Clean Install with a Upgrade Windows 7 Version

How to Do a Clean Install with an Upgrade Windows 7 Version​

   Information

This will show you how to do a Clean Install using a retail Upgrade Windows 7 installation disc.

   Warning

Remember that you need to legally own a valid qualifying previous version of Windows to use a Upgrade Windows 7, and to stop using (or uninstall) the qualifying OS while you have the upgrade installed. Microsoft only made doing a clean install from a upgrade Windows 7 possible to make it more convenient so you do not have to reinstall both the old Windows version (ex: Vista) and upgrade to Windows 7 everytime you needed or wanted to reinstall.

If you do not legally own a valid qualifying previous version of Windows, then you are violating the terms of Microsoft's Windows 7 End User License Agreement and could get your product key number invalidated by Microsoft. Plus, it is considered illegal.

For more about this, please see: Microsoft SMB Community Blog : Regardless of what any hack says, a Windows 7 Upgrade is an Upgrade. What you need to know.

OPTION ONE

A Normal Clean Install

1. Do a clean install at boot without checking the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online box during the installation process.

2. When the installation is finished, then manually activate Windows 7 with your product key number.

3. If your Windows should fail to activate, then pick up at step 2 in OPTION THREE below.

OPTION TWO

Through a Custom Install

   Note

This option will let you do a clean install of Windows 7 without formating the current Windows installation to have your current Windows installation backed up to the Windows.old folder during the installation of your retail upgrade Windows 7. This way you can copy any files back that you want from the C:\Windows.old folder (previous installation) back into your new installation afterwards.

1. Do a custom install at boot or from within your current Windows installation without checking the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online box during the installation process.

2. When the installation is finished, then manually activate Windows 7 with your product key number.

3. Copy any files that you want back from the C:\Windows.old folder into where you want it in you new installation.

4. You can now delete the Windows.old folder using Disk Cleanup to have a clean install now.

OPTION THREE

Clean Install with a Registry Workaround for Error Code 0xc004f061

   Note

If you get a activation error code 0xc004f061 while doing OPTION ONE or OPTION TWO above, then you will need to use this option instead

1. Do a clean install of your upgrade Windows 7 at boot without checking the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online box during the installation process.
NOTE: If you already did this from OPTION ONE above and got a activation error, then skip this step and just proceed to step 2 below instead. There's no need to reinstall again.

2. Click on the Download button below to download the .bat file below, and save it to your desktop.
Activate_Windows_Upgrade_after_Clean_Install.bat


Download


3. Right click on the downloaded .bat file, and click on Run as administrator.

4. If prompted, click/tap on Run and Yes (UAC).
NOTE: If you like, you can stop getting the Run prompt by unblocking the downloaded .bat file.

5. You will now notice a command prompt quickly open and close while applying the changes to your registry.

6. Click/tap on OK. (see screenshot below)

7. Restart the computer.

8. When the computer is finished restarting, then manually activate Windows 7 with your product key number.

OPTION FOUR

Double Installing Windows 7

   Note

This option is the same that was used to do a clean install of an upgrade copy of Windows 7. It's more work, but if the options above did not work for you, then this should since this is the most reliable option.

1. Do a clean install of your upgrade Windows 7 at boot without checking the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online box during the installation process, and do not activate Windows 7. When finished with the clean install, do not or install any Windows Updates, drivers, or programs yet.

2. When finished with the clean install, start at step 4 at this link to do an in-place "upgrade" install with your upgrade Windows 7 installation disk from within the just now finished clean install of Windows 7.

3. When the in-place upgrade installation is completely finished, then manually activate Windows 7 with your product key number. You can now also install any Windows Updates drivers, and programs you like.
That's it,
Shawn

Related Tutorials

---

• How to Do a Upgrade Installation with Windows 7
• How to Do a Clean Installation with Windows 7
• How to Do a Custom Installation of Windows 7
• How to Create a Windows 7 Installation USB Key
• http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/30470-make-bootable-iso-student-d-l.html
• How to Partition the Hard Drive in a Windows 7 Install
• How to Install Windows 7 on Computer with Less than 512MB RAM
• How to Install Windows 7 Using "Unified Extensible Firmware Interface" (UEFI)

 

[Brink]

Thanks, your comments and John's confused me on that.
Clean Install with Windows 8 Upgrade

That was only for if he wanted to do so from the Windows 8 Upgrade Assistant instead of a clean install, and how to download an ISO and/or create installation media with.


You won't have any issues doing a clean install with an upgrade copy of Windows 8.

 

[Britton30]

Okey dokey. I think I had told him that. Oh, he was wanting to do an upgrade to save the installs he had.

 

[daveje49]

Clean Win7 Upgrade Install - Double Install (Option 4)

My current 3 yo Win7 home premium is rather gunkerd-up, I was advised to do a clean install. What I want to do is go out, buy a win7 ultimate disc, and replace the current o/s - but I want to save all my settings, shortcuts, tweaks, gadgets, 3rd party programs, task scheduler, etc... LOTS of customization work done over the years and I want to preserve it. In fact, if I had to re-install every program, reconfigure every shortcut, it would be more work than the benefit of the clean upgrade install.
I want to replace 'the guts' so to speak; while leaving my interface intact.

