Windows 7 turned into Windows 8, how did it do it?

bizee · 18 Feb 2014

My main drive is F: as I had 2 other hard drives wired into my system but took them out when this problem arose. I had 1 drive as C: and it contained movie downloads, and I had another drive X: which contained everything from pictures to personal letters etc. I kept my operating system on what I named F: separate instead of partioning a drive to do the same.

bizee · 18 Feb 2014

I personally have never installed Windows 8 on my computer, only the Windows 7 you see in my screenshot. I hope this is what you wanted. If not let me know what else.
Here is System Info:

bizee · 18 Feb 2014

Sorry for my method, but I am trying and appreciate your help.

bizee · 18 Feb 2014

Nettwork 2 of 2 (couldn't edit so I pasted detail instead) Ralink Technology, Corp., 802.11n Wireless LAN Card, Ethernet 802.3, Wireless Network Connection,

So this attachment is Network 1 of 2

bizee · 18 Feb 2014

Here is the rest

Brink · 18 Feb 2014

bizee said:

I have Windows 7 on my computer. I took some Windows updates the other day, and I always look at them first, and I did not see anything saying "Windows 8", and they all looked like normal updates, so I let them happen. I don't have a time frame but it seems like the next time I started my computer I saw the boot screen coming up looking like Windows 8 (blue square instead of colored squares). At first I thought this was weird, as my computer then booted into Windows 7. Then I noticed my desktop icons (google chromes) had lost their color and were now plain white. I managed to search online to find out how to make them colored again, however next boot they were plain white again. Then I tried rebooting and attempted hitting F8 to go into Advanced Boot Options and nothing happened. After hours of searching to try and solve this, and finding nothing, I eventually ended up in "msconfig" and noticed my operating system (and there was only one choice) was Windows 8. So I searched how to get into Advanced Boot Options in Windows 8 and found that F8 does not work for this operating system, which verifies that I have Windows 8. I then tried to force the system into Advanced Boot Options by holding the power button in to shut down my computer and upon starting it back up, it came back into Advanced Boot Options, at which time I tried "Last known Good Configuration", and needless to say that did not work. I tried doing that again, shut off using power button, starting and this time I only got Safe Mode, Safe Mode with Networking, and Safe Mode with Command Prompt. Tried a few more times and kept getting same. This apparently from I understand is what happens with Windows 8. BUT my computer boots up in Windows 7.
Question 1: How the hell did my computer go to Windows 8
Question 2: Can I reverse this? (I tried doing system restore to 3 days before this happened and it did not work)
Question 3: Is my only option to reinstall Windows 7? (I am pretty sure it is)

Anyways, I am in dismay as to how this happened.

Hello Bizee,

Please post a screenshot showing the Boot tab in msconfig to see what it says. :)

3D Jed · 18 Feb 2014

Many years ago at college some guy claimed his XP machine had reverted to W2000, but he had just accidently clicked classic theme.

Layback Bear · 18 Feb 2014

Hello Brink.
Post #5 is what msconfig/boot was at that time.

***bizee do you know Bradley?
https://www.sevenforums.com/members/bradley74.html

bizee · 18 Feb 2014

Like Layback Bear says, see msconfig boot tab in Post #5.

And "no", I do not know Bradley.

Brink · 18 Feb 2014

Sorry Bizbee, I missed it in post #5.

Well, it's obvious you are booting into Windows 7, so it appears that something just changed the OS name in Windows Boot Manager.

See if using the tutorial below to change the OS name back to Windows 7 may sort this for you. :)

Dual Boot - Change OS Name in Windows Boot Manager