WIN-XP to WIN-7 upgrade question

manne · 18 Oct 2012

Two years ago I upgraded to WIN-7 from WIN-XP OEM, using a retail version upgrade. The upgrade included both the 32bit and 64bit version. Unfortunately I missed the boat by installing the 32bit version.
The question here, would I be able to reinstall WIN-XP on a formatted HD. Once the WIN-XP is on the drive I would upgrade to the WIN-7 64bit version. I understand I will have to re-install all my software.
Do you see any problems with this, license keys for both WIN-XP OEM and WIN-7 are genuine.

Many thanks for your response
Cheers
Manne

bigmck · 18 Oct 2012

manne said:

Two years ago I upgraded to WIN-7 from WIN-XP OEM, using a retail version upgrade. The upgrade included both the 32bit and 64bit version. Unfortunately I missed the boat by installing the 32bit version.
The question here, would I be able to reinstall WIN-XP on a formatted HD. Once the WIN-XP is on the drive I would upgrade to the WIN-7 64bit version. I understand I will have to re-install all my software.
Do you see any problems with this, license keys for both WIN-XP OEM and WIN-7 are genuine.

Many thanks for your response
Cheers
Manne

You don't have to reinstall XP. Just do a Clean Install with a Upgrade Windows 7 Version with your Win 7 64 bit and you are good. Just be sure you do not use the 32 bit on another PC. You can't use both at one time.

manne · 18 Oct 2012

Thank you for your response,
It was my understanding that the up-grade disc of WIN-7 needs to detect the WIN-Xp installation. Without it no go.
Am I wrong??

Cheers
manne

MilesAhead · 18 Oct 2012

manne said:

Thank you for your response,
It was my understanding that the up-grade disc of WIN-7 needs to detect the WIN-Xp installation. Without it no go.
Am I wrong??

Cheers
manne

The clean install shows how to get around it. If it wasn't ok, the tutorial wouldn't be on here. There are plenty of MS MVPs on the forum. They wouldn't ignore flagrant license violation stuff on here. :)

bigmck · 18 Oct 2012

manne said:

Thank you for your response,
It was my understanding that the up-grade disc of WIN-7 needs to detect the WIN-Xp installation. Without it no go.
Am I wrong??

Cheers
manne

With the tutorial that I noted in my last message, it explains how to do it without the previous version on your PC. Microsoft put this feature on the Win 7 disk for instances just like yours. This is 100% legal.

manne · 18 Oct 2012

Thanks again, I will give it try.

Cheers
Manne

bobkn · 18 Oct 2012

I'm not dead certain of this, but I believe that you can use the 32 bit Win7 install to qualify the installation of the 64 bit version.

Boot from the X64 DVD or a prepared USB flash drive (recommended). The X64 installer will detect the pre-installed 32 bit version, and let you proceed normally with the clean install of X64 (using the upgrade license).

An irrelevant cavil: you can physically install Windows 7 on any number of PCs using the same installation disk. (I'm not sure that would be permitted under the license agreement, but I know of no enforcement of that.) You may only activate as many of those copies as your license permits (one for most, 3 for a family pack). As you can't run Win7 for more than 30 days (up to 120 days with the re-arm procedure) without activation, the practical difference between "install" and "activate" has little importance.