Windows 7: What to do when FULL VERSIONS are available.

Good day all,
Have been musing about this for a while.
Windows 7 RC Build 7100 Installed here.
Been using it quite happily for a while, adding my software bit by bit to see how it all goes and what works and what doesn't.
Nothing to complain about really, all going fine just as if I was using my Vista OS.
So what happens when my copy of the FULL VERSION Windows 7 arrives ??
As this version tells me it's the Ultimate one, and I'm not getting that as a FULL VERSION, (I assume mine will be Windows 7 Home Premium), what it will actually be depends on what Microsoft sends over here to the EU region.
Is this going to entail another FULL installation, or will I be able to do an UPGRADE style install and keep my settings and programs etc.
Not sure if this has been mentioned here so far, but I was just wondering if someone could give me some clarity on this.
All the best, happy 7er's
Mick C.

You'll need to do a clean install. Ya can't load for example Home Premium on top of Ultimate. Most smart people would recommend against doing an upgrade from RC to RTM anyways. Clean install will be best.

You don't necessarily have to format the C: drive though. You can clean install the final version of Windows on the same partition that RC was on (provided there's enough free space). But you will have to reinstall most programs. Your previous files will be moved into a folder called Windows.old

Hello sup3rsprt,
Thank you for the clarification,and advice.
It'll be a full install for me as I have my original Vista OS and the Windows 7 RC on different hard drives, took heed of the warnings about using the RC on main home computer that were on the Microsoft site.
Windows 7 RC was dead easy to install, leastways I had no problems.
Oh, if anyone else is looking in on this post my hard drives are 2 seperate SATA drives. All I had to make sure of, was that the 2nd drive had it's primary partition set to active.
Without any real input from me I ended up with a dual boot system.
Many thanks,
Mick C.

I always prefer clean installs, theres less problems that way. Most of the time all you need to do is backup appdata folder and most of your settings for your installed programs will be backed up. You can use the backup and restore program included with Windows 7 which does backup this folder amongst other things.

I would definitely do a clean install as well. You aren't using one of the trial RTM versions, but an older RC, which all in all, is still beta, unoptimized code. I would feel much better about my system knowing I cleaned all of that off, wiped the drive, and then installed the final product.

If I understand what is being said, then I would do a clean install of my retail copy of Windows 7 Pro when I get it. Install the software I currently have installed then I could restore my AppData folder from my Acronis (or Windows 7) backup and most settings would be preserved?

How is this so? Most settings are kept in the registry which is not under AppData. From what I can see, very little application specific information is under AppData.

The part I would like to preserve but don't think I can are the tweaks I've made to how Windows 7 looks and behaves. I recorded most of them so it won't be as time consuming to make changes the next time (I hope).

I'm one to do upgrades as much as possible. I avoid clean install if I can. Too much work. I don't think people are giving Microsoft enough credit here. I am running what essentially has been an upgrade with every available release/leak since build 7000 without a single issue on both of my machines. Like most of us here, I'm the tech type so even if there were any problems from upgrading, I would have likely sorted them out. But even if I were less knowledgable about computers, I wouldn't have had any issues from all the upgrades. So I recommend using the upgrade feature and if you run into any unsortable issues, then clean install. I doubt you will have any problems though.

You might want to take a look at GFI Backup - Free backup software for Windows - GFI Backup Home Edition

I'd recommend giving it a test run before you get your registered copy to see if it will do what you want in terms of saving your tweaks, etc.

That said, I'd recommend a clean install after backing up your data - email, desktop backgrounds, screen savers, etc.

While a bit of a pain, a clean install will ensure that you don't bring over any anomalies from the RC that may have been addressed in the final release.

Many interesting and informative points here now, thanks to all who have chipped in with their views. Personally it's not really a problem to do a full clean install as I've been learning a lot from the Forum about the tweaks and stuff. I'm pretty sure that I can soon get my full copy of Windows 7 up to scratch. Still have time to do some experimenting though, I haven't been able to make this RC build 7100 crash yet lol Which is quite reassuring, if it can withstand me digging in it's innards, I can't see any problems for when I'm using it as I should....
All the best,
Mick C.

Considering just how quick Windows 7 takes to install, you might as well just do a clean install.