the dreaded windows 10 upgrade with extra hard drives

[Dean_Maytrap]

so i borrowed my offices Oculus Rift headset and Touch controllers over the weekend (loved it), and have decided to completely overhaul my life & system to get ready for VR at home.

Im still running windows 7 at the moment (i know....i know....leave it......) and have read that future VR releases will almost certainly require windows 10 to run.

So im now looking to finally make the jump upwards. Friends and colleagues have all assured me that is a now very much a simple process & relatively bug-free, HOWEVER - i do have 4 hard drives in the rig:
1 SSD for the OS
1 SSD for my games
1 SSD for my work programs
and 1 HDD as a data backup

what is the process here? My understanding is that i have to unplug all the non-OS drives, but that any programs on the extra drives will then not be usable after the upgrade and would then need to be formatted and the programs reinstalled - although articles stating that were a llittle on the older side, is that still the case?

 

[srimasis]

Yup that's still the case. When you install a new OS your old installed softwares are now useless. You need to reinstall them. Your OS drive will be formatted but it's not necessary to format your other drives. You can still install new OS without formatting your OS drive, but that will be a mess to be honest, and your existing installed softwares would still be useless in the new OS.

 

[Dean_Maytrap]

thanks for the tip man. The friend that assured me i can just do a simple windows 10 overwrite is a particularly lazy mofo, so a clean install is def. my preferred method

so with my extra SSD 2 hard drives that have programs (games & work) i understand im going to need to reinstall everything - essentially format the drives and just start from scratch (backing everything up beforehand, of course)

concerning formatting the drives, is there a preferred method to it? Do i bother uninstalling the programs on them first? Do i format them prior to upgrading the OS drive or after?

I assume the answer to these questions will most likely be "it doesnt matter...." but im just looking to be 100% on everything here, no room for errors

 

[velocityg4]

thanks for the tip man. The friend that assured me i can just do a simple windows 10 overwrite is a particularly lazy mofo, so a clean install is def. my preferred method

so with my extra SSD 2 hard drives that have programs (games & work) i understand im going to need to reinstall everything - essentially format the drives and just start from scratch (backing everything up beforehand, of course)

concerning formatting the drives, is there a preferred method to it? Do i bother uninstalling the programs on them first? Do i format them prior to upgrading the OS drive or after?

I assume the answer to these questions will most likely be "it doesnt matter...." but im just looking to be 100% on everything here, no room for errors

Use GPT instead of MBR if you want UEFI boot on the OS drive. Should be automatic if you use Windows installation media booted in UEFI or Legacy (BIOS) mode, wipe partitions off the drive and start it fresh with a new partition.

I prefer to leave other drives disconnected during installation so there are no mistakes. Also I don't know if Windows still adds files to secondary drives during installation. This was a pain during the XP days if you later removed a secondary drive. I don't care to test it so I always disconnect all other drives during a Windows install.

If you plan on a data only drive. I use exFAT instead of NTFS. That way it can be used with any OS.

 

[traxxmy]

Rather than install Window 10 why don't you just upgrade which will preserve all your program and games. Installing will essentially made you window new and broke all link to the games an work program drive. I'm not sure if free upgrade to window 10 still so have search yourself.

 

[Dean_Maytrap]

Rather than install Window 10 why don't you just upgrade which will preserve all your program and games. Installing will essentially made you window new and broke all link to the games an work program drive. I'm not sure if free upgrade to window 10 still so have search yourself.

but apparently it won't preserve them (see other reply above), and it especially wont preserve the programs and games on the additional non-OS drives (see also above), plus the upgrage is liable to render the whole thing a bit sluggish and id prefer a rebuilt but robust system

 

[Peter Martin]

upgrades of OS should be not allowed by MS. Format/Nuke partitions/Reinstall with just one drive attached at install, hook rest up later.

in my vast experience, upgrading an OS is NEVER the way to go to get it just right. Let's face it, upgrades suck.

 

[srimasis]

thanks for the tip man. The friend that assured me i can just do a simple windows 10 overwrite is a particularly lazy mofo, so a clean install is def. my preferred method

so with my extra SSD 2 hard drives that have programs (games & work) i understand im going to need to reinstall everything - essentially format the drives and just start from scratch (backing everything up beforehand, of course)

concerning formatting the drives, is there a preferred method to it? Do i bother uninstalling the programs on them first? Do i format them prior to upgrading the OS drive or after?

I assume the answer to these questions will most likely be "it doesnt matter...." but im just looking to be 100% on everything here, no room for errors

No need to uninstall anything, just do a quick format when installing OS (the option will come during installation).

Just a tip, backup your important data (pictures or software configs, projects, game save files, music etc) to an external HDD before installing new OS. Don't take any chance for accidents.

 

[USAFRet]

You've been living with Win 7 for several years.
A direct Upgrade to Win 10 will carry over all that old cruft from the ancient Win 7.
Time for a clean break and start over.

How to do a CLEAN installation of Windows 10

 

[Dean_Maytrap]

[/quotemsg]

No need to uninstall anything, just do a quick format when installing OS (the option will come during installation).

Just a tip, backup your important data (pictures or software configs, projects, game save files, music etc) to an external HDD before installing new OS. Don't take any chance for accidents.[/quotemsg]

sure, that's the OS drive. But if im to have the other 3 drives unplugged while installing the new OS, and 2 of those drives (games and programs) need to also be formatted and then everything on them reinstalled, is it preferable to format that prior to the clean install (under windows 7) or wait until after they been reconnected and then do it under windows 10?

Like i said, im sure the answer will probably be "it doesnt matter", but i just want to be 100% on this

 

[USAFRet]

sure, that's the OS drive. But if im to have the other 3 drives unplugged while installing the new OS, and 2 of those drives (games and programs) need to also be formatted and then everything on them reinstalled, is it preferable to format that prior to the clean install (under windows 7) or wait until after they been reconnected and then do it under windows 10?

Like i said, im sure the answer will probably be "it doesnt matter", but i just want to be 100% on this

It doesn't matter...
Reconnect and format them after the Win 10 install is up and running.

 

[Dean_Maytrap]

awesome, thanks man