Installing Win7 after end of support

Megahertz07 said:

@blue skies
First of all you must find out if the Lenovo problem is the HDD.
Does it start? Can you enter BIOS?
The Win 7 SLP license is tied to the Motherboard, not to any other component. But if you don't have a Lenovo installation disk to restore Win 7 SLP license you can use any Win 7 installation disk and the license on the COA sticker. Remember that any Win 7 installation disk has all types (HB, HP, Pro and ultimate). With a little trick you can make it universal.
I'm have used some Crucial BX500
They are fast and cheep. So far, so good.

Thank you very much for your reply Megahertz07! There may be additional problems with the Lenovo, but I figured I would definitely want to replace the hard drive even if I got it working... so I am relieved that that won't cause an issue with the Windows 7 license. (I don't know where I read that it would, but I'm glad it was misinformation.)

That is very good to know about the license on the COA sticker. I probably won't get a chance to get it out of the box and see what's going on with it for a while though. It's been years since it failed and I set it aside, but I think the hard drive went first and I was still able to get to the BIOS... but then I think the power supply was also having issues right around that time. I will try booting to my live Linux USB if I get it to start and get into BIOS.

I was reading this thread and thought I'd better ask now in case a lot of posters go away in January. I've loved Windows 7 and will never switch to Windows 10, so I hope this community sticks around a long time. (I've been very grateful for all the help and advice I've received here over the years, and Brink is the best!!)

I plan to keep my laptop, and my Lenovo if I can get it working, on Windows 7 long term. I bought a new mini computer on which I installed Linux Mint which has been fantastic, but I'm not ready to say goodbye to Windows 7 yet - which to me has been the best OS Microsoft has ever released.

Thanks again for your help! :)

Just so you guys know, I haven't forgotten about this thread but I've been busy with family/holiday stuff for the last couple of weeks and recovering from that and working on a couple of other projects since.



1) I am relieved to know that this forum maintains an ISO of the most recent update of Win7 that I will be able to download and use after Jan 14 and that if I do that I won't need to worry about updating a fresh installation.
2) I fully intend to try what TechnoMage suggested in post #6 of this thread but at this point I think I'll wait for the final version of the ISO.

TechnoMage2016 said:

JFYI, I have several ISO's that I've downloaded, that will NOT fit on an 8GB Flash Drive.

Buying 8GB Flash Drives today, is just a waste of time and money.

I have some 8GB, 16GB and 64GB USB flash drives that I only use for stuff like that. I also have some 8 and 16 GB SD cards that are new in the packages and it is tempting to use one of those but I think I'll stick with a USB drive for this so that I don't have to work through a card reader.



As for smaller USB drives being a waste of money, that all depends on what you are going to use them for. My main use for USB drives is for playing audio while I drive (both of my bikes have stereos with USB/MP3 players). 1GB will hold about 10 hours of music or podcasts so I almost always have a 1GB USB drive in the player (usually with only an hour or 2 on it) and a few more handy. Yes, I could put 16 times as much on a 16 GB drive but it is a lot easier to pull one out and put another in than it is to browse through 160 hours of stuff to find what I want to listen to.
And yes, the 16GB ones you mentioned cost a lot less per GB than the 1GB ones but as long as I can get 1GB for about $1 CAD (75 cents US) including postage I'm not spending a lot for the convenience.

My 'official' Win 7 SP1 isos were downloaded from MS in 2013. In following SIW2's "update your win 7 installation media", I'll be using these isos. Any issues using these isos that are 7 yrs old (I have all flavors)? Can win 7 isos even be downloaded these days?

If you have a Win 7 retail key, yes you can download from M$ Windows 7 ISO Files
The latest release is SP1
Any Win 7 installation disk edition (HB, HP, Pro or ultimate) has all versions on it so you can make it universal renaming ei.cfg from \sources.