Upgrade to Win7 RTM

[Nemo 1,305]

Hi all,I would like to report a successful upgrade from Vista x64 (enterprise) SP2 to Windows 7 x64 RTM (enterprise). Before I started the procedure I made images from both system drive and FSX drive. The whole procedure took me about one and a half hour and four or five restarts.The only incompatibility was acronis image which I had to uninstall first. After the Windows upgrade I checked all my drivers which were fine. No additional updates were necessary. After configuring the display settings with nhancer (which needed a reconfiguration and a restart) I deleted the fsx.cfg file which then should be newly generated at the first run of fsx. Don't get impatient, it took at least 10 minutes before the fsx opening screen appeared. Some adjustments in the configuration menu and later in the fsx.cfg and the upgrade was complete.Some system and fsx restarts later the system was ready for my first flights. FSX meanwhile started within 30 or 40 seconds. I made several test flights with addon aircraft (PMDG, Real Air) at several locations (Seattle, Tongass Fjords Aerosofts Venice, FTXAU area) all was fine.I hope this information is useful for those who, like me, have a bunch of addons installed, which would have required at least 4-5 days if had made a "clean" installation procedure.Harry (LOWW)sys: i7-920 @3.8, 6G, 285GTX(190.62 driver)

[yellowjack 28]

Thanks for the heads up, I'll keep this in mind when the tikme comes. :( :(

[BMG50 9]

Hi all,I would like to report a successful upgrade from Vista x64 (enterprise) SP2 to Windows 7 x64 RTM (enterprise). Before I started the procedure I made images from both system drive and FSX drive. The whole procedure took me about one and a half hour and four or five restarts.The only incompatibility was acronis image which I had to uninstall first. After the Windows upgrade I checked all my drivers which were fine. No additional updates were necessary. After configuring the display settings with nhancer (which needed a reconfiguration and a restart) I deleted the fsx.cfg file which then should be newly generated at the first run of fsx. Don't get impatient, it took at least 10 minutes before the fsx opening screen appeared. Some adjustments in the configuration menu and later in the fsx.cfg and the upgrade was complete.Some system and fsx restarts later the system was ready for my first flights. FSX meanwhile started within 30 or 40 seconds. I made several test flights with addon aircraft (PMDG, Real Air) at several locations (Seattle, Tongass Fjords Aerosofts Venice, FTXAU area) all was fine.I hope this information is useful for those who, like me, have a bunch of addons installed, which would have required at least 4-5 days if had made a "clean" installation procedure.Harry (LOWW)sys: i7-920 @3.8, 6G, 285GTX(190.62 driver)

So where did you get Win 7 RTM??? RTM (I thought) was for new rig manufactures (Release To Manufacturers) I also want to upgrade my Vista 64 to Win 7 64 and have the retail upgrade on order for the Oct. 22 release date....Lou

[Nemo 1,305]

So where did you get Win 7 RTM??? RTM (I thought) was for new rig manufactures (Release To Manufacturers) I also want to upgrade my Vista 64 to Win 7 64 and have the retail upgrade on order for the Oct. 22 release date....Lou

It's the enterprise edition (volume license) which is on market since August 6th or so. I got it from my company.Harry

[Guest j0nx]

I upgraded from win7 rc1 to rtm last week. Worked perfectly for me as well. I see ZERO difference between the rc and the rtm versions though. the rc was solid. it is a superb OS.

[BMG50 9]

It's the enterprise edition (volume license) which is on market since August 6th or so. I got it from my company.Harry

Thanks,Harry....(I,m jealous)....I,ve been running Win7 RC and l really like it...Lou

[vgbaron 3,714]

Just to clarify - you upgraded - meaning an in place upgrade OVER the current install folder? This would keep the registry entries for FSX and addons relatively intact.Any idea - can this method be used over XP64?If I misread your install and it was into a different folder, how did you deal with the FSX registry entries?Thanx,Vic

[Alan_A 1,650]

This is very encouraging. I've got a hugely complicated FSX install and really can't afford to spend days recreating it after a reinstall. But conventional wisdom has been that a clean install of Win7 is the only way to go. So - no performance problems at all after the upgrade? Alan

[Guest j0nx]

XP can't be upgraded to win7. Only vista and the windows 7 release candidates can be upgraded to Win7 RTM. In order to upgrade the release candidates you have to edit a single file and run the upgrade from your hard drive and it has to be the ultimate edition of the windows 7 RTM before it will work. An upgrade preserves all registry settings and nothing needs to be reinstalled. FSX and all addons and settings remain intact. Everything works perfectly for me. I had to remove a few programs that RTM didn't support in order to move forward with the upgrade, but I just found the most recent versions of the software after the upgrade and those worked perfectly. No issues.

