vista clean install

A

Amberly

Member
this may get confusing so feel free to ask questions to clarify.

I have 2 computers. A laptop that was upgraded from xp to vista home premium. And an hp pavillion deskdop that came with home premium installed. with the desktop I didn't get a recovery disk or a windows install disk with it. And i was stupid enough to not do the back up disks that they suggest when you first buy the computer.

I need to do a clean install on my desktop. I don't want to pay the money to buy windows new. I have my upgrade disk from when I upgraded the laptop.
my question is, can i do a clean install using the upgrade disk but using my key code from the desktop?
 
Hi Amberly, welcome to NST.
That should work fine, though the DVD, being an upgrade, might want you to provide proof of a qualifying previous system (an old XP CD). If you're installing it directly over the existing Vista though, it'll probably skip that check.
Are you sure you can't factory reset your HP. As long as the recovery partition is intact, you should still be able to boot directly into the recovery environment as decribed in the above link. From there you can restore your PC and create the CD(s) you neglected to do before. (Vista doesn't have to be working - that's just one of the ways to get into HP recovery)
 
i think i'd rather do the clean install so I dont have all those pre-added programs that came on my comp from circuit city. and I have a full version of windows xp on disc(from when my laptop was fubar'd)....so i don't think it would be an issue...thanks for you help...although i'm sure i will mess something up and be back for more advice :smile:
 
Best get into the recovery environment and create those backup disks before putting XP on the PC.
Remember that the Vista licence is a fair chunk of the value of the PC. Best protect your investment by keeping it available should you want to sell the PC in the future.
If you have a friend with a retail Vista DVD (any variety will do, they're all included on the same DVD), you could try a clean install of Vista using your PC key not the one on the DVD. That will put a clean copy of Vista on the PC without all the bundled rubbish. Setup will automatically install the correct version for which your PC is licenced from the information contained in the key.
Vista will support all of the features of the PC. Chances are, that your XP CD might be too old to contain all of the necessary drivers for your PC (SATA HDD for example) and will need them downloaded from the manufacturer and F6'd into the install on a floppy disk.
 
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i wasn't planning on putting xp on this computer. I was just going to do a clean install of vista. And when you say it doesn't matter which disk to use b/c all versions are on it, does that include the upgrade disc? I mean, is the full version on the upgrade disc asw long as i have my full version key?
 
Yes, they all contain all flavours (except OEM DVDs are either 64 or 32bit, not both). The key tells setup what to install. The only difference with a upgrade version is that setup will demand proof of eligibility (a previous qualifying OS CD) if you want to do a clean install and it can't see the old OS.
 
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