Installing "Upgrade" without "Full" license is NOT legal

[EzyStvy]

Microsoft SMB Community Blog
Eric Ligman – Global Partner Experience Lead - Microsoft Worldwide Partner Group
Regardless of what any hack says, a Windows 7 Upgrade is an Upgrade. What you need to know.


http://blogs.msdn.com/mssmallbiz/arc...d-to-know.aspx

[vtfanmv5]

"[If] you have the previous version FULL Windows license and qualify for the Windows 7 Upgrade, you have the rights to do a “clean” install."

Nothing new here. It's legal to use one of the many workarounds for a clean install as long as you own a full version of a previous license.

[EzyStvy]

Exactly...But there are a lot of people that simply don't understand it

[Panama Red]

Ah, all very true about the legalities. Unfortunately, MS changed the way the Windows 7 Upgrade disks work as compared to older Operating System Upgrade Disks. In the past, if you had a Windows XP Pro Upgrade version, you could do a clean install on a new hard drive but you would reach a point during the installation when you would be prompted to insert a qualifying disk of a previous/older Operating System. Simply inserting a Windows 98/98SE disk would satisfy the Upgrade gods and you could continue the installation. This too was a technical violation of the EULA if the machine you were loading with XP didn't originally come with 98 installed.

Now comes Wndows 7 and MS has done away with the "show me your old OS" on a clean install. The writer of that article refers to "hacks" being posted on how to install 7 without a qualifying previous os. That's absurd. No hack is necessary. Last weekend I disconnected my Vista Ultimate hard drive from my main machine, installed a new 250Gb hard drive and proceeded to install Windows 7 Upgrade. Nothing prevented me from doing the install and I was not prompted for any older, qualifying products. I was prepared to "show" a disk if needed but MS has changed the game - not me. I didn't "hack" anything.

The install of Win7 Upgrade on a XP machine requires backing up all your personal files, wiping the hdd during the install and reloading all your programs and personal files. That's what I call a Clean Install - same thing as installing an operating system on a new machine. It would make more sense for XP upgraders to purchase a new hard drive, do a Win7 clean install and transfer their personal files to the 7 hard drive. Then they could keep the old drive for backups. Plus they would be using a new hdd rather that chancing their files to a hdd with limited life expectancy. Yes, they would still have to install all their software, but that's the price of the upgrade regardless.

I just don't see the need for all the "noise" on the Upgrade install. MS created this gorilla. Just lock him in a room with their marketing people and let the lot of em fight about it.

Edit: I just realized after posting in David M's thread that I did encounter one glitch during the 7 install. I had formatted my new hdd previously by attaching it to a Vista machine. During the 7 install, my Product Key was rejected as invalid. I started the install again, selected custom, deleted the previous partition, created a new partition and formatted it. The rest of the install went without a hitch.

[vtfanmv5]

The obvious solution that comes to mind would be for the installer to ask you for the Product Key from your old XP or Vista purchase in order to utilize your "upgrade" product key. I'm pretty sure 98% of the people using these "hacks" (which include, as PR mentioned, just entering your upgrade product key - it has worked for a lot of people) are using them only because Microsoft hasn't given them a convenient way to do a "clean" install from upgrade media.

[Panama Red]

Originally Posted by vtfanmv5 only because Microsoft hasn't given them a convenient way to do a "clean" install from upgrade media.

Very true. And some folks remember the disaster of "Upgrading" from 98 to 98se, or 95 to 98se with an Upgrade disk. All too often those Upgrades went in the toilet and the user lost all their files. I never did an XP Upgade over 98/Me/2000 so I don't know how well those went. I much preferred a clean install to prevent disasters.

[EzyStvy]

But...why would someone purchase an upgrade dvd if they intended on doing a clean install? (price doesn't count)

If I want the "new car smell" and several years of warranty - I go to the NEW Car section.

[vtfanmv5]

Originally Posted by EzyStvy But...why would someone purchase an upgrade dvd if they intended on doing a clean install? (price doesn't count) If I want the "new car smell" and several years of warranty - I go to the NEW Car section.

Well, uh...how can price not count. It's perfectly legal to do a clean stall with an upgrade version, as long as you own a full copy of a previous version...no sane person is going to waste an extra $100 because Microsoft's software doesn't easily do what it can legally do.

[Panama Red]

Originally Posted by EzyStvy But...why would someone purchase an upgrade dvd if they intended on doing a clean install? (price doesn't count)

Why does price not count? It sure did for me. I bought 3 copies on the prelease promo for $50 each. Newegg is selling the full Retail Version for $189 and the Ugrade for $115 (both Home Premium). Retail gets you MS factory support (I prefer NOT to talk to Shawn or Habib - whatever his name is) and my olfactory sensors are still picking up that new OS smell just fine. The best part is my wallet is a bunch fatter.

[EzyStvy]

Now - who isn't going to re-use their qualifing OS keycode cause they can Be honest and raise your hand

[Panama Red]

Originally Posted by EzyStvy Now - who isn't going to re-use their qualifing OS keycode cause they can Be honest and raise your hand

Now that pops open another can-o-worms. Nothing prevents reusing that key but I doubt anyone upgrading from Vista ( which is what I did) will reinstall it. Win7 is that much better. Now, if you're talking about upgrading from XP...............hmm. My hands are at my sides.

[EzyStvy]

Way back when, I had heard that when you upgraded - the process would kill/invalidate the keycode you were upgrading....Betting someone from tech support stood up and said: "WHAT -ARE YOU KIDDING. Do you know how many phone calls we'll get from the people that re-install every other month."

[JimmyDee]

I did something a little different on my clean install. I backed everything I wanted to an external e-SATA hard drive. I was running Win 7 RC. Did a clean install with a reformat of my C: drive with XP Pro. Since I was going to install the XP virtual machine anyway, I was just pre installing XP. It was a clean install. Then I installed a clean install of Win 7 from an XP system and let it do its thing but did not allow the files it saved in "Old Windows Files" to reload. I manually reloaded my doc files and programs.
Everything is running great. I like the Win 7 but it would not run several costly programs I purchased years ago and they are running great on the XP virtual machine. So far, it a great setup.
Jim

[glc]

What happened to the loophole they left open with Vista - where you do a clean install with the upgrade CD, do NOT put a product key in, choose Evaluation - then upgrade THAT with another install over the top, this time putting in the product key?

[tomster2300]

Originally Posted by glc What happened to the loophole they left open with Vista - where you do a clean install with the upgrade CD, do NOT put a product key in, choose Evaluation - then upgrade THAT with another install over the top, this time putting in the product key?

That worked too...

[tomster2300]

I just purchased Windows 7 Professional at the $30 student discount. It said it was an upgrade version, yet there was a note on the download saying that if you were upgrading from Vista Home Professional (as I was doing), you would have to reformat and do a clean install. It then linked to the Windows section on how to do so.

I created a boot dvd from the download, then reformatted and installed with the disc. I was ready to put in my valid Vista serial, but it never asked for one. Nor did I have to do the above mentioned loophole where I install a trial version then upgrade on that. Everything installed as normal, I put in the serial I was emailed during my upgrade purchase, and everything has worked great. I'm typing this from within Windows 7 right now, and it has been rock solid so far.

I have also activated it without any problems.

To me this is legal if they provide instructions on how to do so. I mean, how else are you supposed to upgrade from one version of Vista to a newer version of 7?