Upgrade or clean install

[sgmidf]

I just received my T400s with Vista Ultimate today. Part of me wants to boot it up, install programs and upgrade in a few weeks. The other side tells me to just wait and do a clean install when the disks come out in a week or 2. I've got another NB to use in the meantime. As it's so close, what do folks recommend?
Thanks

[asiafish]

Clean install, ALWAYS

[sgmidf]

That's what I figured although I thought that I'd read that the upgrade was pretty clean. Am I correct that I CAN do a clean install using the upgrade disks that I ordered through Lenovo?

[ZaZ]

I could never wait that long.

[bill bolton]

Part of me wants to boot it up, install programs and upgrade in a few weeks.

Go for it.

I've let Win 7 Ultimate x64 RTM do ugrades from Vista Ultimate X64 SP2 on two ThinkPads so far, and its gone very smoothly in both cases.

There's no point in depriving yourself of a new T400s!

Cheers,

Bill B.

[mgo]

I just received my T400s with Vista Ultimate today. Part of me wants to boot it up, install programs and upgrade in a few weeks. The other side tells me to just wait and do a clean install when the disks come out in a week or 2. I've got another NB to use in the meantime. As it's so close, what do folks recommend?
Thanks

Because of my multiple experiences with a clean install using XP, Vista and now Windows 7, I am a very strong advocate of clean install. There is less left over digital "trash" remaining, based on my one time experimental Upgrade from Vista to Windows 7.

Windows 7 seems rather good at finding drivers for a machine via Windows Update, and Lenovo also has drivers and utilities on their Windows 7 beta page. Install the operating system, run Windows Update a couple of time, reboot in between, and you will find some drivers for your machine.

Here is the link for the Lenovo Windows 7 download page:
http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... -BETA.html

Some of the downloads from Lenovo do not send the install files over to C:\Drivers, but rather complete the install right away. Easy to be confused by that (for me, anyway)

[Marin85]

@OP: If you have time, I think you should go with the clean installation. The chance that something goes wrong when performing an OS upgrade is simply much higher than with clean installation. Even though clean installation is time consuming (installing all your programs, transferring all your data), I think it eventually pays off. On the other hand, if time is an issue, you may be better off doing an OS upgrade.

[Tasurinchi]

Clean install no doubt!

The chance that something goes wrong when performing an OS upgrade is simply much higher than with clean installation

Fully agree...

From my personal experience, after a clean install the system is normally faster and leaner.

Just my 0.02 cents...

[bill bolton]

From my personal experience, after a clean install the system is normally faster and leaner.

How many Vista to Win 7 updates on ThinkPads have you had experience with

[aeschylus]

If you do go the route of a clean install won't you lose a lot of the preinstalled software (such as Roxio media burning software) with no way to retrieve it?

[Marin85]

If you do go the route of a clean install won't you lose a lot of the preinstalled software (such as Roxio media burning software) with no way to retrieve it?

Only if it is worth anything to you! When I got my machine, I found Roxio obsolete (as well as Google Picasa and other preloaded stuff).

[Harryc]

If you do go the route of a clean install won't you lose a lot of the preinstalled software (such as Roxio media burning software) with no way to retrieve it?

This is something I'm anxious to see in action as far as how the Lenovo W7 upgrade discs will handle older software. It's particularly interesting in light of the fact that Lenovo has already publicly stated that 'some' of their existing Thinkvantage utilities will not be supported in W7..e.g 'Presentation Director'. So, what happens to the older unsupported stuff during an upgrade?

http://www.thinkpads.com/2009/08/12/len ... hnologies/

[Marin85]

So, what happens to the older unsupported stuff during an upgrade?

I see only two possibilities: it either gets uninstalled during the upgrade process (sounds rather unlikely to me) or it stays and *runs* under Windows 7, but one doesn´t receive any updates. Some of that older stuff may turn out to be fully compatible with Windows 7 as it is with Vista. As for the non-compatible stuff one will have to uninstall it by himself.
I think it appears reasonable for Lenovo to discontinue those applications since Windows 7 seems to have excellent built-in applications for all that features. I have never seen much sense in Productivity Center either.

[Tasurinchi]

How many Vista to Win 7 updates on ThinkPads have you had experience with

Zero

It was poor wording from my side. I was referring more generally to OS upgrades. I've seen XP to Vista upgrades and I can remember some W2k to XP upgrades too that did not went completeley wrong, but still caused sluggish performance and several bugs. On the Ubuntu side I did try once updating from 7.04 to 7.10 on my old T30 which gave me problems with audio and wireless drivers.

All these "bad" experiences make me prefer to do clean installs.

Sorry for the confusion...

Cheers

[bill bolton]

So, what happens to the older unsupported stuff during an upgrade?

The standard Windows 7 "upgrade" installation selection (from a Microsoft Signature Edition x64 Ultimate system disk) prompted me to uninstall a number of pieces of software, and I recall that Presentation Director was one of those items, prior to commencing the upgrade installation.

It also indicated which of the uninstalled items should be reinstalled after the update... and Presentation Director wasn't one of them.

Cheers,

Bill B.

[Harryc]

Bill, thanks for the information. I read all over the Net how Lenovo worked closely with MS on Windows 7, so it sounds like some of what you experienced my have been a result of that collaboration.

[mattfromomaha]

Now, if I do a clean install on my Vista T61, does setup delete the Vista service partition, which would prevent me from recovering my factory settings (without restore CDs)?

