Windows 7 installer recognized this hard drive nor was it an option listed to install Windows 7.
I booted to Windows 7 install DVD, and performed a Custom install.
Once Windows 7 finished its formatting of the hard drive and installation, and I was able to successfully register/activate Windows with Microsoft online. I was never asked to verify previous Windows install. Nor was I able to browse to the HDD that had Windows XP on it (it didn't show in Windows Explorer or Disk Management).
I inserted one new hard drive purchased specifically for Windows 7 clean install. I removed two file storage only hard drives and moved my previous OS hard drive (Windows XP Pro) to a secondary slot. Curiously, neither BIOS nor the Windows 7 installer recognized this hard drive nor was it an option listed to install Windows 7.
I booted to Windows 7 install DVD, and performed a Custom install.
Once Windows 7 finished its formatting of the hard drive and installation, and I was able to successfully register/activate Windows with Microsoft online. I was never asked to verify previous Windows install. Nor was I able to browse to the HDD that had Windows XP on it (it didn't show in Windows Explorer or Disk Management).
Pretty sure I know the answer, but figure this is a good thread to address it since it generally revolves around the retail upgrade. Being that this is retail, I assume we can uninstall it and install it on a new system without issue as long as it's no longer in use on the old system?