Please Help Me -

[shafff]

I downloaded windows 7 to try out on a "vista" laptop. Then I used Daemon tools to mount the image file. Then I started install... Then at the "completing install" stage (the last stage among the 4 or 5 stages) it stopped (I think) at the bottom of the screen (the installing bar thing). Did it stop? or is it just taking long? It's a pretty good laptop.

But that's not the big problem. I (the idiot) held the power down to see if it would restart and continue reinstalling... But obviously it didn't. It said in the middle of the screen "setting up services" or something... Then it would just come up with a message saying ... ... ... "press OK to restart and continue install" then after trying that several times that message dissappeared... and now it would just restart and go back to that "setting up services" and restart again automatically - constantly. How could I fix this? without losing the pictures being lost? (I'm so gonna die).

I have searched all over the internet for answers but had to post this up to see if you guys had the answer. I beg you - This is my girlfriends mum laptop... Please help me.

If I had the money I would pay you!

Edit: In fact I will donate to this site, if i can conserve or "recover" if I have to, the pictures.



Thanks so much.

 

[iPwn]

Shafff, welcome to CF.

You can't legally download Windows 7 so you're doing something illegal which isn't supported by CF. So I won't help you install Windows 7, but I can guide you through getting Vista back, as long as you/her mom has the original Windows Vista CD/DVD that came with the Computer. You're most likely going to be spending some time with this machine now as there's a lot you have to do.

Insert the Vista DVD and boot from it to reinstall Windows.
Select the C: Drive to install Windows on.
DO NOT partition OR format the drive if you want to retain the pictires on there. Just select the drive (in setup it will be the drive with the largest amount of space on it) and select Continue.
You will get a prompt telling you that there is already a Windows installation on the disk and that installation will be moved to Windows.old
Continue the Vista setup to completion

Now that Windows Vista is up and running, you'll need to restore the settings originally on the PC. This is where a lot of your time is going to go, making it just like dear ol mom had it previously.
To recover the files, open a Windows explorer and go to My Computer > C: > Windows.old > Users > [Moms old username]
Open another Windows Explorer to My Computer > C: > Users > [Moms new username]
Copy the contents from C:\Windows.old\Users\[username] to C:\Users\[username]. This includes the My Documents folder, Pictures, Video's, everything.
Now you have to go through and reinstall all the programs that mom once had (the fun part )
You can browse through the Windows.old folder to see if there's anything else that needs to be retained or moved to a more accessible folder for mom. Most likely though, if she's the average computer user, all of her documents were in the folders that you already copied. I would say that you're safe to completely delete the Windows.old folder, but I would keep it just in case.

 

[shafff]

Hey man Thanks a lot for your help! it worked perfectly, your the man!

I asked a friend, "where can download windows 7 to try out?", he gave me his USB which contained a trial windows 7, it didn't work for some reason. So he told me to download it from a site I can't remember. But dang I didn't know it was illegal. I thought it's only a trial lol but now I know, thanks for the heads up!

Thanks again for the help now it's back on vista and thanks to you her mum didn't beat me to death.

God bless you!

 

[iPwn]

So your post about the trial threw me through a little loop, so I did a little searching on the net and found that there is indeed a trial version of Windows 7. However, this is for IT professionals and you have to be a member of the cool kids club, as outlined here, in order to get your hands on it. So, I stand corrected, you can indeed get a trial version of Windows 7 from their site, granted you meet the requirements of Micro$oft.