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Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE
I bought a prebuilt machine about 3 months ago. It's a Gateway and came with an OEM version of Vista Home Premium. If I wanted to buy an upgrade version of either Home Premium or Professional, would I only need the key that shows up in Control Panel > System? I didn't get any boot disks with the PC (although I can create my own by following instructions in its manual, I think) and it has a partition I can use to revert the OS back to factory-state. I have a few questions.

1) When I'll install the upgrade, will I just need to input the OEM key that shows up in System or will it automatically detect the product key and upgrade by itself? Will the key change to a W7 version that I'll need to write down for the next time I reinstall?

2) What (if anything) will happen to my recovery partition - will it be useless or will it actually still work?

3) If I wanted to do a fresh install, would I need to use my recovery disk (which I plan on burning later today) to install my OEM first and then do an upgrade install by typing in my newly-converted OEM key?

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Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

fishmech posted:

When I installed Vista as an upgrade over XP, I started the upgrade within Windows and it never asked me about the XP install's key, just the key for the upgrade copy of Vista. I imagine it'd be the same thing going from Vista to 7.

Ah, so there's an actual key in the box? That clears things up. I might sound stupid but I thought it just took your XP/Vista key and gave you a new one instead, rather than actually shipping with one.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE
What exactly does this mean for pre-built computers? My rig came with the same revert-to-factory-settings drive most pre-builts have. I used the software that came with it to burn a DVD version of the image. What'll happen if I end up wanting to reformat after having upgraded to 7? Will I need to stick use my DVDs to revert back to Vista and then be able to re-upgrade without issue?

The main things I'm worried is what happens to your key/activation when you revert back to factory settings, how that's affected by upgrading the OS, if it'll be activated upon reverting as well as if I'll need to call up Microsoft every time I re-upgrade to 7 after going back to Vista for a "format".

Gah, this is turning out into more of a hassle than I figured, I should've just built my own and went with an OEM copy like I always do. :(

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Ryokurin posted:

You could A) install your image, and then reinstall 7. or B) find a OEM copy of Vista suitable for your system and install with your systems existing key, and install 7. If you do A then you shouldn't have to ever worry about activation since it usually uses bios information to verify itself. With 7 installed it will revert to the standard way that normal systems uses, checking the existence of various parts of the machine.

Something tells me that the old trick that worked in Vista will work in 7 as well. That was install the OS once without entering the key and then reinstall entering your key and choosing custom install.

Okay, that sounds good then. Honestly, this system's pretty stable and I really shouldn't have to reformat too often, but it's good to know I won't be screwed or have to do a bunch of ridiculous stuff just to get back to a clean install. That said, hey, it was $70 CDN so whatever, that's the cheapest I've ever had to pay for an OS.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Xachariah posted:

But that makes people hate Microsoft more. They cut their nose off to spite their face. Now people in Europe have to jump through a bunch of hoops to put a browser on their computer.

Keep a copy of a Firefox/Opera install on a CD/USB drive? That's hardly a "bunch of hoops." Sure, it's impractical but really, it takes two minutes to download an installer and slap it on a USB drive before reinstalling your OS, and it's something you should always have on hand if you're moderately computer savvy (as with all the other apps you want to install after a format). As for OEM copies on pre-built computers: I really doubt people selling laptops and PCs would sell a product without an internet browser. They already install a bunch of shitware anyway, you bet your rear end they'll either include IE8 or get begged to include Opera by its devs. They wouldn't dare sell a product without internet access.

Crumbletron fucked around with this message at 05:13 on Jul 13, 2009

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

kode54 posted:

While I mostly agree with the rest of your post, this part is bullshit. 128MB is sufficient for XP, and 256MB is even better. I ran XP with 1GB for several years, and then installed Vista on the same machine and used it for over a year. The only problem I had was that the install partition was too cramped, so I had to disable certain useless updates like the dictionary update that adds "Friendster" to the system dictionary.

