Windows 7 Upgrade Could Take Over 20 Hours

[Pyroflea]

Personally, I don't see 20 hours being bad at all. Considering I have about 200 programs and games installed, how long do you think it would take to back up all my media, install ALL of those programs and games, reconfigure all those programs and games, replace media, etc. I bet longer than 20 hours.

And Mac dearest comrade, just... just stop talking. The reason yours took 45 minutes is because it was barely doing anything. Windows 7: New OS. Snow Leopard: Service Pack. So yeah.

 

[ptroen]

I think the assumption at the worst case is a 5400 rpm disk. Do yourself a favour and install it on a solid state disk. I mean if your paying ~$100+ for windows then you can afford the extra $100 for the solid state disk.

 

[matt87_50]

anyone who would spend 20 hrs installing windows deserves the mac they'ed no doubt run to...

 

[mickey21]

Upgraded Vista Ultimate SP2 to Windows 7 Ultimate and it only took 1 hour and 20 minutes, from DVD insertion to completion and running desktop. Including the upgrade validation program... One, I needed to know how long it would take (in the IT field) and two I recently installed Vista SP2 when I built my large RAID5 volume and wasnt interested in redoing it after only 5 weeks of use. Not to mention all the application reinstallation. No issues encountered at all with upgrade. I mean come on, it is essentially Vista anyways, who are you kidding... XP to Win7 sure, but Vista is so close in design to Win7, I am not worried...

 

[apache_lives]

[citation][nom]demonhorde665[/nom]i neer do "upgrade" versions , always get a new os , not looking forward to any kind of upgrade at teh moemnt thiough , 1. would have to back up EVERY thing school related (3ds , max files jepgs , of art work , flash presentations, adobe premiere presentations this alone would eat up teh better part of my day 2. would ahve to back up game saves (less time than the otehr stuff but still a hassle 3. would avhe to reformat HD , (and ntot eh quick reformat , not when i do a enw install) 4. install new os , can gbe long process in it's self5. last but not least the killer - reinstall every peice of school software (3ds max , photoshop , illustrator , ms office aps , adobe priemere, maya , adobe acrobat pro., ect ect) then reinstall every game i was playing prior to the new os , as wlel as re d/l any custom content for said games ...this step woudl liekly be a 2-3 day thing with me installing shita round the clock[/citation]

Backup the whole USERS and PROGRAM DATA (or if your using ancient windows xp - DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS) folders to somewhere safe, wipe the system and install fresh - how hard is that? and when you need the software you simple REINSTALL it when needed - i do the same thing between all the pcs im on - need firefox? reinstall it etc - NOT hard.

Its not difficult - your list there would take me well under 2 hours and the benifits - a much cleaner fresher system, more free space, no errors, no issues at all.

If the down time is that bad and that important you should have a decent backup system in place, and even the i would suggest copying all your required items to the backup so when needed you can install it from the backup - i do all my stuff over the network, i copied the office cd contents to my server and install it directly - installs as if it was from a cd but 10x quicker - most other software allows it too.

Also look into microsofts own software and settings transfer wizard (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Easy_Transfer) - been around for ages but never touched it my self.

 

[belardo]

einstall every peice of school software (3ds max , photoshop , illustrator , ms office aps , adobe priemere, maya , adobe acrobat pro., ect ect) then reinstall every game i was playing prior to the new os , as wlel as re d/l any custom content for said games ...this step woudl liekly be a 2-3 day thing with me installing shita round the clock

Theres a better way...
1 - Don't INSTALL everything to C: drive. A thing called Partitions is a life saver. If I want/need to do a "clean" OS install, I just copy what few settings folders and "my docs"(minor) to another partition. and wipe C: drive. Things like games, content are NOT on C: drive. And when de-fragging, it speeds things up!

2 - Win7(ultimate) installs in about 15~20 mins. Photoshop about 5mins, MS-Office2007 Pro = 3-6 mins. Most games can be installed anywhere (like any software)... and save the REG keys. DL content for games SHOULD be in the game folder... otherwise, typical sloppy programming.

3 - Yes... installing a NEW OS on a system with a history will never be quick. But I've done emg rebuilds in 3-4 hours (backup, re-install, etc)

Learn the habit of having a 30~50GB C: (OS + APP).
OS7 typically eats about 5~7GB of space. After driver installs, compressed into a backup file, its about 2-3GB. Then install your Major Apps... then updates... a typical *TYPICAL* user may max out around 8~12GB of OS & Apps.

Then use the FREE backup mirror software Reflex to make an IMAGE of your C: drive and put the file on an external USB HDD drive / whatever.

If your OS gets hosed or drive failure... boot with the restore CD (to read the USB drive) and restore the drive to its original state. Very very fast. Restored a 4GB C: partition perfectly in about 5mins.

 

[ossie]

"First of all, the core software changes to go from Vista to 7 aren't as drastic as previous generations of Windows."
Great discovery! Are there any?
"Interestingly, the time it took for Windows 7 to upgrade from Windows Vista SP1 outpaced that of a Vista SP1 to Vista SP1 upgrade procedure."
Seriously? I guess it should be vi$hta -> sp1.
Obviously there is no difference compared with sp1 -> sp2, as it's mostly the same with sp1 -> $even (aka sp2+lipstick).
"At its very worst the upgrade from Windows Vista to 7 was found to take a whopping 20 hours."
Evidently, with the notably exception of complete failure...

Sometimes, I'm just wondering what yummy boy is getting it's paycheck for...

