Vista Upgrade: Stuck in the Middle of Nowhere
by Will Bond - February 9, 2007 / 2:27pm View more articles
Recently I agreed to help Craig update his system since he was stuck with one of those horrible RDRAM systems Dell produced a few years ago. In short, it would cost him as much to try and upgrade his current system to 2GB of ram as is would to buy a whole new system (e.g. a new motherboard, processor, ram, etc) with some of the latest technologies.
In the process Craig decided to go out and grab an upgrade copy of Vista. While I am not a huge fan of Vista (that is another post for another time), I agreed to install it on his new system. What ensued what one of the most frustrating experiences I have had building a computer, short of dealing with faulty hardware.
I assembled the mix of old and new hardware and then popped the upgrade DVD in to install Vista. I knew I had to leave XP on the hard drive since that is one of the new upgrade requirements. So I started to boot from the DVD and all of a sudden the system restarted. Awesome!
A few posts online suggested bad ram or disabling hyperthreading (the Athlon 4200+ x2 we got doesn't have that). I was able to boot onto a windows PE disc no problem, so I didn't think any of the hardware was faulty. I played around with some bios settings for a while and found that to get the Vista installer to boot without restarting during the progress bar, I had to manually set my ram speed. Setting the ram speed to auto did not work. For reference this was in an ECS Nforce4 AM2 motherboard with ddr2 ram.
I figured that would be the end of my problems with the install, but boy was I wrong! Now that I could boot the Vista DVD, I tried to enter the CD key. After doing so I was informed that I could only upgrade the system by starting the installing from my existing operating system. Whatever, so I booted into Windows XP.
In the process of booting into Windows XP I got a nice BSOD, probably because of drivers that were trying to load for the old motherboard. Since I work with Windows a bit I knew I could boot into safemode and uninstall the drivers.
So booting up again I hit F8 and chose Safe Mode with Networking. Once the system was done booting I clicked one of the screen names to log in. Upon doing so I received a nice error message indicating this copy of Windows needed to be activated, and that I could not log in until activated. I was instructed that I could not activate in safe mode, but I would rather have to boot Windows normally.
Talk about awesome! I can't install without booting into Windows, I can't boot into Windows because of old drivers, I can't remove the old drivers because Windows isn't activated, I can't activate Windows because I can't boot normally. Thanks Microsoft!
Luckily for my sanity, and Craig's, some people have found a way to install a Vista Upgrade 'clean'. It really is too bad we had to go to such lengths, but the only people we have to thank is Microsoft.
This is just another reason (again, that is another post for another time) why I am hoping to never upgrade my Windows XP laptop to Vista. I am hedging my bets on Linux and Wine improving to where I can abandon Windows before XP is no longer supported.
In the process Craig decided to go out and grab an upgrade copy of Vista. While I am not a huge fan of Vista (that is another post for another time), I agreed to install it on his new system. What ensued what one of the most frustrating experiences I have had building a computer, short of dealing with faulty hardware.
I assembled the mix of old and new hardware and then popped the upgrade DVD in to install Vista. I knew I had to leave XP on the hard drive since that is one of the new upgrade requirements. So I started to boot from the DVD and all of a sudden the system restarted. Awesome!
A few posts online suggested bad ram or disabling hyperthreading (the Athlon 4200+ x2 we got doesn't have that). I was able to boot onto a windows PE disc no problem, so I didn't think any of the hardware was faulty. I played around with some bios settings for a while and found that to get the Vista installer to boot without restarting during the progress bar, I had to manually set my ram speed. Setting the ram speed to auto did not work. For reference this was in an ECS Nforce4 AM2 motherboard with ddr2 ram.
I figured that would be the end of my problems with the install, but boy was I wrong! Now that I could boot the Vista DVD, I tried to enter the CD key. After doing so I was informed that I could only upgrade the system by starting the installing from my existing operating system. Whatever, so I booted into Windows XP.
In the process of booting into Windows XP I got a nice BSOD, probably because of drivers that were trying to load for the old motherboard. Since I work with Windows a bit I knew I could boot into safemode and uninstall the drivers.
So booting up again I hit F8 and chose Safe Mode with Networking. Once the system was done booting I clicked one of the screen names to log in. Upon doing so I received a nice error message indicating this copy of Windows needed to be activated, and that I could not log in until activated. I was instructed that I could not activate in safe mode, but I would rather have to boot Windows normally.
Talk about awesome! I can't install without booting into Windows, I can't boot into Windows because of old drivers, I can't remove the old drivers because Windows isn't activated, I can't activate Windows because I can't boot normally. Thanks Microsoft!
Luckily for my sanity, and Craig's, some people have found a way to install a Vista Upgrade 'clean'. It really is too bad we had to go to such lengths, but the only people we have to thank is Microsoft.
This is just another reason (again, that is another post for another time) why I am hoping to never upgrade my Windows XP laptop to Vista. I am hedging my bets on Linux and Wine improving to where I can abandon Windows before XP is no longer supported.
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15 Comments
No, the only people you have to thank is YOU, and the other millions of lemmings who keep using Microcrap software instead of Macs or Linux.
a) you for trying to install the "upgrade Vista" on an XP that was NOT installed on that system - obviously any remotely competent user would have tried first to install XP on that system and only then to UPGRADE;
b) your friend for buying the "upgrade" version.
