How to install Windows 7 – Upgrade your operating system with ease with these tips

The new version of Windows is out, and I am going to talk about how to install Windows 7.  Every other year or so I like to refresh my computer for speed and performance.  Over time, Windows tends to collect crap and will eventually become as slow as molasses.  So what I like to do is completely wipe the entire drive and reinstall everything, and after a few times of doing this over the years, I find there are certain things that I always forget.  So, in an effort to not find myself scrambling to remember all those applications that I use on a regular and not so regular basis, I’m going to list everything that I need to take care of before upgrading to Windows 7 from XP.

If you are thinking about refreshing your system with a new OS, or just want a fresh start, this article might help you avoid some problems.  There is nothing worse than getting to the other side of an operating system upgrade only to realize that you forgot something and will pay the price for forgetting.

I have been running XP for the longest time, and the stars are lining up right for me to take the jump to Windows 7.  I am a little more hesitant to upgrade since I once had Vista for about a week until I decided that it was complete crap and went back to XP.  When my system is down, I am not making money, so it’s very important to do this with as little downtime as possible.  Fortunately, I found that upgrading to Windows 7 was painless and actually quite enjoyable, and very quick!  A nice change from the Vista upgrade debacle.

If you are planning to upgrade, read on.  I am going to share some of my methods with you so that you to might have a good experience upgrading as well.

Before you install Windows 7

Before you buy or install Windows 7, I highly recommend running the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor to help determine if you’ll have any issues.  After clicking the link, you’ll see the download button on Microsoft’s page, just click that and you’re off and running.  Make sure that you have plugged all your external devices into your computer so that the Upgrade Advisor will know the devices exist and will be able to report back on the their compatibility.

The advisor process will take a few minutes, and while you’re waiting for it to finish, it is a great time to visit your PC manufacturer to see if they have any updated device drivers for any of your equipment.  It is also a good idea to take the extra time to build a folder with everything you need to support your hardware, and then burn the entire folder to CD.  With your device drivers on CD, you will be able to access them after the install of Windows 7.

AT A MINIMUM: Make sure you have a backup set of network device drivers.  With those, you can still hop online and find drivers for everything else…hopefully.

When I ran the advisor, it warned me that I need to have at least 16GB of free disk space.  That isn’t going to be a problem since I’m going to do a low-level wipe of everything before I install.  There were a number of other warnings for things I really do not care about, so there is nothing that will stop me from continuing this little journey.

Make notes for system devices and configuration settings

Another very good idea is to have a piece of paper and pencil handy.  I always forget a few things when I am going through the motions of upgrading, so instead of trying to rely on memory, I’m going to scan through my system for anything I need to copy or write down.

Here are a number of items that you might want to take note about before you perform the install:

• Backup your entire hard-drive to an external drive. Normally what I will do is keep all my data files (anything that I cannot simply recreate without an inordinate amount of time being spent) under a folder called “c:\data” so that I can backup all my work easily.  However, over the course of time, I have failed to contain everything to one folder (Windows loves “My Documents”, and I hate MS for that…), so I am just going to back up the entire hard-drive.  If you are unable to backup your entire hard drive, you will want to take extra time to ensure that you grab each and every data file.
• Take note of all your email addresses. I have about 10 email addresses, and each is set up in Microsoft Outlook.  I need to make notes on each email addresses pop, smtp servers, as well as the credentials used to access the email servers.  If I do not do this, I will fumble around trying to recall the credentials like I have the prior two refreshes.
• Account for specific applications settings. I had to perform backups of each database running in SQL Server, and copy them to external drive, as well as note the settings for each Remote desktop instance I connect to.  That financial software you are using, does it write to a file that is outside of your “normal” data storage area, say buried in numerous levels of folders?  Point here, make sure you take time to explore and scrutinize each application you run.
• Jot down your network settings for each network connection.
• Download drivers for each hardware component. My list included the following items, and the rest I expect to just work, but do not let my brazen, wild abandon stop you from doing a thorough job on your system.
  • Network cards
  • Video cards
  • DVD/CD-Rom
  • Modem
  • Printers
  • External devices like cams, etc…
• When in doubt, write it out. If there is anything else that you feel might be worth writing down, it is probably safe to say that you should write it down.  There’s nothing worse that getting to the other side of an operating system install to find that you lost something, or forgot to write something down and have to hack your own system to get everything back to normal.

