Windows 7: Installing win 7

Ken -

After reading your reply to Deacon's thoughful question asking why you want to Dual Boot, it's clear you'll want 64 bit after you compare the difference.

For this and other reasons, your best approach is to unplug the HD with your old Windows 7, plug it's cable into the target HD, boot the Windows 7 DVD, select Custom Install, use Drive options to delete all partitions, Create new one(s) as you wish, format before installing Windows 7 to first partition which will be immediately after a 100mb System Reserved partition Windows 7 creates when formatting the HD.

Once you complete the install you can plug back in the other HD, set preferred one to boot first in BIOS setup, boot the other one using one-time BIOS BOot menu key at boot. This keeps the HD's independent so they can come and go as you please, whereas configuring the Windows Boot Manager interlocks them requiring surgery to remove one.



However if you want the Windows Dual Boot, install EasyBCD to the new install to add the old one which will make the old one easy to remove by just formatting when the time comes.

Many thanks for that, I was able to follow your line of information and the detail stopped me worrying about screwing up my pc. Will have to catch up on some work for a couple of days, once completed I will try again and up date you.

I disconnected all but the drive I wanted to install on, booted on o/s disk went through to custom install, tried to use drive options for removing partitions, no way, so I followed it through got to putting in key again no way, tried with out key and this time it carried on and I completed install.

Shut down and reconnected drives one internal and my main external storage, booted up and had two choices but not quite as I was expecting.

First option was win 7 which fired up the 64bit o/s no problems at all.

Second option Vista (recovered) the Acer was running on Vista, I fired up and it booted into win 7 32bit. My program was working OK.

The info on that disk is stubborn to say the least, but it is working which is the main thing. I will ditch it at a later date and install a new clean disk.

many thanks for your advise.

Hello Ken.


Try booting to diskpart and using the command below for each partition to see if that helps.

DISKPART : At PC Startup

diskpart

select disk # = # target disk number

list partition

select partition 1 and each in turn for all partitions

delete partition override

when finished exit 2 times to close the command window and continue the installation.

If there was no OS on the target HD, the installer refuses Upgrade version key. After install do the quick registry workaround given here to activate Windows 7 when XP/Vista isn't on the same HD: Clean Install with a Upgrade Windows 7 Version

Was there an error message when Custom>Drive options refused to delete, create an/or Format partitions? I've never heard of that before. If you'll post back a screenshot of your full Disk Mgmt drive map using Snipping Tool in Start Menu, we can help you arrange your partitioning and disks as you please.

Been in diskpart and this is what I keep arriving at using "clean" or "format"



I knew this disk was stubborn

Your problem stems from the fact you're trying to use a dynamic disk.

By default, Windows 7 uses a basic disk.

Convert a Dynamic Disk to a Basic Disk

I have tried so many ways

This is my last result in diskpart