Oh, and this:

Yeah, I was using a 3 year old hard drive with Vista in 2007, because it was new in 2004. Seagate, scored 4. or 5.something on the Windows Experience Index, where the CPU was the bottleneck. (S754 Athlon 64 3200+) Just because the drive is a few years old doesn't mean it's a piece of crap.

Of course, what do I know, I never tried to run WoW on that machine.

I used a 5 year old hard drive up until June with Vista and still did fine. It really isn't that big an issue until it's actually giving you problems.

I don't really trust the WEI. I got a new computer in June with some pretty good guts (http://www.pricecanada.com/p.php/GATEWAY-FX6800-01H-Intel-Core-i7-920-PTG410X002-615509/) and I'm getting 5.9 across the board. I have really no idea why it's such a lovely score because my old rig was way worse and had something similar.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Captain Novolin posted:

Isn't 5.9 the limit :confused:

Is it? Well, poo poo. If so, I guess I feel pretty dumb. I figured it was out of 10 :downs:

e: That's Vista, I only installed the RC on my laptop. I'm waiting for 7 to come out before installing it on this computer.

Well, thanks for the clarification :)

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Fists Up posted:

I'm having trouble installing Windows 7 on my laptop.

I make it boot from the DVD and it says loading windows files, then it shows the little flag loading and then I just get a blank screen with a mouse cursor. Nothing happens after this. Its not frozen because I can move the mouse but I've waited over an hour and nothing happens.

Could it have something to do with Vista being hosed on my laptop (won't boot). If so how do I format my laptop? I hit F8 on startup and then I get a list of options such as Repair your computer (doesn't work) and a bunch of others...

I don't have a recovery disc as it never came with one. I remember being able to restore to factory settings before.

It's a toshiba A200

If you at all want to salvage your Vista partition, I think you can download (legally?) a 120-something meg repair disk.

e: here: http://neosmart.net/blog/2008/windows-vista-recovery-disc-download/

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Vinlaen posted:

Woah, it can do this?

That's freaking awesome if so. I've been using TrueImage but I'd love for a built-in/native backup solution. As long as it's truely backing everything up 100% bit-by-bit.

http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/windows_7_feature_focus_%E2%80%93_backup_and_restore

This was posted today and explains how to do it in a step by step guide.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Godzilla07 posted:

I believe 10/23 is when you'll be able to buy a desktop or laptop with W7 preloaded on it already.

If you want a prebuilt desktop, try HP or Dell's budget-box systems. My grandfather had the same WinME desktop by HP for 7 years so it has to be built well. My dad has a Dell that's running along fine. As for laptops, Lenovo, HP or Dell. I am heavily biased towards ThinkPads because of their awesome build quality. Dell and HP also have good laptops from what I've heard.

I wouldn't really go with HP. I dunno if they've changed much in the past 5 years but they're a bitch to customize if that's your thing. Their cases had all these special compartments and the hardware was made so pretty much your only option was to upgrade through them, costing you a heftier premium.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Combo posted:

Punkbuster has worked just fine for me when I use it to play quake live. I have to run IE as an administrator though.

My only problem I've had with windows 7 so far is if I'm playing a game full screen, like WoW, and I alt-tab out to log into ventrilo or whatever, I can't tab back in. The game crashes and I just have to start it back up. But it doesn't do it all the time so I'm not really sure what I'm doing differently.

For now, run it in a maximized window until they release a fix of some sort. Comes out to about the same thing.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

NoArmedMan posted:

I downloaded WMM a while ago as I had to do some simple video editing and felt I was totally missing something really simple, then I realized, no, it's just a piece of poo poo with pretty much no use anymore.

Same thing happened with Sound Recorder in Vista. Went to being relatively useful in XP to complete poo poo with zero features in Vista.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

ToG posted:

Just a quick question; I have Windows 7 Professional RTM. Would Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 work on it? I don't want to start my years license incase it doesn't work. Kaspersky seems very non-comittal.