This blog post wasn't about me not being able to install Vista, but rather a critique of a poor user experience Microsoft has implemented. To get it to install I either had to reinstall XP and then install Vista, or install Vista demo and install the upgrade on top of that. Don't worry, I'm not bagging on an issue I don't understand.
@Ron Garret
Actually, we have Microsoft to thank. Craig doesn't use Windows because he is lemming, but rather because it is the best solution for what he needs done. A lot of people don't seem to understand that there are different situations that call for different operating systems.
@cucu
Rather, I would counter that neither my friend or myself are "dumb." It is widely known that Vista requires a more powerful computer for the same level of performance you get with XP. Wouldn't it make logical sense to upgrade the software and hardware at the same time? I believe it does. Why should a user first upgrade the hardware and fix his OS just to install a new OS? As for Craig buying the upgrade, what is dumb about that? He has XP and he wants to upgrade to Vista and stop using XP. Makes quite a bit of sense to me...
@Paul
So lets say Microsoft doesn't consider this a strict upgrade, and instead that I just wanted to replace the motherboard so I could get more ram. So I try to boot into windows normally and I get the BSOD. I try to boot into safe-mode to fix it and I can't log in because I am not activated. At thins point I have to reinstall the OS because of a hardware upgrade, when all that really needs to be done is have some drivers removed. What it really seems to come down to is that Microsoft's activation system is not flexible enough.
It does bug me. I love Macromedia's activation system, because you can easily de-authorize a machine, move your software, and then activate on a new machine. I've moved the same copy of Dreamweaver across three upgrades that way.
Even XP's full retail version (that you can move to any machine you own) doesn't support doing this. Teh Lame.
I have a fast, 64-bit machine which was running XP (32-bit because of the compatibility issues) which has emblazoned across the front "Vista Capable"...
I ran the various checks to ensure that upgrading to Vista was not going to be an issue - though I quickly realized that my on;y upgrade path was to Vista 32-bit from XP 32-bit... Sigh...
Ran the DVD from XP and started the upgrade - everything seemed to be progressing nicely - when the machine reached the first (and only) restart point. I didn't realize that, at this point, I should remove the DVD from the drive as the machine started up from the DVD and required activation which had already occurred when I started the DVD in XP. When the penny dropped, I removed the DVD and restarted - again, everything seemed to be working as expected and finally I reached the point when the upgrade announced that it was complete. The computer restarted...
Since then, the machine cycles through a start-fail-restart sequence which never gets as far as the Vista startup screen (if there is one) and I cannot even start up in Safe mode. Error message tells me that the problems is that I have loaded some new software (yes... Vista) which may be incompatible???
Microsoft doesn't support computer installations with less than 10 networked machines over the weekend, so I will have to wait until Monday to get then to help me sort this out.
For the "should have used a Mac" brigade out there - I do also run computers with OS X and agree that these are more intuitive, less prone to such mind-boggling WTF moments, and generally more powerful, compatible, enjoyable yah-di-yah-di-yah, but I have no choice but to use Windows also and knowing that OS X "just works" doesn't help me with my Windows problems...
Now who is to blame?
Thanks Microsoft
Wonder if the following will work going from my Gateway RDRAM $$$ machine to a new homebrew system:
1, Clone current OS partition onto new drive and install in new machine.
2. Borrow a generic OEM XP install disk with key. Do a repair install with said disk/key over the old system - this should build a new HAL with a 30 day grace period to activate.
3. Purchase/Install Vista Upgrade with it's new key. Done.
Only question is: does Vista install care if original OS is unactivated when installing??
Worst case, I may have to purchase a NEW OEM XP and activate it, but this is still cheaper than my time to reinstall 3 years worth of programs.
I am a system builder/troubleshooter guy, and am now faced with having to inform all of my prospective clients that they will need to go through the angst of a full clean reinstall of Vista every time that some (larg-ish) piece of hardware changes on their system.
Just to clarify what the initial post is saying, and to explain my predicament:
1) Customer comes in with hosed mobo on Windows Vista Upgraded (XP Home base) machine.
2) Troubleshooter guy (me) replaces mobo
3) Troubleshooter tries to boot in to Vista - Does not load due to new chipset (etc et al) form motherboard manufacturer.
4) Troubleshooter boots off Vista 'Upgrade' DVD. No Upgrade option possible, only clean install.
5) Troubleshooter tries full retail edition of Vista only to find you CANNOT upgrade from this disk EITHER. It insists that you start the install from within Windows.
What a bunch of gehness... How are you supposed to retain existing settings on an install of Vista if you cannot boot from the Vista DVD and perform an 'upgrade'? System troubleshooters such as myself are going to have to get used to telling people with broken systems (or systems that can't boot) that they will have to reinstall all of their programs (etc et al) JUST BECAUSE someone forgot to code the DVD's to allow for the bootable upgrade option....!
An interesting point to note: Yes I am aware of the 'install XP first and then go the upgrade' option, however this will NOT retain the existing copy of Vista with its files and settings.. Effectively you would be replacing the clean (recently) installed version of XP with a new copy of Vista, and not 'reinstalling Vista over the top of itself'.
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