Solved Installing Win7 after end of support

[blue skies]

@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!

 

[Sidecar Bob]

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.

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.

 

[msalton1]

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?

 

[Megahertz07]

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.

 

[RoWin7]

By "retail" you mean bought separately from the computer, as opposed to OEM? I'm putting my next one into a computer my friend built, but he passed on before adding the OS.

 

[Barman58]

OEM install media has always been the responsibility of the specific oem, not Microsoft. This can be an issue if the oem is no longer trading, and of course they will usually supply recovery DVD complete with all the bloat.

Best solution for those with an oem licence is to create your own recovery media for you system, with all you mods.

There are many software options available for this, macrium reflect is one but others are available some will even allow transfer to new hardware should the old fail, and you can obtain a suitable device

 

[RoWin7]

It's not OEM, it was bought separately for a build when they were still available.

 

[Barman58]

If you have a few systems it may be worthwhile getting some external drives and creating images of the installs including all the software, using something like Macrium reflect. You could then be completely back working after a failure in less than an hour. I would still advise keeping the images up to date when application software updates but with Win7 itself this is not being updated so you could just make the images and store them. If you have to restore the applications could be restored, and updated later.
Of course with Win7 at EOL it may be that applications may not work after they are updated so a fully working backup of system and applications is even more important.

 

[TechnoMage2016]

I guess I've missed something along the way, in the last 40 years that I've been a PC Tech.


I've never noticed that installing an OS had anything to do with MS Updates. At least not for me.
I guess I'm just different. Eh?


Windows 7 is still my favorite OS, but if need be, I can get along with Windows 10, after I spend an hour or so, tweaking and tuning it to look and act like Win-7, and after killing WUDO and disabling Cortana.


Oh, and I permanently disable MS Updates.


Having fun in the Sunshine state!

 

[RoWin7]

NVM

 

[Sidecar Bob]

Hi Bob,

there are 2 threads in the installation and set up sub-forum where Up to date "iso's" are currently maintained.
supported by these users SIW2 & Wkeller
Hopefully these will become pinned at that time, @Brink

Once that date is reached you could use either as your input media

Roy

OK, so I finally got around to trying this. I started looking at the pinned threads from those users but there are a lot of pages to sift through and I have no idea what I need to download for Rufus to work with. As I said before, I'm pretty advanced in some areas but I have no clue about others. Can someone please explain it to me in simple terms?

 

[Sidecar Bob]

I have started a new thread for help with this
https://www.sevenforums.com/install...sh-install-usb-drive.html?422340=#post3459518

 

[ian50]

I'm installing a legit copy of Win7 (after the MS cutoff date) onto a second hand i3-5 machine as a backup redundancy machine. This was suggested by a comment earlier, and which I thought quite a good idea if one wants to avoid Win10 for some years yet.


I wemt through the excellent tutorials on how to generate a bootable USB install, slipstreaming all the updates, usb3 drivers etc. One contribution in particular attracted me:

Integrate7 script – automatically download and slipstream all updates!



Seems to have it all, so I ran the script on the legit Win7 install iso. Everything seemed to run ok, with the resulting modified iso at over 5Gb, with an install.wim at over 4Gb. But I could not get it to install completely off the USB card using Rufus 3.8 as the iso burner. The installation attempt would simply reach a point where it insisted a DVD file was needed. Eventually I concluded that the clean Win7 iso that I'd modified was coded to install only off a DVD. That may not be accurate but it seems adequate.



That presented a problem as the modified install.wim at 4+Gb was too big. So I could install off the initial Win7 iso off a DVD but without the updates or drivers.


Again, the excellent tutorials here helped enormously. There is a freeware programme noted in one of the tutorials at wsusoffline.net. Easily installed, this automates the update process almost completely. It certainly reduces a great deal of the tedium. The most recent version names Win7 as "Legacy Windows".



This programme is running on my redundancy machine now. If it falls over, I'll post that as comment. On the expectation that it will work ok, the last step is to remove the telemetry updates - and again there are great tutorials and command scripts here for that.


The wsusoffline.net site has a YouTube that takes one right through the process here:


YouTube



Thanking this forum for those wonderful tutorials.
​

 

[SIW2]

Easiest way is to download and run simplix updatepack. No telemetry or other junk.

UpdatePack7R2-20.1.17.exe

Just click install and off it goes

 

[ian50]

Thanks SIW2

 

[ian50]

From SWI2:


UpdatePack7R2-20.1.17.exe


Works perfectly. Streamlined so that the programme installs all the useful updates and reboots for you.


Thanks SWI2 and the wonderful, sharp tutorials here.

 

[Sidecar Bob]

I have marked this solved. With the help of SIW2 (& TechnoMage's suggestion to use Rufus) I have prepared a fully updated Win7 ISO and used it to install windows on 2 computers 18 days after EOS.


Thanks again to everyone who replied and made suggestions.

 

[ian50]

Good - Rufus with the updates added to the USB install package, or a DVD installation with the simplix update package following installation, are distilled wisdom from this website.



I successfully installed on a backup redundancy machine some days ago after EOL. Activation worked within a few seconds, so we know the answer to that question now.



Was your install iso MS Retail or OEM ? Mine was OEM, with a name including the DVD term. It would not complete installation off the USB file I generated. This required a DVD installation then updating with the simplix package. Still relatively painless and smooth though.

 

[Sidecar Bob]

I used a home burned install disc I inherited from my son and the files supplied by SIW2 to produce the ISO.

- I installed from the USB on a computer with an empty HDD and it worked perfectly the first time.

- I had installed Win7 on another computer from the original disc a few weeks ago and let it spend a couple of days updating; I decided this would be better and I wanted to learn how to burn a bootable disc so I did and used it to re-install on that machine. It also worked perfectly.



I don't know if this will get me into trouble here but I used something called Windows Loader (also from my son) to activate. This also worked perfectly.

 

[SIW2]

To legit activate:

1. Use the coa key from a sticker - often in the battery compartment on a laptop.

Or

2. Backup the current activation using e.g. dism++. Then restore the activation after reinstalling the operating system. This works for the same edition on the same machine.
View attachment Dism++10.1.1001.10.zip

:ar: SCREENSHOTS activebackup

Or

3. Use 7oeminstaller. This will work only if the machine originally had what is called an oem preinstall. It matches a marker in the bios and activates offline. ( nearly all laptops and some desktops from the big oems - Acer, Packard Bell, eMachines, Advent, Asus, Dell, Fujitsu, Gigabyte, HP, Compaq, Lenovo, IBM, Medion, MSI, Samsung, Sony and Toshiba)

7oeminstaller