Vista to 7 - Yes; more n00by questions.

King Kittan · 06 Aug 2009

Sup guys,

So I happen to have landed myself with copy of the Windows 7 RTM (7600.16385.090713-1255_x86).
I'm running Vista Home Premium (x86) currently, on a laptop with 2gb of RAM and a 150GB hard-drive (for anyone who's interested) and am totally new to re-installing and installing operating systems. I've done some research, obviously, but I still have a few questions and wish to clarify a few things.

Firstly, I understand that during the installation of seven, my hard-drive will be formatted. However, I've heard of some people saying that their programs and files have remained from their previous OS (e.g. vista). Is this right? Also if this is true, would it be more beneficial to completely format my PC first instead?

One more thing; I also have a recovery partition (D) on my laptop. Should I delete this partition first, before running the installation and if so, how?

Thanks in advance.

mickey megabyte · 06 Aug 2009

hi King, welcome to seven forums,

i would advise you to read this excellent tutorial first. you may want to print it out for reference while you are doing the install.

if you follow the tutorial, it will allow you to install 7 alongside your current vista - it's a good idea to try out 7 first without wiping your working vista, as you may find you have driver problems with 7, or you just don't like it (doubtful, but maybe!). when you boot your machine, you will see a menu offering you to boot up into vista or your new 7.

if you don't need or want your recovery partition, you could just wipe it to reclaim the disk space. you can use the inbuilt computer management tool, more details to be found in the tutorial linked above.

good luck and have fun with your new os!

Dwarf · 06 Aug 2009

Hi King Kittan and welcome to Se7en Forums

There are two main methods for installing W7.

Clean Install Windows 7 Use this method if you do not wish to preserve any existing files. It will give you the opportunity to format the disk should you so wish.

Upgrade Install with Windows 7 This method allows you to upgrade your current installation of Vista to W7. This preserves your files from your current OS. Obviously, the formatting option will not be available using this method.

In either case, it doesn't really matter if you delete the recovery partition, but be aware that if you did and you haven't created recovery disk(s) then you might not be able to restore your laptop to its original condition should things go wrong. I advise you to leave this partition alone, at least until you are satisfied that W7 is working satisfactorily on your laptop.

Alternatively, you could always try a Dual Boot Installation with Windows 7 and Vista which will leave your current installation untouched (except for reducing the size of the partition, which needs to be reduced in order to provide space for a new partition to be created for W7). It also means that you will be able to choose whether you want Vista or W7 when you boot up.