[Marin85]

If you mean the *hidden* Vista partition from Lenovo, I believe the Vista install program should be able to see it during the setup, that is, when it comes to the available partitions you should be given the choice of installing Vista on the free space and thus preserving the partition from Lenovo. However, I´m not sure how usable it would be after the install since it needs its own boot data if I remember correctly. In any case, to reinstall Vista from there one needs the Rescue&Recovery predesktop area, which will most likely be broken after the clean install. Maybe someone could shed some light whether with the current state of R&R it´s possible to restore the functionality of the predesktop area. If I´m not mistaken, it now resides on its own partition. Having said that, Vista setup program should actually see 2 'service' partitions from Lenovo. If not, then I don´t see any chance how to use the 'hidden' partition to restore to factory settings (if preserved at all).

[sgmidf]

Well I couldn't wait and have set up the T400s with all of my software. Very nice machine. When the disks arrive, I'll try the upgrade (unless I hear differently from others here) and let folks know how it turned out. I can always wipe everything and start from scratch if I need to.

Steve

[syrahnose]

I bought an x200 on 21st and ticked the free w7 upgrade. Does that mean when it is delivered it will come with a separate set of w7 disks, or will it have the old vista disks and some special download to upgrade. I'm assuming this twilight area will make it difficult to do a clean install of w7, and require adding w7 on top of vista.

forgive me if this is a stupid question.

[pipspeak]

I'm fascinated to hear about folks' experiences upgrading from Vista 32 to Win7 32. I would love to do a clean install but simply don't have the time to faff around reinstalling and congifuring dozens of pieces of software, let alone all the Lenovo utilities.

Is it really true that an upgrade will not be as lean and fast and trouble free as a clean install, or is this just a rumor based on previous MS upgrade snafus?

[bill bolton]

Is it really true that an upgrade will not be as lean and fast and trouble free as a clean install, or is this just a rumor based on previous MS upgrade snafus?

To date I have upgraded two ThinkPads and my Desktop system, plus clean installed another ThinkPad.

I can't see any significant difference in general Win 7 performance between either approach, but an upgrade certainly takes MUCH less time overall than an clean install of the OS plus all the applications I use.

Cheers,

Bill B.

[Tasurinchi]

To date I have upgraded two ThinkPads and my Desktop system, plus clean installed another ThinkPad.

Went the upgrade process smoothly? I assume it was from Vista to Win7, right?

I can't see any significant difference in general Win 7 performance between either approach, but an upgrade certainly takes MUCH less time overall than an clean install of the OS plus all the applications I use

I agree, for those using lots of software it's a pain in the neck to reinstall everything after a clean install. Alltough there are applications like nLite (for XP) and vLite (Vista) where you can customize your installations CD/DVD, add applications and drivers, exclude parts of the software you don't want/need, etc. etc. I assume a version for Win7 will appear soon (if it's not done yet).

I personally allways do clean installs, but I use my TP mostly for "couch browsing" and watching videos when I'm away only, so once Firefox is installed I don't need much to re-install. The rest of the applications I use like VLC and Open Office are portable versions that I have in a seperate partition. So in case Winxx is screwed up, a reinstall will not destroy either my data or the portable versions of the software.

I' did yesterday a clean install of Win7 on my X31 (have to change my signature), and the process was pretty straight up, it tooks around 20 minutes to complete and is working quite well. I still have some issues with the old ATI drivers but I will put my comments and another topic I saw in the Windows 7 section of this forum.

My 0.02 cents...

Cheers

Tasurinchi

[bill bolton]

I assume it was from Vista to Win7, right?

That's the only sort of update from a previous Windows version that you can do!

I've just finished an upgrade on my T400... it also went smoothly. I only had to do a couple of manual Lenovo driver installs, after System Update 4 found/installed 10 driver updates automagically for me.

Cheers,

Bill B.

[tbar2112]

I am waiting for my copy of Win7, I am also going to opt for the upgrade from Vista on my T400s, just can't take the time to move all the data and the adaptation of all the apps. I'll tell you how it goes!

[Tom7]

On a T500 running vista business with all the lenovo thinkvantage applications intact I decided to do a clean install of windows 7 premium .
The reason I went for the clean install was that after running the windows upgrade advisor program I was presented with quite a long list of incompatibilities . I had bought the T500 only 2 days earlier 2nd hand but like new so I thought that this would be a great opportunity to really make it mine with a clean install of windows 7 . As a previous poster already mentioned it was only a case of installing Lenovo update 4 and letting it find my missing apps and drivers . This worked very smoothly except for one driver (simple communications driver AMT ) which I manually downloaded and installed .I think the only application that is missing is roxio win dvd but I have an OEM version from a DVD burner I installed on a desktop.... I have to say that windows 7 found nearly every driver .The installation took about 20 minutes and the nicest part was near the end when it found my wireless network and asked for the security key then bingo ,online immediately.

Sorry if I ranted a bit but I do favour clean installs over upgrades .I have done the same sice win 9x .

T

[syhead]

I did a "custom" (aka clean) install.

Win7 kept my old data in a Window.old folder. No surprises, I knew it would do that.

But I also noted that some other folders from my previous installation where still there... quite strange.

[pipspeak]

I'd be curious to know if anyone scanned their registry for errors after the upgrade -- is it likely that upgrading will results in a registry clogged with unused (former Vista) entries?

[bill bolton]

I'd be curious to know if anyone scanned their registry for errors after the upgrade

I didn't see anything much of note... which is hardly surprising given that Win 7 is basically Vista SP3.

Cheers,

Bill B.

[Tom7]

Syhead, what you have done is an installation of win7 on the same partition where vista resided but without formatting that partition .
I am not entirely sure if this counts as a clean install and whether it makes any difference to performance or not .I know when you do it this way you are left with a folder c:/windows old or something similar .

Tom