Can I Use a Win7HP ISO File for a Clean Install of an Older Vista Sys?

The reason I'd suggested Vista is you get comparable performance to Win7 without having to buy a new copy, since you own the copy of Vista that came with the PC for its life.

But you can also sample Win8 and Linux, or WIn7 but you'd have to buy a $100+ upgrade version if you want to keep it. That copy could then be moved to another PC later.

I think I may reluctantly donate this old rig to science...by that I mean, tote it over to the nearest Best Buy for a permanent dropoff.

I successfully burned the .iso file for the Win7HP upgrade downloaded previously from Digital River to a DVD, as documented in the other thread I have going in the forum for "Webcam drivers for acer aspire 1410 notebook (11.6")." Having toggled to boot from the CD drive in the Setup options, I should have seen the beginning of the process for a hoped-for upgrade to Win7HP, but the boot process still defaulted to the HDD, so I got my Vista sign in screen back instead. This honestly might not be worth any more of my time, and I can devote everything to the other issue.

Thanks to all for the assistance today!

sbuxman

Did you tap the ESC or F9 key to try to trigger DVD at boot? If that fails did you set DVD drive to boot first in BIOS setup.

If not prompted to Press any key to boot disk then the DVD may not be burned correctly. Try using ImgBurn at 4x speed.

gregrocker said:

Did you tap the ESC or F9 key to try to trigger DVD at boot? If that fails did you set DVD drive to boot first in BIOS setup.

If not prompted to Press any key to boot disk then the DVD may not be burned correctly. Try using ImgBurn at 4x speed.

I tapped the key to enter setup and change the boot sequence in the BIOS to boot from the CD/DVD drive...nothing doing.

As a last resort, I tried tapping the F11 key to enter the Recovery Program, nothing doing...booted right past my tapping the key.

Reset the BIOS to defaults: Clear CMOS - 3 Ways to Clear the CMOS - Reset BIOS

Will the disk boot successfully in another PC? If not confirm ISO or download another, burn using ImgBurn at 4x speed.

If that fails try writing ISO to flash stick using Universal USB Installer with Win7 in dropdown. Boot using one-time BIOS Boot Menu key under USB, Removable or HD's.

gregrocker said:

Did you tap the ESC or F9 key to try to trigger DVD at boot? If that fails did you set DVD drive to boot first in BIOS setup.

If not prompted to Press any key to boot disk then the DVD may not be burned correctly. Try using ImgBurn at 4x speed.

Success with the creation of the Win7HP Svc Pak 1 booting up my old rig...after reburning using the imgburn program you recommended. I've chosen a new installation which will create the folder Windows.old of the former Vista OS.

Installation is progressing nicely...so glad to be rid of that Vista dinosaur and its problems. My concerns now are 1) can any possible infections from the old OS be transferred to this new installation?, and 2) I hope the product key I have works.

Did you boot the installer to Clean Install Windows 7 , choosing Custom Install, using Drive Options to delete all partitions, create and format new as you wish or just click Next to have installer do it for you? This is the cleanest way if you have infection concerns.

I would not run the installer from Vista to create the windows.old folder containing the old installation as it may import the infection.

gregrocker said:

Did you boot the installer and delete all partitions, create and format new as you wish or just click Next to have installer do it for you? This is the cleanest way to do it if you have infection concerns.

I would not run the installer from Vista to create the windows.old folder containing the old installation as it may import the infection.

Ugh...I don't know. When the computer first rebooted, it wanted to install again, so I selected no, obviously, and was told to 1) remove the DVD, then 2) select the upgrade installation and the windows.old folder would not be created after all.

Right now I'm being told, "Completing installation..." I knew this wouldn't go smoothly.

sbuxman said:

gregrocker said:

Did you boot the installer and delete all partitions, create and format new as you wish or just click Next to have installer do it for you? This is the cleanest way to do it if you have infection concerns.

I would not run the installer from Vista to create the windows.old folder containing the old installation as it may import the infection.

Ugh...I don't know. When the computer first rebooted, it wanted to install again, so I selected no, obviously, and was told to 1) remove the DVD, then 2) select the upgrade installation and the windows.old folder would not be created after all.

Right now I'm being told, "Completing installation..." I knew this wouldn't go smoothly.

I'm seeing this:

check mark Copying Windows files
check mark Expanding Windows files
check mark Installing features
check mark Installing updates
(no check mark) Completing installation...

I wonder if this is where I run the DVD again ... when I was told to do an upgrade and not a full, I was old to remove the DVD, restart, and then run it again...

Stand by...