Will Repair Install work with Windows Anytime Upgrade?

[davwilli]

I upgraded from Windows 7 Home Premium(OEM) to Windows 7 Professional using Windows Anytime Upgrade. Since the upgrade is done online, with no DVD provided, is there any way to do a Repair Install? I allready tried the OEM RE-install disk, and setup won't allow the install. It is an install DVD, not an image restore disk.

 

[gregrocker]

You have a Premium locked DVD which now needs to be Professional.

The solution is to unlock all versions in the installer, which can be done by:

downloading the DVD files to your desktop,

editing the Sources folder to delete the ei.cfg file,

then recompiling the files into an ISO using this tutorial: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/32055-bootable-iso-create-installation-files.html

Then use ImgBurn at 4x speed with Verify to burn your DVD. Never fails.

You should now be able to do your repair, or even clean reinstall from boot with that DVD by choosing Pro since you have a pro key, although I would def make a system image backup in case Anytime keys prove to not work in regular installs.

 

[reghakr]

After you get it sorted out

Most all of us agree that an upgrade is not the route to take. It leaves useless files on your system and can cause conflicts.

Save all you Documents, Pictures, contacts, videos, music, etc to a flash drive,

Be aware, you will need to re-install your 3rd party applications.

 

[davwilli]

Clean Install

Thank you for the good information, I will burn the DVD and do a clean install. I purchased this Dell to replace an unexpected motherboard failure, chose the OEM mainly due to budget considerations. Had to go through a long service ticket to get Dell to send me an install DVD. No one at MS seems to know much about how the Anytime Upgrade process works, or if they can provide me with an upgrade DVD, told me to check back later. Seven Forums provides much better information than Microsoft!

 

[gregrocker]

Well we still need to know for sure if Anytime keys work in reinstalls, as the reports around here are split and confusing so far. So even running a repair install (which requires re-activation) is a risk.

That's why I again suggest you use Win7 backup imaging to save a System Image to an external or secondary internal HDD, so that if the Anytime key is rejected you can come in here for immediate help and if necessary reimage to try another route.

MS needs to get its act together and provide a path to doing Repair installs and reinstalls on an Anytime Upgraded OS!

 

[davwilli]

I do have an image backup, however one of the problems I am trying to correct is that windows file backup will not work, returns an error 0x8007002 " The file cannot be found". I have a complete harddrive image using a third party backup.

 

[gregrocker]

You have one of those situations where you cannot afford to lose your OS (until you get a repair install to work so you know you have the ability to reinstall), so I would suggest SIW2's solution to having a failsafe image backup: Use two different programs.

On the very last XP install which would run the Sanjet 4070 scanner for slides here, I used Acronis and Macrium free. This way if one fails, the other one has it's back.

Suggest you also set up a Windows 7 Image backup saved externally. This might get the backup center working correctly so you can try your file backup again. If it returns the same error, post it here in a new topic for maximum attention troubleshooting.

 

[davwilli]

Thanks, good advice. I will be working on this late tonight, and tomorrow, and will post back and let you know.

 

[davwilli]

I created a DVD that will install all versions of Windows 7 by copying the setup files from the OEM DVD to my hard drive, deleting (dvd files)\support\efi.cfg, creating an ISO image using ImgBurn, and burning the image to a bootable, dual layer DVD(image is over 6 GB). vLite would not work with the OEM DVD.

Well, the Anytime Upgrade key won,t work with a clean install or a Upgrade Reinstall. It appears the only path is to reinstall the OEM OS(in my case Windows 7 Home Premium), then use Any Time Upgrade from the Start Menu to reinstall the Upgrade(in my case Win 7 Pro). The key won,t work for a clean install, even if you install the OEM first, and if you try an Upgrade Repair Reinstall, setup tells you the only path to upgrade to a higher version of Windows 7 is to go to Windows Anytime Upgrade from the Start Menu. So thats what I did, a clean install of Windows 7 Home Premium(OEM), and installed Windows 7 Pro using Windows Anytime Upgrade. Activation of the upgrade went fine using the key I had allready purchased.

 

[gregrocker]

Sorry to hear it. This is a glaring problem with these Anytime upgrades which MS needs to address soon.

Now we know for sure that Anytime Upgrade keys DO NOT work when reinstalling Windows 7 upgraded version, only to Upgrade the lesser version by unlocking features.

It is even more important now that you use Win7 backup imaging (or a 3rd party app which isn't built in) to save a System Image so that you never have to reinstall Win7 again, just boot into the install/repair DVD's Repair console and "Recover Using an Image" to reimage your HD (or a replacement) in 15 minutes.

 

[davwilli]

I installed the 30 day trial of Acronis before starting on this adventure, I will purchase a license before the trial expires. Thank you for your help.

 

[gregrocker]

Have you tried Windows 7 Backup imaging?

I use it on all of our machines here, keeping a copy in a primary formatted partition for easy detection, copied to external in case of HD failure.

Have used it several times now and it is fast, flawless, built-in and free.

 

[davwilli]

I had it set up, untill it stopped working, never had a chance to try a restore. Tried backing up to internal and external drives, changing the fileset backed up, could not get it to work. I Had some serious problems with this system that seemed to start around the time I installed Paragon 10 Backup(free), Windows backup quit working, Windows was hanging up during shutdown, and some applications GUI would not start, the process would start, but no GUI. Maybe Win 7 does not like 3'rd party backups? I think I might stick with Windows Image Backup.

 

[gregrocker]

Have you tried Win7 Backup imaging since you did the clean re-install when you couldn't do the repair install? Did that fix it?

If you reinstalled any 3rd party imaging software which might be causing this, then try System Restore to before them if the problem persists now.

If it's Paragon corrupting system (Backup center) files then if you can't SysRestore before it: uninstall, set restore point, delete Paragon in first two registry hive's Software keys, then run sfc /scannow to check system rile integrity.

If none of these work to get your Win7 backup imaging working, use MS tech support which comes with Anytime and blame it on that to get their excellent support.

 

[davwilli]

Windows backup just completed successfully, I have not installed any other backup software, or much else for that matter. I will be cautious reinstalling apps, dont want the same problems again.

 

[gregrocker]

You have a baseline now with that image, better than disappearing Restore points.

I store each of my computers' image in a primary partition for easy detection, but they then also need to be copied to an external in case of HDD failure.

Test them by booting from Win7 installer/repair disk selecting Repair console then "Recover Using an Image" to see if it auto-detects the image both on partiton and plugged external. It will need to be named the same WindowsImageBackup and in the root of any drive.

 

[davwilli]

Sounds like more good advice, I wil do as you suggest.