[Alan_A 1,650]

XP can't be upgraded to win7. Only vista and the windows 7 release candidates can be upgraded to Win7 RTM. In order to upgrade the release candidates you have to edit a single file and run the upgrade from your hard drive and it has to be the ultimate edition of the windows 7 RTM before it will work. An upgrade preserves all registry settings and nothing needs to be reinstalled. FSX and all addons and settings remain intact. Everything works perfectly for me. I had to remove a few programs that RTM didn't support in order to move forward with the upgrade, but I just found the most recent versions of the software after the upgrade and those worked perfectly. No issues.

That's a relief. I'm all for doing things the "right" way, but the labor involved in a clean install... Well, I could always split the difference and go with dual boot, but for ease of use, an in-place upgrade is far and away my favorite. Thanks for the positive reports.Alan

[Nemo 1,305]

Just to clarify - you upgraded - meaning an in place upgrade OVER the current install folder? This would keep the registry entries for FSX and addons relatively intact.Any idea - can this method be used over XP64?If I misread your install and it was into a different folder, how did you deal with the FSX registry entries?Thanx,Vic

The upgrade was an install OVER the current system partition. Meaning all programs, registry entries were imported to win7. It will not work with XP.Harry

[Cruachan 705]

The upgrade was an install OVER the current system partition. Meaning all programs, registry entries were imported to win7. It will not work with XP.Harry

And there, for me, lies the problem. I am on XP Home and unless Microsoft can find a more user friendly way of allowing the world's current XP users to upgrade to Windows 7, without all the hassle and time consuming 'restarting from scratch' nonsense, then they have lost me at least until 2014 (or some catastrophic incident that forces the change) when support for XP is withdrawn. I predict this shortsightedness may well prove to be their undoing. Also, how many users (other than happy gamers and simmers) currently on a service packed Vista really want to shell out for yet another operating system? Those that routinely enjoy being part of the vanguard of technological change will likely remain a minority group for a while to come.Yes, I could be wrong and time, as always, will tell. Sorry to seem a bit negative, but I really do feel that Microsoft have missed a great opportunity here. Some will be jumping up and down and arguing that such a feat would be impossible, but in these days of programming wizardry I find that very hard to believe. Where there's a will there's always a way. If the majority of the world's users are currently still running XP on reasonably modern and reliable systems then where is the incentive to change? As with Vista, once again the migration to a new operating system will likely be patchy and the success of Windows 7 will be judged on the number of licences sold which, in turn, will depend on it being preinstalled on new systems. If some effort had been expended towards finding a way to allow XP users to upgrade their current installations then the outcome, most assuredly, would be very different. Let's hope my crystal ball proves to be unreliable; sadly my gut tells me otherwise.It will be very interesting to watch developments over the next year or so.Mike

[Tallguy 9]

I also upgraded my Windows 7 build 7100 to the RTM version (all x64). Only thing I had to do was thange a *.cfg file to adjust the MinClientVersion of 7233 to 7100 in order to upgrade.Win7 with FS9 works fine, although some scenery add-ons may give you an OOM (it did on my system yesterday with the UK2000 EGLL scenery).No issues running ActiveSky, UT Europe, FS Global2006, PMDG MD-11, my VRisight software, RadarContact, Cloud9 EHAM, etc...

[iainsmith 9]

Hi all,I would like to report a successful upgrade from Vista x64 (enterprise) SP2 to Windows 7 x64 RTM (enterprise). Before I started the procedure I made images from both system drive and FSX drive. The whole procedure took me about one and a half hour and four or five restarts.The only incompatibility was acronis image which I had to uninstall first. After the Windows upgrade I checked all my drivers which were fine. No additional updates were necessary. After configuring the display settings with nhancer (which needed a reconfiguration and a restart) I deleted the fsx.cfg file which then should be newly generated at the first run of fsx. Don't get impatient, it took at least 10 minutes before the fsx opening screen appeared. Some adjustments in the configuration menu and later in the fsx.cfg and the upgrade was complete.Some system and fsx restarts later the system was ready for my first flights. FSX meanwhile started within 30 or 40 seconds. I made several test flights with addon aircraft (PMDG, Real Air) at several locations (Seattle, Tongass Fjords Aerosofts Venice, FTXAU area) all was fine.I hope this information is useful for those who, like me, have a bunch of addons installed, which would have required at least 4-5 days if had made a "clean" installation procedure.Harry (LOWW)sys: i7-920 @3.8, 6G, 285GTX(190.62 driver)

I don't know how you did that, being in Europe. It's my understanding that due to an EU ruling, Win 7 RTM in Europe comes without IE and any e-mail client and upgrade versions will not be available. All European versions being sold from 22 October require a clean install according to MS.Iain Smith

[Kosta 122]

I don't know how you did that, being in Europe. It's my understanding that due to an EU ruling, Win 7 RTM in Europe comes without IE and any e-mail client and upgrade versions will not be available. All European versions being sold from 22 October require a clean install according to MS.Iain Smith

Wrong. There will be upgrade and full install versions (full install is for those who don't own either XP or Vista license). Upgrade is possible from Vista directly ONLY, and from XP, one has to do a clean install but CAN use the Upgrade Version (an existing XP license is required).