Issues trying to install SP1

I have an ACER Extensa 5420 laptopm with 2GB RAM, 160 GB HDD with AMD Turion 64 x2 CPU. Nothing else is customized on this machine. It was originally delivered with XP. I upgraded it to Win 7 using the Upgrade 32-bit disk because XP was 32 bit. Something happened that required me to reinstall Win 7. Since my Win 7 is a licensed XP Upgrade, I did not have the option of wiping the HDD and starting over. Instead I first renamed the old Windows7 folder to WindowsOLD and then I inserted and reinstalled Win 7. It completed the installation just fine. I then installed Kasperky 2011 Internet Security. Then I recieved tons of Win7 updates to install. Everything went fine until SP1 came along.

Each time I tried to install SP1 it would always present me with a msg to restore the prior settings after that painfully long download and install. I've tried it with Kaspersky disabled, etc. I've tried everything mentioned below as well, with the same result. I subsequently set the SERVICES to MANUAL in the hope I can (at least for now) bypass the SP1 update and accept others. I've right-clicked the SP1 downlad and UNCHECKED the box so it will hopefully not try to install SP1 anymore until I can get everything fixed.

What else do you suggest and why should this be so hard? The only other apps I now have installed (anew after the Win7 re-install) are Kaspersky, Quicken Home Preimium 2010, all the drivers for my HP L7500 wireless printer, and (IMPORTANTLY) System Mechanic Pro (SMP), which I religiously use to clean out the clutter and keep the registry tuned up. SMP also has tools to check for the availability of updated drivers and perform other diagnostics. All the hardware drivers report no error and current drivers are the latest (according to SMP).

As Karl rightly pointed out, you cannot upgrade to Windows 7 from Windows XP, it has to be a custom (clean) install, where you'll lose anything you haven't backed up. Also, all your applications will have to be reinstalled.

Upgrading from Windows XP to Windows 7 - Help & How-to - Microsoft Windows

Thanks for your comments, but now I see why I was confused. I purchased from COSTCO a box with two DVD disks in it; one for 32 bit and one for 64 bit. The box clearly says "Upgrade 3 PCs to Windows 7 Home Premium..." on it. It's an orange colored box called the Family Pack 3x, Upgrade 3 PCs for a SPECIAL price. So, up until your notes I assumed that by "upgrade" it meant I had to keep the original XP so the prior license would be recognized on the HDD. Ahhah, now I see in tiny font on one section of the box a notation that says "if you're upgrading from XP you will need to start with a clean install and then re-install all the apps...." This won't be a problem for me but I'm so sorry I didn't see that notation earlier. My other upgrades were from Vista, which did NOT require a clean install.

Thanks guys. I'll try it out and if it works on a clean install and I get the SP1 too, I'll mark this as closed.

OK, to remind you this is an ACER 5420 Laptop runnking with AMD Turion 64x2 CPU. It was originally purchased with XP installed, and I gather it was running at that time with a 32-bit OS. Since you've advised me to do a clean install, I formatted the entire disk NTFS and I've tried installing my licensed Windows7 64-bit OS.

The installatoin gets partway through and then tries to reboot on its own. It fails to do a reboot either if I leave the Wn7 install disk in the CD drive, or if I remove it. The Install screen does show Win7 OS is on the drive.

I tried the Repair startup options (surprising I'd have to do that on a clean install!) and it just brought me nowhere. I've obtained all the 32bit and 64bit Drivers from ACER for this model and I have them at this point on a drive on one of my other pc's. These drivers are all supplied in zipped form, so I have created a DVD that has (separately for 32bit and for 64 bit) the Unzipped drivers that are essential (there's one for the AMD CPU by the way). I then tried the Load Drivers option in the Win7 install repair stage, pointed it to some of the driver files, e.g the one for the display or mouse) and it returns with a message saying the "drivers are unsigned".

Why isn't the Win7 64bit install supplying the drivers it needs automatically? Should I abandon the attempt to install 64bit on this PC and go to the 32bit Win7 install disk that came with my win7 pkg? If so, that's a disappointment because the CPU is listed as 64bit.

WELL, It looks like it's already been ****'d out. Sorry, I didn't mean to violate the policy.

FYI, I now have the sytem up and running through the kind (and free) help of MS Tech Support. Though I had reformatted the drive into one clean NTFS partition, apparently the key different step he had me go through to get this to install was to let the new installation DELETE that record. Then everything went thru smoothly. I'm now in the process of rebuilding with all the most-current updates, which will (of course) take some time.

I also have obtained all of the drivers from ACER that are supposed to work with this hardware. I have both 32bit and 64bit drivers from them. All of them are downloaded as zipped files. I suspect I'm going to have to install at least some of these drivers to fully exploit the ACER hardware. I intend to use the 64bit drivers because I installed the 64 bit Win7. If you have any further advice, feel free to offer it. Otherwise, you can consider this CASE CLOSED.