Reinstalling W7 On Dual Boot System

One of the things I've thought about in preparation for W7 EOL is to do the "non-destructive, in-place re-installation." (Fred Langa has an excellent tutorial on that). However, since the original installation of W7, I have created a dual-boot system, with Zorin being the other OS. So, the W7 partition is now smaller than before (when it was the whole hard drive). So, I'm not sure that will work. I can foresee getting an error message like " The partition you are installing to is not the same size as when Windows was originally installed." I'm afraid it either won't work, or it will work, but I'll wipe out Zorin in the process, as Windows will take up the whole drive. Anyone have any thoughts on this?


BTW, the reason I want to do this is to keep all my files and programs, but have a fresh W7 install, so it works flawlessly. I would not do any updates, as I would just keep it offline and use Zorin for online work.

Paul Black said:

Hi michael diemer,



This is a Repair Install.

See my post with information and instructions here => Repair Install.

OK, I'm a bit confused. Langa says, at the point where Windows asks you what kind of install you are performing, "you tell Windows a little lie. You choose the 'upgrade' option."



This installs a fresh copy of Windows without affecting anything else. Also, it is possible to do it with Windows booted, because it is in effect an upgrade, though not really. I have used this method successfully in the past.


So, is this the same as a repair? It doesn't sound like it to me, as the repair option has you doing it with a live CD. Although the result may be the same.

SIW2: I am using the Linux Grub bootloader. But if it doesn't boot, I can probably fix it with a boot repair disc, which I have done successfully in the past. Also, I said I have Zorin on the drive. Actually, it's Solus. Although that doesn't make much difference.



As for cleaning the partition, I have pretty much already done that, I like to keep things stripped down pretty lean.

michael diemer said:

OK, I'm a bit confused. Langa says, at the point where Windows asks you what kind of install you are performing, "you tell Windows a little lie. You choose the 'upgrade' option."

This installs a fresh copy of Windows without affecting anything else. Also, it is possible to do it with Windows booted, because it is in effect an upgrade, though not really. I have used this method successfully in the past.

So, is this the same as a repair? It doesn't sound like it to me, as the repair option has you doing it with a live CD. Although the result may be the same.

Langa is right. There is no Repair option on Win 7. What you do is "upgrade" installation from one version to same version. It will reinstall Win 7 and keep your data and programs (and unfortunately al the garbage it has collected over the years). You will have to reinstall all updates.
My suggestion is to use Simplix.
MS releases SP2 for Windows 7

I normally do a fresh install (delete everything) every two years to get performance increase.

Thanks Megahertz. I'm nor sure I'll do this; I will first see if I can optimize things. I just want a reasonably fast system by the time January rolls around. This W7 install will be essentially a relic, there to access files, use Office, etc. but staying offline. I'll be using Linux for daily online stuff. also, this computer is my test machine, to help me figure out what will work on the wife's laptop, which also has W7-HP. I also have a third rig with W7-Pro, but that's my music machine, and it is basically already in W7-EOL mode, as I rarely take it online.


It looks then like I can do this, that is, do a non-destructive reinstall on a dual boot system. I will refer to this thread if I decide to do it, so I can prime it per SIW2's instructions.


Thanks everyone, this forum is the best!

Thank you for clarifying that!