How can I make a .iso of Windows 7 Professional

Okay, for any of you who are interested, IT WORKED

Thankyou to everyone who helped, and anyone who is still having problems, feel free to post your problems on here, and I will try to help you, however I am no expert :)

I think this is how it works.....
If one has ‘Update Media’ and you boot it to a blank drive,install and then try to activate, it will fail.

If you install ‘Update Media’ from within Vista or XP you will sucsesfully activate.

In the second instance, the ‘update key’ matches a ‘flag’ on the install and now MS knows the install is a legal update from a legal previous OS.

In the first instance , no flag was set by the install so it is now looking for a Full retail ‘Key’ and will activate with this key. Update key will fail.

Pardon the pun but the key to the process is the type of ‘Key’ MS sends you matching the type of licence you have.

wallyinnc said:

James, thank you for posting your positive result.
You have to unpack and burn the iso to be able to boot. I use ImgBurn, never let me down. Do at a slow speed.

Just to let you know, I had to restart, and when prompted, choose "Boot from CD or DVD" - This, I presume, is because I was going from 32bit to 64bit, however after that it all went smoothly.

James Wood said:

Okay, for any of you who are interested, IT WORKED

Thankyou to everyone who helped, and anyone who is still having problems, feel free to post your problems on here, and I will try to help you, however I am no expert :)

It only worked if it will activate.
If it activated, then well done......

James, Just so I can be clear before I head into the install process,

You created the ISO CD using the command you listed above, and then booted from that CD after restarting and the install worked?

Also, for anyone to answer, I am planning on formatting and performing a clean install, but have no Vista disk, (Gateway got all cheap on me with this computer and didn't give one with it) do the disks I made for restoring the system along with the product key on the bottom of the machine work as a prior version of Windows to continue the install?

Thanks for your help,

Wyeth

wglarson509 said:

Also, for anyone to answer, I am planning on formatting and performing a clean install, but have no Vista disk, (Gateway got all cheap on me with this computer and didn't give one with it) do the disks I made for restoring the system along with the product key on the bottom of the machine work as a prior version of Windows to continue the install?

Don't format, just install over the old Windows partition. It will move everything into "Windows.old" before installing. Since I do not have upgrade media I cannot test the requirements for using the media.

wglarson509 said:

James, Just so I can be clear before I head into the install process,

You created the ISO CD using the command you listed above, and then booted from that CD after restarting and the install worked?

Also, for anyone to answer, I am planning on formatting and performing a clean install, but have no Vista disk, (Gateway got all cheap on me with this computer and didn't give one with it) do the disks I made for restoring the system along with the product key on the bottom of the machine work as a prior version of Windows to continue the install?

Thanks for your help,

Wyeth

Yeah, the command that I listed, the one that I said worked. Make sure you replace the places I showed. Then I simply restarted my computer, and got the option "Press any key to boot from CD or DVD" - Hope this helps.

To Nosmo; by activated, do you mean entered the activation key?
If that is the case, then, when I was prompted to enter the activation key, I couldn't remember it as it was in my e-mail from Digital River, or what ever it's called. So I ticked the box that said "Register online" or something along those lines.

James Wood said:

[

To Nosmo; by activated, do you mean entered the activation key?
If that is the case, then, when I was prompted to enter the activation key, I couldn't remember it as it was in my e-mail from Digital River, or what ever it's called. So I ticked the box that said "Register online" or something along those lines.

Most times during an install, you have to enter a 25 digit 'Product key'.
Then you have to 'activate' online or by phone. If this is not done by a certain time your computer will stop working or some other.

Nosmo said:

James Wood said:

[

To Nosmo; by activated, do you mean entered the activation key?
If that is the case, then, when I was prompted to enter the activation key, I couldn't remember it as it was in my e-mail from Digital River, or what ever it's called. So I ticked the box that said "Register online" or something along those lines.

Most times during an install, you have to enter a 25 digit 'Product key'.
Then you have to 'activate' online or by phone. If this is not done by a certain time your computer will stop working or some other.

Well, I did not enter the activation key, but I have it in an e-mail, however I ticked the "Activate online" tickbox or whatever it said.

Edit: Is there a way I can enter the activation code somewhere? Or do I not need to do this now that I "Activated Online"

James Wood said:

Edit: Is there a way I can enter the activation code somewhere? Or do I not need to do this now that I "Activated Online"

Start > Right-click Computer > Properties. All the way at the bottom.