"Backup" a lot of things, but not the system?

multimolti · 12 Aug 2009

Hi!

I'm currently using the RC of Windows 7. As I read in the Internet, there will be no upgrade option from RC to final even with a purchased final version.
Since I bought a new computer as well, I would like to use W7 on that new computer, but have all the customized settings, installed programs, ... from my computer running the RC on the new computer.

The backup feature backups my whole system, right? So it will still be RC and the drivers for my old computer are included.

Is there any possibility to backup all programs, settings, registry entries, ... without drivers and the system itself?

Thanks for your replies!

harpua · 12 Aug 2009

One can back up files and settings but not programs (which still have to be reinstalled) with the Windows Easy Transfer utility which can be found under Start Menu, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools.

Also despite what you may have read to the contrary, one can in fact upgrade from an RC build to the RTM build. Instructions on how to do it were provided here by MS: Engineering Windows 7 : Delivering a quality upgrade experience

It seems that at MS, sometimes the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.

I know it works because I've done it myself. Many people will tell you that it's better to clean install and that is generally good advice but I have found W7's upgrade process to work better than in any previous Windows version. I'm pretty delighted with the way my upgraded system is performing now, although I did have to reinstall a few security apps and a driver or two after doing the upgrade install. But that was a heck of a lot easier for me than doing a clean install and reinstalling 30+ apps even with the aid of the Easy Transfer Utility. If I felt performance was suffering, I would still do a clean install, but so far I haven't felt that to be necessary.

Paarkhi · 12 Aug 2009

multimolti said:

Hi!

I'm currently using the RC of Windows 7. As I read in the Internet, there will be no upgrade option from RC to final even with a purchased final version.
!

If you really wann to upgrade then it is possible to upgrade from RC to Final...
just extact the iso of win 7 to upgrade and change 2 lines of code in cversion.ini in source folder.

I've done it personally.

multimolti · 13 Aug 2009

Sounds cool that I can upgrade my RC to final, but that doesn't help me to transfer all the stuff to my new PC, does it?

Fliplip · 13 Aug 2009

Cant you just do a ghost image of the old computer and load that on to your new computer?

Ive also done this and it works ok.
I went from the RC through various leaked builds and am now on 7600, all by doing upgrades. Ive not encountered any problems but im sure its not the ideal way of doing it.
I did a ghost image of my C: drive and then loaded this image on to my son's PC. It needed to load different drivers when it first booted up but i didnt have to go looking for them (luckily), they were all on the disc already.

I do plan on stating again in Oct though but so far both our PC's are working fine.

poin2 · 13 Aug 2009

You can use the Windows Easy Transfer wizard to move most stuff over.

It's not a bad idea to take this as an opportunity to figure out where all your settings, etc. get stored anyway. Most new computers can handle fresh install of the OS and programs pretty quickly, and then you can just restore settings quickly.

You can tweak the minimum version allowed via the cversion.ini thing to technically upgrade from the RC, but it's not advised. Haven't read of anyone attempting it and noticing major issues just yet, however. It might be a way to at least buy yourself more time until you can properly fresh install.

chuckr · 13 Aug 2009

Paarkhi said:

If you really wann to upgrade then it is possible to upgrade from RC to Final...
just extact the iso of win 7 to upgrade and change 2 lines of code in cversion.ini in source folder.

I've done it personally.

2 lines of code ? Which 2 ?

Where did you get that from?

Do you have a 'source' link?

I only see one (1) line:

Engineering Windows 7 : Delivering a quality upgrade experience

Download the ISO as you did previously and burn the ISO to a DVD.
Copy the whole image to a storage location you wish to run the upgrade from (a bootable flash drive or a directory on any partition on the machine running the pre-release build).
Browse to the sources directory.
Open the file cversion.ini in a text editor like Notepad.
Modify the MinClient build number to a value lower than the down-level build. For example, change 7100 to 7000 (pictured below).
Save the file in place with the same name.
Run setup like you would normally from this modified copy of the image and the version check will be bypassed.

These same steps will be required as we transition from the RC milestone to the RTM milestone.

Paarkhi · 14 Aug 2009

ChuckR said:

2 lines of code ? Which 2 ?

Where did you get that from?

Do you have a 'source' link?

I only see one (1) line:

Engineering Windows 7 : Delivering a quality upgrade experience

Actually the 7600 ISO which I had was having a cversion.ini which said [HostBuild]
MinClient=7233.0 (Changed to 7100)
MinServer=7100.0 (Changed to 7000)

To be on safe side, I'm not techie as you

harpua · 14 Aug 2009

multimolti said:

Sounds cool that I can upgrade my RC to final, but that doesn't help me to transfer all the stuff to my new PC, does it?

Yes it does. It transfers all your installed programs, settings, data, files, etc.

chuckr · 16 Aug 2009

Paarkhi said:

Actually the 7600 ISO which I had was having a cversion.ini which said [HostBuild]
MinClient=7233.0 (Changed to 7100)
MinServer=7100.0 (Changed to 7000)

To be on safe side, I'm not techie as you

Ahh,
Checked the torrented iso and you are correct!!!

I must have assumed the posted picture was the real thing with the real ini, changing 1 line.
(And, I probably checked my RC or 7201 DVD at the time, to compound errors...)

At least I got my techie question answered.

Thanks, Paarkhi!

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