Repair Install

Hello Santelm,

Sorry, but it will require a clean install of Windows 7 to go back to it.

Clean Install Windows 7

shinyjanjan said:

Hi shawn, does doing this will loss all the files located in Public Pictures, Public Documents and Public Music?

Hello Jan,

No, but I would always recommend to back up anything that you do not want to lose to be safe. You never know what may happen (ex: power outage) during the repair install that could cause you to lose everything. :)

McNano said:

Hi,

I have one question. My current system install is Win7 Home Premium without SP1. Somehow the system is broken, because I can't install SP1 at all.

So, is it possible to make repair install from Win7 Home Premium SP1 -disk, while my system is not SP1? Or should I use Win7 Home Premium RTM -disk?

Hello McNano, and welcome to Seven Forums.

No. You wouldn't be able to use a Windows 7 HP w/SP1 installation disc to do a repair install with since you do not have SP1 installed yet. You'll need to use a Windows 7 Home Premium RTM disk without SP1 to do so instead.

I hope it helps with your SP1 issue. :)

I would like to know what impact this type of repair upgrade will have on installed program activations?

Several of my programs are of the type in which the program vendor limits the number of activations allowed, and monitors that number via the net. For example, MS Flight Simulator X. In order to not exceed the allowable number of (re-installation) activations (a number usually not disclosed to the program purchaser) I typically have to UN-install each of those programs while internet access is available, so each will reduce its activation counter by 1 with the vendor.

In situations where the PC has a sudden death, and the programs can't be deactivated before a wipe and rebuild, the vendors may refuse to allow the program to be reinstalled by its legitimate purchaser because they have "exceeded the allowed number of activations". I've had this happen to me before I knew anything about these limits placed on program activations, forcing me to purchase a program a second time. Some vendors are sympathetic by phone, but some are not.

So, I'd like to avoid all that, but I would prefer not to have to uninstall all my programs. If I have to do that, I might as well just wipe and do a full clean installation. This tutorial is a handy shortcut, if it will work without losing program activations. Has anyone run into this problem using the tutorial?

Hello Zoandar,

It shouldn't affect it, but there's no guarantee since it really depends on how the program goes about it's activation.

Thanks, Brink.

I am debating whether to just reformat drive C and start over. I just did that in September and things worked OK. But adding a second SSD (in addition to the boot drive) and my forgetting when reconnecting the SSD drives, that the boot SSD had to be on SATA1, sent me down a long path of grief when the BIOS tossed its boot drive sequence and started looking at several other drives in the PC, as well as network boot (which I don't use).

After remedying all that with moving the boot drive cables back where they belonged on SATA1, and running the BootRec utility to fix the boot files, the PC is OK now, except that my external eSATA enclosed bluray burner is no longer seen as a bluray drive in Win7 Home Premium x 64. It shows up as a CD Drive in Device Mgr., and I've burned 3 DVD-DL coasters trying to use the drive since then.

I hooked the bluray drive back up by eSATA to my Windows XP rig and burned 5 DVD-DL discs without errors. So something is still wrong in the Win7 PC. The only SATA drivers provided with my Asus P7P55D board are for RAID, which I don't use. I installed them thinking it might help. Now I can't remove them. So this is why I was thinking of the Repair/Upgrade procedure, to hopefully sort out any messed up system files.

But I guess the only guaranteed path of safety at this point would be to uninstall all those activation-monitored apps and do a full clean installation again. A few of my programs are legacy versions, like FSX and Paperport, neither of which have much in the line of decent support if I exceed their activation counters. Nuance would probably just tell me I needed to spend $100 to upgrade to their latest Paperport (which I have tried, but hated, because they stripped away all the tools I use the most).

If you have any other suggestions how to fix this bluray issue I'd love to hear them. I tried Device Mgr. Update Driver on it and Windows just says it already has the best match for a driver (still showing it as a CD drive). Oddly, if I dig into the properties of the CD Drive listing it does show being a Pioneer BDR-206 there. Rather confusing that Win7 knows this and yet has decided to stop listing bluray drive in the main Device Mgr. listing. It used to show as bluray before I started this adventure.

Thanks again.

You're welcome. A repair install wouldn't have gotten rid of the driver.