Will this 'double install' option do this for me? And if things go screwy, can I use a full system image backup to get things back to where they were? Atlas (my comp) actually is running 'OK' but I know it could run a lot better.

 

[Brink]

Hello Dave, and welcome to Seven Forums.

In that case, you would want to do a repair install instead.

If you did a clean install, it would wipe everything out to be starting from scratch again.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

 

[bascotie]

Having a little trouble:

This is an awesome tutorial, by the way, just didn't work out in my case.

I installed Windows 7 pro 64 bit for someone with an upgrade key for it. We did a clean install after replacing the hard drive. I got the activation error saying it's for upgrades only. I tried option THREE, but still got the error.

Called Microsoft, they basically told me to do the same thing mentioned here in option FOUR, which I did. Popped the cd in, hit upgrade, and went with it. Tried to activate, and got the same error.

The funny thing is, on the old hard drive we did something similar, where pro 64 was already installed and we were repairing the OS with an in place upgrade, and it activated fine.

Any idea how to get this thing to activate?

 

[Brink]

Hello Bascotie, and welcome to Seven Forums.

If you have not already, you might see if you may be able to activate by phone.

 

[bascotie]

Hello Bascotie, and welcome to Seven Forums.

If you have not already, you might see if you may be able to activate by phone.

I did try to activate by phone originally but got the same error (before doing the in place upgrade).

I tried option 3 again, and when I rebooted I got a "Windows must be reinstalled" message saying an unauthorized change to windows was made.

 

[Brink]

What are you using to install Windows 7 with? Is it an upgrade version to match the key and not a full version?

When you used Option Four, did you make sure to do all of step 1?

 

[bascotie]

I used a System Builder (OEM) Windows 7 Pro 64 disc I had and used the upgrade key along with it AFTER installing (aka skipped the step during install to put in key)

So it looks like I did follow step one (just looked over it again to make sure). thanks for the quick reply!

 

[Brink]

Is this is an upgrade version System Builder (OEM) installation media?

If not, then this will be why your upgrade product key is not activating it.

When you do Option Four, you need to enter the product key during the 1st install, but only uncheck the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online box.

 

[bascotie]

Is this is an upgrade version System Builder (OEM) installation media?

If not, then this will be why your upgrade product key is not activating it.

When you do Option Four, you need to enter the product key during the 1st install, but only uncheck the Automatically activate Windows when I'm online box.

Gotcha. The version i bought is this one:

Newegg OEM

It'll be a pain to go back at this point, so no alternatives huh?

 

[Brink]

That is a full OEM copy of Windows 7 Pro, and not an upgrade copy.

You should be able to do a normal single clean install with this purchased installation media, and activate with the key that came with it.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1649-clean-install-windows-7-a.html

 

[bascotie]

That is a full OEM copy of Windows 7 Pro, and not an upgrade copy.

You should be able to do a normal single clean install with this purchased installation media, and activate with the key that came with it.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1649-clean-install-windows-7-a.html

I do computer repair so I have the disks, but the customer in this case had the piece of cardboard with the upgrade key, but not the original disk that came with the upgrade.

 

[Brink]

Ah, ok. It's always fun when they don't keep up with their installation media.

If that's what they purchased at that link, then I'd give a normal clean install shot with full retail or OEM installation media.

 

[bascotie]

Ah, ok. It's always fun when they don't keep up with their installation media.

If that's what they purchased at that link, then I'd give a normal clean install shot with full retail or OEM installation media.

That's actually a disc I saved from a previous purchase.

Their laptop has a Home premium OEM key on it, and then she upgraded to windows 7 later and just saved the key (lost the disc).

Anyway, thanks for all your help, great write up

 

[Brink]

I hope it goes smoothly for you this round.

 

[Xiigen]

The 64 bit ultimate upgrade here will work fine if I reformatted a hard drive that had XP on it and am putting into my new gaming rig, correct. I assume I will have to use method three, and it is known for a fact that the batch file is still up to date?

 

[Britton30]

The 64 but ultimate upgrade here will work fine if I reformatted a hard drive that had XP on it and am putting into my new gaming rig, correct. I assume I will have to use method three, and it is known for a fact that the batch file is still up to date?

Yes it will work fine. Option 3 only applies if you get the error listed there. The .bat file is good.

 

[Xiigen]

The 64 but ultimate upgrade here will work fine if I reformatted a hard drive that had XP on it and am putting into my new gaming rig, correct. I assume I will have to use method three, and it is known for a fact that the batch file is still up to date?

Yes it will work fine. Option 3 only applies if you get the error listed there. The .bat file is good.

One last thing before I try this, will changing the registry key, possibly by a registry repair program, unvalidate the computer or do something unwanted to windows?

EDIT: This will also give me the full version of Windows 7 Ultimate edition, and I won't have to redo this process if I want to install it on a new hard drive if I upgrade, correct?
Also, I will have the 64 bit version from here: http://www.utexas.edu/its/products/win7/purchase.php

 

[Brink]

Hello Xiigen,

It depends on what you change in the registry, but yes it's possible to completely hose Windows by messing something up in the registry. If you are referring to the .bat file in the tutorial, then it's completely safe to use as intended.

If you get a full version of Windows 7, then yes you will only need to do a normal clean install instead of the process in this tutorial to clean install an upgrade version of Windows 7.

Hope this helps,
Shawn