Upgrading to Professional 7, I think i did something bizarre

[Rick_88]

Ok so, I think I made a pretty huge mistake trying to upgrade from Vista to Professional 7. Where to start...

My school provides me with licenses and an ISO for numerous operating systems, Windows 7 Professional included. I have an old PC that it's on Vista that I want to upgrade from Vista to 7. I don't have access to a DVD burner or a DVD drive on this computer, so I downloaded the ISO using Secure Download Manager, and then mounted the .ISO file using PowerISO. I currently had a 500GB HDD attached to the computer, and I wanted to put the OS on a brand new 240 GB SSD that I purchased for said computer. So my genius idea was to initialize the SSD while I was still running Vista, and then doing a custom install of Windows 7 over Windows Vista. Vista was on the old HDD, but I wanted to do the Windows 7 install on the SSD, so when I was prompted by Windows 7 to install it onto the SSD, I went ahead, and the process seemed normal.

This is where everything started to get not normal.

I managed to get a functioning copy of Windows 7 going, but it seemed incredibly sluggish. I have it on the SSD, but I can't boot from the SSD, i have to boot from the HDD. When I choose to boot from the HDD, I have the option to pick between WIndows 7 and Windows Vista. When I boot 7, I get 7. When I boot vista off the HDD however, I get my preinstall version of Window Vista, the version that I thought would be wiped clean when I did the upgrade, even if I targetted the SSD with the Windows 7 upgrade.

Additionally, when I attempt to boot off the SSD, I get an error akin to BootMGR is missing, press ctrl+alt+del to restart. I feel like I've done a pretty good job mucking up this entire process, and I was wondering what the solution to it would be. Maybe a USB bootdrive? I don't have a way to use physical Windows Discs currently so everything that involves a disk has to be done off a mounted ISO.

The next solution I'm meaning to try is to redo the Vista to 7 Professional Upgrade, actually target the old HDD with the upgrade, and then clone the OS onto the SSD. Not sure if that's a proper solution or not

EDIT:

I have around 40GB of stuff on my SSD so Windows 7 is on there in some capacity, I'm thinking something like the BootMGR still installed to my HDD even though I specified to put it on the SSD?

 

[Paul NZ]

If]http://rufus.akeo.ie/]If you've got the Win7 key I would use Rufus.[/url]

You'll need a flash drive. Add the ISO to it wait for it to finish then boot from it

If the system you're installing it on supports UEFI, select it in Rufus, if not select MRB before you add the ISO and click start

And use a USB 2 port if there are any on this

 

[Rick_88]

I think I will try this out then. Should I do a full format on my SSD?

 

[Paul NZ]

Hmm looks like Sandisk made flash drives this way when Win8 came out.

Something to do with Win8 certification. Then they realised that the people who had them had faulty flash drives.

People couldnt use them, because they were fixed not removable

This sounds similar to the prob you're having with your Sandisk

 

[Rick_88]

Yeah I think I will have to purchase a new USB stick for this solution.

Rufus was attempting to read my stick, but I don't think it's going to work in the end, I had already tried the one put out by microsoft for the purpose of making a usb bootdrive and it wasn't working too well

 

[Paul NZ]

I think I will try this out then. Should I do a full format on my SSD?

Yup but you can't do it if Windows is on it.

If you've got the ISO and burned it or used something to extract it to, boot from it

 

[Rick_88]

It has Windows 7 on it, but is missing the BootMGR I believe. I'm currently using the HDD and Vista, but I can also boot off the HDD to Windows 7, but not the SSD. I guess I'm misunderstanding when it comes to why I can't format the SSD currently? Sorry, I'm kinda getting some brain lag at this point

 

[Paul NZ]

I would get another flash drive first, then all you have to do is the above with Rufus. It should work but use a USB 2 port

Win7 doesnt support USB 3 when you install it

 

[Rick_88]

Oh I see, Ok thanks I'll give this a shot!

 

[Paul NZ]

No probs ! Good luck