Upgrading OS question

[David M]

If I upgraded from Vista to Windows 7 and I had a hard drive crash, would I have to reinstall Vista and then do the upgrade again or could I install Windows 7 directly without having to reinstall Vista first?

Or if my drive was okay and I wanted to do a clean install and already owned a licensed copy of Vista, could I wipe the drive and install the Windows 7 upgrade directly?

Basically, does the upgrade require that the older OS already be there and be operational?

Is there still a problem with legacy code and software being there possibly mess up the new installation making it better to do a clean install, like we used to see when upgrading older versions of Windows?

Although more expensive because you have to buy the full version, is a clean install still better?

[vtfanmv5]

You can do a clean install with the Windows 7 Upgrade media as long as you own a full copy of a previous version.

This article has been updated a ton since I used it, but I used what he now calls Method 2, which is a regedit. Worked perfectly for me. The Vista double install method also still works, but that takes a bit more time.

edit: Yeah, I totally forgot to link the article. Here it is: http://www.winsupersite.com/win7/cle...rade_media.asp

[Panama Red]

I installed Windows 7 on a new hdd last weekend, David, with an Upgrade disk. No registry hacks or previous proof of qualifying os was required. I did reach a point where the Product Key was rejected so I restarted the installation, delelted the partions that had just been created, created and formatted a new partition and the install proceeded without any hitch. No hacks or registry editing necessary.

[vtfanmv5]

Just using the product key seems to be hit or miss. It wouldn't work for me. But it's definitely worth a shot. Either way, it seems easiest just to not enter a product key during the initial installation, and then use the 3 methods in that article in order until something works.