Kaspersky has a technical preview of their new W7-certified IS solution that you can still use for free until they decide it's good enough for release. I'm currently using it right now with the RC on my laptop and it works fine. Save your license for later.

http://www.kaspersky.com/windows7

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Munky_Magic posted:

I currently have Windows Vista Business (64 bit) on my Gaming Rig, and I just found out that MSDN Academic Alliance now has Windows 7 Professional available.

Now I was just wondering if there are any disadvantages of upgrading vs a clean install. For instance, does upgrading perhaps result in an overall bigger install (perhaps some of the Vista files remain after the upgrade)? Or should there be no difference in user experience if you go down the Upgrade route vs a clean install. I just don't want to have to download Steam and all my games again (although I realise you can copy their local files), and I also really don't want to go through the hassle of Downloading and updating WoW from scratch.

I also have run out of activations on my Office 2007, which is another reason I don't want to do a complete clean install.

If you have external storage that's big enough, you can copy your steam folder's GCFs to keep your games. For WoW, just copy the entire folder. It's self-contained and doesn't hook into your registry so you can move the game's folder from one computer to another any time you want without losing anything.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Blue Footed Booby posted:

Oblivion will poo poo its pants if you try to run mods if the game is installed in program files and UAC is enabled, or at least it used to. Presumably Morrowind would poo poo even harder. Titan Quest seems to have some odd problems connecting to multiplayer servers if you don't right click and run as admin. Was it any of these?

The easiest way to run games that are heavily moddable or have connection issues under UAC is to either install the game in a seperate folder on your C:\ drive or, my preferred method, to give yourself full localized access to the game's folder. For example, I set Program Files (x86)/Bethesda Softworks/ as fully accessible by my user account and you can do whatever you want while letting UAC do its thing with everything else.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Xenomorph posted:

My daughter's system has a "Safely remove hardware" item in the tray for her VIDEO CARD.

It is the system's only video card. Nothing onboard. Just a PCI-Express GeForce 9500 GT.

I clicked it once, and the screen went black. I didn't try pulling the card or re-inserting it. I figured that would be a BAD thing to do.

My old computer used to have a "Safely remove hardware" item for the hard drive in Vista. I never touched it for fear that it would gently caress up my system, but I never found an explanation for why it was there.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Casao posted:

SATA hard drives are hotplug, all of mine show up on the list.

It was an IDE drive I've had since 2004. It only started doing it after a format one day.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE
So basically all you need to do is reinstall all your programs and copy your settings from their old location? I have Vista Home Premium x64 and want to probably do a clean install so ensure no hitches occur and if I don't have to backup anything (I spent a few hours doing it a couple weeks ago and don't feel like doing it again if I don't have to) that'd be sweet.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

redeyes posted:

I would at least try the upgrade, it should work very well from vista 64. Failing that yes, you can do a clean install and just copy your files from windows.old and reinstall apps.

Alright, thanks. It's finals week for me next week so I'll probably try the upgrade and do a clean install as a last resort. If ever something fucks up bad, can I just upgrade my existing 7 install and do a clean install from within itself? I have a Vista image I can just reapply if not, so it's not just a big deal.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

redeyes posted:

If it fucks up it will actually roll back to vista. I have seen it do so.

Oh well I meant more like if 2 weeks down the road (when finals will be over and I actually have time to backup my poo poo) it starts running choppy.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

RiceBurrito posted:

Well this is some bullshit, I pre-ordered from Amazon and chose release date delivery back in June and its not gonna make it today. I was wonder about you guys that ordered from Amazon when you pre-ordered? I did mine June 26 and its not like I live in the boonies, I live California between Sacramento and San Francisco. Oh well, I got a refund for shipping at least.

I live literally 4.5 hours away from the Amazon warehouse my copy shipped from (at 4 p.m. yesterday) and apparently I'm only getting my copy on the 26th. :sigh:

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Alex007 posted:

Didn't check the mail yesterday because I didn't expect my package to arrive on the same day it was shipped ... But apparently something is already waiting for me at home:



Thank you Canada Post !

Mine shipped from the same warehouse around 4 p.m. yesterday and tracking on Canada Post says it should arrive tomorrow. Mississauga is about 5 hours away from my house, I'm on the QC side too.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Rashomon posted:

I'm running the Administrator account.