 

[ossie]

[citation][nom]kato128[/nom]Think of it as retraining. MS is increasing your value to your employer.[/citation]
I'd rather think it's costs...

 

[Andraxxus]

19.59 hours power failure Nooooooooooo!

 

[ssddx]

20 hours would be a godsend. Installing programs and applications is not the problem. The trouble lies in diagnosing driver errors and restoring application settings to how they were before the install. This includes all shortcuts, macros, window settings, etc. Please also keep in mind the sheer amount of effort in screenshotting & documenting of written commands down on paper. At least you can save time with backing up data if you have a partition for your OS and a seperate one for data.

Restoring a system for me would take at LEAST 20 hours. If It was my work pc I would say about 40. All in all, starting fresh is the best choice: albiet a pain in the ... Well worth the effort

 

[Prescott_666]

Here's a question about installing Windows 7 Home Premium. My wife has a gateway laptop that came with Vista Home Premium. When her system crashed, there were a lot of broken files, Windows would boot, but several things like Windows Explorer, Microsoft Installer, and Office 2007 broke, so I got a fresh hard drive and did a clean install of Windows 7 RC1. I have ordered Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade, and I will do a clean install when it comes. I know that I can't do an upgrade on Windows 7 RC1 since it is Windows 7 Ultimate. Can I reformat one of the hard drives and do a clean install, or will I have to reinstall Vista Home Premium and then install Windows 7?

Anybody know?

 

[Guest]

Wow lot of Mac haters here...

Never figured out why some people are so opposed to other techs. I run all three - OS X (laptop) for general work and as a media center (mini), Linux for servers firewall/fileservers, WinXP for school and a clean copy of Win7 for games.

That being said, anyone that thinks that Snow Leopard won't install is cherry picking sensationalist headlines and running with them... As for the security, anybody want to back up their claims that OS X is less secure than Windows (out of the box?)

 

[itadakimasu]

I remember Vista Sp1 took forever to install. It was left on overnight and wasn't finished, I don't know the exact amount of hours but it was more than 12.

 

[zak_mckraken]

A new OS is always an excuse for me to buy a new hard drive! I need room to back up my po... my thesis on international foreign exchange politics on natural ressources!

 

[jangocat]

I doubt it. You would have to have a really weak computer that must be running really bad already for an upgrade to take that long. As been previously stated by other poster a clean install is the only sensible way to upgrade an OS anyway.

 

[Camikazi]

[citation][nom]Pyroflea[/nom]Personally, I don't see 20 hours being bad at all. Considering I have about 200 programs and games installed, how long do you think it would take to back up all my media, install ALL of those programs and games, reconfigure all those programs and games, replace media, etc. I bet longer than 20 hours.[/citation]
Put all important data on a separate drive/partition and no backups needed, backup reg and ini settings for programs onto other drive/partition and it cuts down on reinstalls by a huge amount. I do it every 4-6 months just to keep system fast (I try out alot of beta and small company software), I've gotten reinstall and setup down to about 4 hours or so now. Another option is do complete install with drivers and mostly used programs then make a ghost copy and keep that backed up, with a good program can cut down reinstalls to 1 hour.

 

[p05esto]

You guys forget a lot of people can barely figure out email.... and certainly can't set up their email settings without help. For this HUGE group of people they will simply press the upgrade button. You mention backup and their eyes glaze over.

 

[jangocat]

[citation][nom]ssddx[/nom]20 hours would be a godsend. Installing programs and applications is not the problem. The trouble lies in diagnosing driver errors and restoring application settings to how they were before the install. This includes all shortcuts, macros, window settings, etc. Please also keep in mind the sheer amount of effort in screenshotting & documenting of written commands down on paper. At least you can save time with backing up data if you have a partition for your OS and a seperate one for data.Restoring a system for me would take at LEAST 20 hours. If It was my work pc I would say about 40. All in all, starting fresh is the best choice: albiet a pain in the ... Well worth the effort[/citation]

Dude that's ridiculous! Seriously if it honestly take you that long you need symantec ghost. I could restore a server in 1/4 of that time. No way a workstation should take 40 hours to restore. That would never fly in our IT dept.

 

[saint19]

And Microsoft says that "win 7 is better that vista", if this is better, how could be bad?. this is the reasons because I LOVE LINUX.....

 

[agentjon]

[citation][nom]08nwsula[/nom]20 hours? were they using a floppy?[/citation]

They would have gotten better results using carrier pegions.

 

[jwl3]

By now, I can do it with my eyes closed and one finger. I can't count the number of times I've formatted and reinstalled XP for myself, friends, and family because of scum viruses. (they need to execute virus writers for the misery they cause - lost productivity, aggravation, stress multiplied by the millions that get affected). And being the anal type, I can't just turn it over like that. I need to reinstall every program and organize every menu and folder just so and remove all the useless startup items in XP. It takes a good 6 hours to get everything to perfection wit Win updates, virus detection installs, MS Office, etc. etc. etc. I absolutely hate it!

 

[CptTripps]

Freshy install for me, I will not lie though, it's gonna be hell re-installing all my apps.

 

[nachowarrior]

20 Hours for a kernel update is retarded. especially for a 100-200 dollar kernel update. I guess in os producti\/ity the adage "you get what you pay for" is flopped upside down.

 

[aford10]

Yet another reason to do a fresh install.

 

[brendano257]

Sadly I've reformatted my HD, and re-installed Vista Ult. sooo many times that I've gotten down to about 12 hours from clean install to having all my games and other programs installed/patched. And having all programs set up for use, iTunes, Media Center(with AVI and such) and of course all drivers too XD