With everything backed up, and all the notes you could ever want that pertain to your system, it’s time to inventory your software.  Installing a new operating system is a great time to start fresh, and get rid of the trash that you have accumulated over the years.

Inventory all the software you’ll want to install into Windows 7

Not all software will work on Windows 7.  If you are using any 16-bit applications, I understand that you might experience questionable results under the new Windows architecture.  If you currently have the applications installed, the advisor application should tell you if you will run into any problems.

For organizational reasons, you should make a list of each application you will want to install, and make sure you have the ability to install and use each one.  Do you have the disks to perform the install?  This is especially important for those of you that have downloaded software.  Did you take the time to burn an image of that downloaded software to CD?  Or did you make a backup of the software to an external device?

I lost my download of Spore last time I did this, and I was not terribly pleased.  As Spore is a game, I was not really all that upset about it either.  Point here, don’t let that happen to you, make sure you can install everything you will need to use.

Performing a clean install of Windows 7

When I do an upgrade like this, I will preference wiping out the old operating system before installing the new operating system.  By doing this, there will not be any settings or left-over “stuff” from the prior operating system, or from the upgrade process.

The install process itself is incredibly easy, and I found myself quite impressed with how quick it was too.  When I installed Windows 7, I inserted the disk into my CD tray, rebooted and forced my laptop to boot from the CD, causing the installer to start up.

I am not going to get into the nuances of the install process, but I will mention that in the beginning of the install process, you’ll get a chance to define where Windows 7 should be installed.  You will also be able to indicate if the drive should be formatted or not.  I choose to format my drive and then install the operating systems and subsequent applications.

It just feels better, and I will swear I get better performance from my computer by doing so.

Performing an upgrade to Windows 7

There is not much to say here other than to slip the disk in the drive and start the install process.  I might be making an assumption that all your applications will remain in tact and usable on the other end of the install, but I do believe that all those legacy settings that were made by the install and uninstall of all your prior applications will also carry forward as well.  It is for this reason that I preference a clean install.  But to each their own, right?

Post Windows 7 installation procedures

Once Windows 7 gives you back control of your system, it is time to get everything just the way you want it.  You took notes on everything and made backups of all your data files, so the effort is really about establishing the environment settings just the way you like them, and getting all your software reinstalled.

First though, you should make sure that all your devices are working properly.  To help with that, here is a list of steps that you should take to ensure everything is working properly:

1. Make sure you can connect to the Internet.  Install/update your network card drivers if you need to.
2. Access Windows Update and perform a scan – make sure you do this a couple times.  Many times when you go back, you will find that Windows update has found yet another patch for something.  Repeat this until Windows does not find anything to patch, and repeat after you have reloaded all your applications again, or if you’re feeling spunky, after each application is installed.
3. If you need to reboot, do it immediately.  Do not wait to see what else you can install, just take the hit and reboot when the computer says you should or when it needs to reboot.
4. Set your video, mouse and keyboard settings.
5. Check Device Manager for any devices that are not working properly.  If you need to install drivers for the device, now is the time to do so.
6. Begin installing your software.  Maybe check Windows Update after each install?
7. Copy your data from backup to a location that is usable.

You should be back in the game and have your system back to normal at this point.  Now might be a good time to explore all that Windows 7 provides.

Notes and observations of my own install of Windows 7

This entire process generally takes me an entire day to perform, so I favor doing this on weekends where I know I will not be interrupted.  However,  this time I decided that I’d take two weekdays to perform my install and upgrade.  At the end of the first evening, I had backed up everything (over 350GB of data), taken the notes I needed to take, installed a fresh copy of Windows 7 (took about an hour! Yay!) configured and updated Windows 7, installed MS Office and Visual Studio.

The second evening I was able to get the remaining applications installed and configured, as well as re-establish my Data folder where I keep everything “data”.

So far I’m impressed with Windows 7, and hope to not have to uninstall it like I had to uninstall Vista.  Some applications just did not work right under Vista, like Microsoft’s premier development suite, Visual Studio!  Vista killed Microsoft’s own applications, and that was disturbing enough to me to cause me to revert to XP.

So far, everything seems quite fine under Windows 7.  I hope your install of Windows 7 goes just as smooth, and is just as enjoyable as my own experience was.

More Resources

Visit the Windows 7 Homepage
Still undecided? Try a Test drive of Windows 7
Read about Windows 7 features in Engadget’s review of Windows 7
Buy a copy of Windows 7

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