Hi.

 

Seems like W10 is going to be a strong platform over time but can we still take image of our Windows 7 and recover if we want to try it out?

 

Thanks Michael Moe

Hi.

 

Seems like W10 is going to be a strong platform over time but can we still take image of our Windows 7 setup and recover if we want to try it out?

 

Thanks Michael Moe

Of course you can. I have installed WIN10 BETA on two test PC.s and it installs WIN10 and keeps a copy of my old WIN-OS (IF I told the istaller to keep my old OS). When I start my computer I get a question about WHICH OS I want to start. Same thing as it has been for many years, you can have several OS;s on the same computer.

 

Jack

the Swede in Spain

Thanks, but i am not interested in having 2 OS on my computer hence i just want to have the oportunity to go back

 

Michael Moe

Thanks, but i am not interested in having 2 OS on my computer hence i just want to have the oportunity to go back

 

Michael Moe

 

Heres your answer

 

http://www.howtogeek.com/220723/how-to-uninstall-windows-10-and-downgrade-to-windows-7-or-8.1/

Thanks Richard.

 

But lets say i format my OS drive after a Windows 10 if its even possible. Because i have a dedicated drive for image of my current setup. My P3D drive and OS drive is therefor imaged on a separat drive for recover

 

Thanks Michael Moe

I think you will have decide on one ot the other - for me its windows 10 life moves on

Thanks Richard.

 

But lets say i format my OS drive after a Windows 10 if its even possible. Because i have a dedicated drive for image of my current setup. My P3D drive and OS drive is therefor imaged on a separat drive for recover

 

Thanks Michael Moe

You are good to go...you do not have to format anything.  Use your Emergency Disk, (or create one, if you have not already).  Place that in your CD tray and start the computer. It will read in all the basic files to run a minimal DOS setup, with menus for you to recover from an Image.  Make sure you have the hard drive on, where the the W7.x image is stored.  It must be an eternal, or external, running off of the USB hub.  It will then find all your Window Back-Up's...and allow you to pick the image you wish to reintroduce onto your computer. 

 

That's it...it will overwrite every sector on your O.S. hard drive, with the system image you created, as well as any other hard drive in your system that was included in the image back-up. If it is W7(x)...then in about 1-5 hours, depending on the size of your image, you will have your entire W7 (all the programs on the system).  It will be as though you never upgraded past W7.

Thanks but last time i recovered from a disc i was almost not succesful because the language of Windows7 was changed with vistalzator. Meening you could have a problem with language if you want to recover. Thankfully i was able to recover my setup because i could return to Windows 7 and reset my original language before running the image disc.

 

Well i hope also Windows 10 is the way forward offcause.

 

Michael Moe

You can use software such as EaseUS Todo Backup or Acronis TrueImage to make a full backup of your system before you upgrade. I like this method better than recovery disks, because as you say, the built-in Windows recovery can fail for various reasons. A full backup is more reliable, and you can also restore individual files and folders.

 

I will perform a clean install of Win10 (my Win7 install is over 2.5 years old), but I will definitely keep a full backup around for a long time, in case I need to restore or just get some small file or registry setting or whatever from the backup.

Been using this for years, has saved me a few times too. I have the paid version, which is well worth it. The free version has less features. http://www.macrium.com/reflectfree.aspx

When upgrading to Windows 10 you have 30 days to revert back to your previous OS.. After 30 days the key to your previous OS is invalidated with that OS and permanently attached to Windows 10.  There is a "Revert back" in the settings of Windows 10 (don't delete Windows.old).  So you can try it if you want..

 

Windows 10 after updating creates a hardware hash and stores it on MS servers.. So if you need to do a fresh install of Windows 10 if you want to format etc (create the USB media with the creation tool MS provides), reinstall, skip entering a key, and Windows 10 will auto activate itself via the hardware hash.  ie: Windows 10 will know you're reinstalling on a previously activated PC and reactivate it accordingly.

 

If you upgrade your MOBO and it doesn't reactivate.. Same process as before.. Call MS and they will square you away (MS are actually good with that)

If you own P3D you might want to hold off on 'upgrading' to Windows 10.  I did a clean install of 10 and installed the latest version of P3D.  Unfortunately i cannot get past the activation screen without it crashing IPLib32.dll.  I have logged with P3D, but they don't appear to support WIndows 10 yet.  I wish i had stayed on 7, didn't have any issues with that.

Can anyone else confirm this - if thats the case I will wait to do a fresh install of OS - and definitely not uninstall P3D - thanks for the heads up

I did a clean install of Win 10 Preview (can't remember which version as there has been so many) over Windows 7 Ultimate a month or so ago followed by a clean install of P3D with no problems (remember to uninstall P3D first or you cant reactivate it). Have since updated to Win 10 Pro RTM and P3D, ASN, OPUS, PMDG737/777 etc still working. 

 

Just make an image of the relevant partitions before hand using the built in Win 7 or 8 imaging tool. As explained above, you can also roll back to previous windows install.

I did a clean install of Win 10 Preview (can't remember which version as there has been so many) over Windows 7 Ultimate a month or so ago followed by a clean install of P3D with no problems (remember to uninstall P3D first or you cant reactivate it). Have since updated to Win 10 Pro RTM and 

 

You have done an update not a fresh install of windows 10 so that doesnt exactly prove out the question - thanks