He probably means access that folder's properties window and manually give yourself access. Right-click the Windows.old folder, click Properties and then go to the Security Tab. Click Edit... and then check all the boxes for your account name. It shouldn't bug you at all afterwards.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Rashomon posted:

Sorry, the guy above you said something about it. Anyway, changing permissions doesn't work.

Have you tried giving full control to every account in the list? That usually works.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Rashomon posted:

That is what is giving me the "Access is denied" message. I'm not retarded, I swear.

In that case I have no clue, really. Sorry.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE
:woop: In class right now, but my copy's in the process of being delivered right now. Not bad for Amazon.ca's super saver shipping, considering we had no release date shipping in Canada.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE
Just did the jump. Did a clean install, setup was smooth as hell. No driver hitches, nothing. Used the Ninite site and it worked pretty great. Right now I'm just transferring my files back from my external drive, but so far I'm really loving it. :)

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

leo_r posted:

That ninite.com website linked earlier is fantastic! It had about 3/4 of my frequently used software. I selected what I wanted, clicked download, ran the installer and a reboot later (installed avast) and I had about 10 programs that would've taken much longer to install individually. Certainly a malware danger there, but I haven't had any issues.

Seconding. Ninite owns, I made a list of like 10 programs, went to eat and it was done when I came back and I didn't even need to reboot. Good deal.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

100 HOGS AGREE posted:

Every time I turn on my computer Microsoft Security Essentials pops its window up, is there a way to make it start minimized?

Open Regedit and navigate to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run. Look for MSSE and double-click its entry. Change the path so it has quotations and add -hide at the end.

Mine's like this:

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Security Essentials\msseces.exe" -hide

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Schnozzberry posted:

I had an OEM version of Vista for a dell desktop. I can buy the upgrade version of Win7 and use it on any machine, correct? (not just the Dell, which has since been parted out and sold)

The OEM copy might not activate a second time on a new computer. I think you can install the OEM copy on your desired computer and call MS saying you changed out something like your motherboard and it isn't activating, though. Once you've done that you can absolutely use it to install Windows 7, as I used an OEM copy to upgrade from as well.

Someone with better knowledge will have to get you back on the activation thing for OEM keys on different computers than they were originally activated on, though.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE
I'm having trouble with my Pictures library. I have the User/Pictures folder selected as a source for it but it's randomly pulling up pictures from another folder in User/Documents for no reason.

I'd like for my pictures to show up but I really don't need the ones from the other folder (which shouldn't appear in the first place) showing up there. For what it's worth, it's a bunch of my design work and some school stuff which just ends up cluttering everything else.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Xenomorph posted:

Ok, now I'm getting this poo poo.

I have "Home" selected for my network.


When I go to Network stuff, it says "Home" - "HomeGroup: ready to create". And when I click it, it tells me I need to be on a Home network.

Does this poo poo work for anyone? This seems like the most brainless, retarded setup.



If you set up your network as a Work or Public network, you can't create a HomeGroup. You need to change the network type to a Home network.

Go to the Network and Sharing Center, look at View your active networks under the network map and click the link. It'll bring up the menu that lets you choose the network type. Click Home.

Here's a pic:


Click here for the full 1253x510 image.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

MariusMcG posted:

Well, I take back what I said about the "Play To" feature being awesome. In theory, yes, it's awesome. In practice, this feature is a giant hunk of poo poo based on my experience thus far.

The intent seems to be that you should be able to right-click on any piece of media-- audio or video-- and "Play To" that content to the 360 (or any other Media Center extender) as long as it's in Media Center mode and the Windows Media Center service is running on your PC. Problem is that the Play To application is choking on nearly every piece of content I throw at it. If I start up Windows Media Center, then start up the 360, then Play To a single two-minute song, that will play-- anything more demanding like that, such as a five minute song, more than one song, or any video, and it chokes. (In this case, "choke" means that the Play To window locks up, and the content I was trying to play shows up on the 360 with a total runtime of 0:00.)

