Couple of questions

[renegade600]

Originally Posted by PurestLight

Its probably me thats got it all wrong lol. I think I see what you're saying now. So which ever of my OS's I upgrade, that one has to stay in order for me to be able to use W7 and as I can't use the W7 RC for the purpose of an upgrade, I have to use the drive with Vista HP on it?

Its the word 'upgrade' that has confused me I think, because from what I understand, a clean install is also possible with an upgrade disc. Im fine whichever way I have to do it, I just want to do it right






Sorry Im being so dim about this

you are not being dimmed. You are just asking questions. When i replied it was based on the info you gave at the time. You had a computer, you had win7 rc on it, I based my answer on that. Since your computer most likely came with an os, I assumed you would be using it to justify the win7 upgrade.

Now if you would have added that you wanted to keep your original os installed, then I would have said nope :-) you would need the full retail version to install. Normally I asked but because of internet issues yesterday, I did not because I was posting between outages.

Anyway, Keep asking questions until you get things figured out :-)

[AnnMarie]

Hi Julie, yes it is a bit confusing however as far as I know, you cant install an W7 upgrade version on a blank hard drive.

Have a look here for more discussion regarding this.

*edit* Sorry Dan, I didnt notice the second page.

[PurestLight]

That was a very useful link AnnMarie, thank you for that, it clarified things for me.

I now just need to decide where to put W7. I went into Disk Management to find out exactly where I have everything and discovered things arent where I thought they were, I was getting mixed up with my previous PC.

Disk 1 is installed but not used, (I cant boot to it because its 32-bit) I just wanted it there to access things if I needed to, and I think the W7 showing there is the first BETA (also 32-bit).

So everything useful is on Disk0, and I either use Vista or W7 RC depending on my mood!



I'm really only posting this as a FYI and so I can reference back easily, hope thats OK.

Thanks both of you for giving me food for thought; Im still not sure what I should do though! Please feel free to make any suggestions

[AnnMarie]

I'm really only posting this as a FYI and so I can reference back easily, hope thats OK.

[PurestLight]

Ive now installed it on the partition where I had W7Beta installed. Now when I boot, I have 3 options to choose from -

Windows 7 (which is the new install)
Windows 7 (this is/was the W7 Beta 32-bit)
Vista

Could you tell me how to get rid of the redundant Windows 7 entry please?

[renegade600]

is it in its own partition? If so, just format the drive. Then you can go to the task manager and delete the entry from the bootloader.

[PurestLight]

I chose to install Full W7 on the drive where W7Beta already was. I thought it would overwrite it or something.

Ive just gone into msconfig, Boot Tab, hi-lighted the entry I dont want and deleted it. I havent re-booted yet though, but hopefully that will do it

[renegade600]

Originally Posted by PurestLight

I chose to install Full W7 on the drive where W7Beta already was. I thought it would overwrite it or something.

Ive just gone into msconfig, Boot Tab, hi-lighted the entry I dont want and deleted it. I havent re-booted yet though, but hopefully that will do it

it should have overwritten. I am not sure of what issues having two versions of win7 on the same drive/partitions and how to remove one. it is too new Most likely I would format the drive and redo the install. this way nothing will be left of the unwanted os.

[renegade600]

Originally Posted by PurestLight

I chose to install Full W7 on the drive where W7Beta already was. I thought it would overwrite it or something.

Ive just gone into msconfig, Boot Tab, hi-lighted the entry I dont want and deleted it. I havent re-booted yet though, but hopefully that will do it

oops, I meant msconf and not task manager in my other post. sorry about that. glad you knew.

What you did will work, you the only disadvantage is you will have unusable space on your drive because of the beta version install. Some you can delete and some hidden.

[PurestLight]

Thats ok, I realised it was a typo

I thought about starting over but its just such a PAIN doing the Files and Settings thing. Takes too long lol and Ive already done it twice because I changed my mind which drive I wanted it on. The first drive I chose, I realised the partition was a bit too small so I had to do it again.

Is there any way I can find out if the BETA one is still lurking and what do I look for to delete?

This partition is currently using 134gb out of 244gb and that includes my Office installation; I dont know if thats over what it should be.

[Murf]

Your boot entry (boot.ini) should look something like this:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOW S
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Micro soft Windows VISTA" /FASTDETECT /NOEXECUTE=OPTIN
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS=Window s 7
multi(1)disk(1)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS=Window s 7

Will not look exactly like the above, but it will tell you where each installation is, post what you have.

[PurestLight]

Hi Murf,

How do I find boot.ini in W7? I cant find it

[renegade600]

Look at the disk management screen. right click the os you no longer want there and format that partition. You want to leave the one that says boot alone.

[PurestLight]

Ive looked but I cant see it

Here's a screenshot:



If it's on the same partition as the full W7, will it show up separately?

[AnnMarie]

See here Julie.