Like many people, I have blocked all Windows Updates in Windows 7 SP1 that have anything to do with Windows 10.
If I want to give Windows 10 a try (using the "free" offer from MS), will I need to install any of those updates in Windows 7? If so, which ones?
No, it's not necessary at all to infect your computer with the GWX virus to try Windows 10 at all. You can just download the official ISO installer and do a clean install, in a virtual machine for example (or a second partition to dual boot, or anything else).
That way your current install is totally unaffected, yet you can evaluate a fresh Win10 install and test it.
Should you dislike it, drop the VM and forget about it.
If you decide to definitely downgrade to Windows 10, you can again install from the same ISO into your real system (here is a guide on how to do it), or let Windows update put all the malware-ridden updates that offer Win10 and follow their advice (which of course results in the worst possible install afterwards, but without the need to reformat).
Hmmm... isn't that how 99% of users are "upgrading"? What makes it so bad?
Having to reinstall and reconfigure every piece of installed software sounds painful.
BTW, on https://www.microsoft.com/software-download/windows10 the first big box has a link to install an updater. Any idea if that's a good compromise between using Windows Update and performing a format?
I don't think using windows update is the best method myself, if you want to do an upgrade instead of clean install then steps 4, 7 or 8 of this tutorial are the better method,
Windows 10 - Upgrade Installation - Windows 10 Forums
You just download the installer using one of those methods and basically do an upgrade install from your win 7 desktop.
SevenOfNine, if it's not too late please take a backup/image of your Win7 install before doing anything. If things go south you can go back to Win7 pretty quick with a backup/image to restore to.
I've upgraded 4 computers, 1 desktop, 3 laptops from Win7 Home and Pro to W10 without any issues, some users on tenforums Windows 10 Forums swear by a clean install. I didn't want to reinstall/redownload programs and set up my computers again, that why I chose to do an upgrade.
A computer that has problems, maybe has been used by more than one person, and has various issues that have built up over the years, a clean install will definitely be the better choice. W10 won't fix issues, you'll continue having problems just upgrading over those issues. For myself I'm the only user on the desktop and one laptop, my wife is the only user on her two laptops, none had issues so IMO an upgrade was the better choice.
W10 is not bad OS, it's not Win7, or XP, it's W10, until the end of this month it's free :) Take the plunge and upgrade, you can always go back using your backup/image. I've heard the "go back to previous OS" function in W10 doesn't always work as advertised so a backup/image is your best bet. Take a browse of the Windows 10 forum to see what's being said and some of the posts, pretty much the same thing that goes on in this forum.
I don't really notice any difference between the two OS's. Take a backup/image of your existing Win7 install using either the embedded backup function, or a third party program such as Macrium Reflect. I've used the embedded backup for years, still works fine with W10 too.
Last edited by cmmtch; 23 Jul 2016 at 18:32.
No idea if "99% users" are doing so or not, I don't believe that it's that high, but I don't have any serious data on how many. Regardless on how much it's actually used, it's a terrible option.
The main reason is that its carries all that's present in 7 to 10. All drivers remain there, all software remain there, every configuration is also preserved. Problem with that is that some things (specially drivers) are simply incompatible with different Windows versions, or have some issues with the migration, or a better choice can be made. Some Windows components also behave somewhat different sometimes.
By performing a clean install you begin from a known good state, then install things that you know are compatible with 10. Also, you get rid of all the bloat, and start over from a pristine install, getting the best possible performance.
It's also not unknown of OS upgrades crashing mid-process and either reverting to 7 or just bricking the OS. Not exactly common, but definitely possible. That's also not something new of 7-to-10 "upgrades", also previous versions of Windows suffered from the same flaws.
Reinstall everything is a far superior alternative. People often don't do mostly of lazyness and lack of elementary knowledge in computers, so a single click that promises doing everything automagically seems tempting. But once you learn the basics of computing, doing a clean install is not that difficult, just boring and somewhat time consuming.
It seems to be just the same download that Windows Update delivers without user consent, hence, yielding the same result. There is no such thing as a middle point here. The only options are either "converting" Win7 to Win10 (by whatever means) or blowing everything up and reinstall from scratch, there isn't any other way to change your OS to anything else.
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