Is there some third-party app out there that can push content from my PC to a DLNA-compatible device? Being able to push content from my PC to my home theater is an amazingly useful feature, assuming it works reliably.

Well, this may not be exactly what you want but you can use something like TVersity. Set up its library and it'll show up as a device on your 360 with all your content. I'm not sure if you can use it to make your 360 play content from the computer (as in you being at the computer, which the Play To thing lets you do) but it'll pretty much ensure you can always access your content without using Media Center on your computer or 360 so long as your computer is on.

Obviously it'd be nice if they fixed your performance issues but it's a workaround for now.

I haven't set up my 360 as an extender yet so I dunno if it'll do that to me yet.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

MariusMcG posted:

Thanks for your response, sir. It's true that TVersity and PlayOn will act as servers for the media on my PC, but unfortunately they do not allow me to "push" content from my PC to the 360. Being able to go to the PC, drag a bunch of songs into a window, and have them instantly start playing on my home theater is a big step up from the relatively slow and cumbersome client interface that the media servers offer. This is the first time I've had access to such a feature, and for me, it's much more convenient than I had expected. If there were a program out there that did it reliably, I'd actually be willing to pay money for it at this point.

Yeah, I get you. My TV's literally 10 feet away from my computer so I usually just use it to stream movies and not necessarily music (since I can play it on my PC), but I agree that it'd be nice if it was more reliable.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Aphrodite posted:

So does anyone know if there's a way to get a full version for Canada at student prices?

Not as far as I know. The cheapest deal we've had here was the 50% off preorder back in July. It's weird that they haven't added 7 to the Ultimate Steal program. Americans can get Office 2007 and Windows 7 there but we've still only got Office.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

Aphrodite posted:

They have, actually.

http://www.microsoft.com/student/discounts/theultimatesteal-ca/default.aspx

Click Buy Now. If you're eligible you don't actually have to buy Office, but can add Windows 7 Pro upgrade for $40 (Or $53 if you want a disc.)



Can you upgrade from Home Premium to Professional with an upgrade key or does it only work on XP/Vista/Server?

:suicide: Why don't they indicate this anywhere? God damnit. :(

Well, I guess I can get my dad one using my college e-mail.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

StickFigs posted:

Well not being able to back up my data was only half of my concern, the other half was that I would have to reinstall all my poo poo.

EDIT: So if I installed Windows 7 Professional right now from current Vista Home Premium it doesn't actually delete any of my files or folders? Just the OS-related ones?

Your User/Documents, Program Files and Windows folders get shoved in Windows.old. Everything else (for example, if you like installing your games in C:\Games) stays where it currently is. That means your files will remain but you'll still need to reinstall your games in C:\Games as they've been purged from your registry.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

xydrine posted:

Either way, without the official drivers, you don't get the nifty control panel with customization options (goes for both nVidia and ATI cards). Most gamers tend to use this (or nHancer/RivaTuner) rather frequently.

You can get the control panel seperate from ATI. It's not a big download either. I'm not sure but I think the drivers it installed for me, which I assume were grabbed when I put in my disk to install and before the first reboot, are from September 30th. They're not that old.

Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE

drcru posted:

Does anyone else keep accidentally clicking unopened programs on the taskbar? Apparently I sure love to open Outlook (thinking it's already open).

I keep accidently clicking Dreamweaver because my hand is retarded and slips off the Live Messenger button.

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Crumbletron
Jul 21, 2006



IT'S YOUR BOY JESUS, MANE
I'm having an issue with Steam. I'm getting that error where you need to turn off the Steam Community overlay in games otherwise Source games crash on startup. Considering I've never had issues with the Steam Community before I switched to 7, I really don't know what could be causing this. I really like the feature and would like it back. I'll also note that it works fine with any other games (such as when I add my non-Steam games to the list).

Is it possible that it's a video card driver issue? I've been using the default driver that 7 installs since it hasn't given me any issues and I've been wary of installing another one since this one works right out of the box.

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