The hard drive of our Windows 7 laptop (HP 8470p about 8 years old) was starting to fail... It would give error messages at startup or it would start very slowly, some applications didn't properly function anymore. It also made a 'ticking' noise. I concluded that there was an issue with the hard drive.
I still have a few external back-up hard drives lying around so changing the hard drive was not really a problem but what operating system would I install? As Windows 7 is no longer supported I didn't really feel like installing Windows 7 back so I was going to give a go at Linux Mint. By chance I came across an article claiming that it was still possible to upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10 for free: https://www.zdnet.com/article/heres-how-you-can-still-get-a-free-windows-10-upgrade/
I dug a little deeper and found the following movie on Youtube: "You can still upgrade to Windows 10 for FREE in 2023" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BC_G3hcU8bA. The movie basically advised on the following steps:
Download the windows 10 iso file on your computer.
Run the Windows 10 setup inside the iso file
Install Windows 10
Upgrade Windows 10
I was curious if my laptop would overall be capable of running Windows 10 so I went to check the system requirements and to my surprise they are the same as Windows 7! (source: https://support.microsoft.com/)
Would this really be doable? I decided to give it a go. As I was going to put a new hard drive into the laptop my process was going to be a little different. If I wanted to activate the Windows 10, I would first need to install Windows 7, activate it and then upgrade to Windows 10. In short I was planning the following steps:
Install Windows 7
Activate Windows 7
Install upgrades of Windows 7 ( I do not know if this is really necessary but preferred to do it)
Make sure everything is working (check device manager - all drivers ok?)
Install Windows 10
Install upgrades of Windows 10
Before removing the old hard drive I made a backup of all the data I wanted to keep to an external hard drive.
I also went to the command prompt and gathered all information regarding the laptop using the command "systeminfo." I figured, if some appliances would be missing some drivers
after installation of Windows 7 I would need to know what they exactly are in order to find
the correct drivers. Here it is also important to take note which Windows 7 version (pro/home/ultimate and 32/64bit) is installed on the system in order to re-install the same version to have no problems with the product key to active it.
Once I had the info I needed I removed the damaged hard drive and inserted a hard drive which I recovered from one of the external hard drives (which I formatted first).
Now, to install Windows 7 I needed to create a bootable USB drive.
I downloaded the Windows 7 iso file from the link provided in this website as I couldn't find it anymore on the Microsoft site: https://tech-latest.com/download-windows-7-iso/
From this website I downloaded the Windows 7 USB DVD download tool as I could no longer find it on the Microsoft site: https://windows-7-usb-dvd-download-tool.en.uptodown.com/windows/download
Running the USB DVD download tool is really self explanatory. When you launch it and go thru the steps the following windows appear:
For me it took about 30-45min to create the bootable USB.
Time now to insert the bootable USB in the laptop and start it up. While booting the pc you need tap the boot menu key to enter the boot menu.
For HP this is Esc.
For most pc's, during booting, on screen will appear which button you need to push to enter the boot menu.
This is just before the windows logo appears.
You only have a second to tap this key so maybe you will have to restart a few times to get it right. Once you are in the boot menu you need to select the boot device options and then select the USB drive as the boot device. Then hit enter.
The Windows logo will appear on your screen and you will need to answer the regular questions of a new install (language, time, keyboard, product key,...). Now let it run and it will go through the installation process and restart multiple times. This will take somewhere between 1 to 2 hours.
Once Windows 7 is installed you can start the pc and now it is time to check if all is working properly. To verify if all is working you can go to the device manger via control panel > system. Check for any exclamation marks. If you have multiple issues, I advice to start with the ethernet and wifi cards. Once you get these working you will be able to download drivers directly to your device. Once your device is online, also make sure that Windows starts looking for upgrades.
To further update the remaining drivers, you can check your manufacturers' website. HP, for instance, gives you all needed drivers when you enter the laptop model. Work step by step to remove as many exclamation marks as possible in your device manager.
Also regularly check back on your Windows updates and restart when needed.
Once you get all devices working you can go and activate your Windows version. Go to Control Panel > System. At the bottom you will be able to click 'Activate Windows now' and follow the instructions.
(I must admit I remained with 2 exclamation marks in the device manager but decided to go further anyway.)
Once I got all devices working and activated Windows I waited for about 24 hours during which I kept looking for Windows updates and restarted the laptop regularly.
I now had a freshly installed laptop with Windows 7 which was running smoothly. I could have stopped here but as Windows 7 was no longer supported by Microsoft I wanted to try upgrading to Windows 10. If it wouldn't work out, I always could repeat above steps and get back to Windows 7.
In order to upgrade to Windows 10 I would now try to implement the steps advised in this movie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BC_G3hcU8bA.
As advised in the movie I downloaded the "media creation tool" but when I tried running/installing it I got an error "0x80072EE7." A quick search showed that I wasn't the only one with this error and trying to fix it seemed quite cumbersome.
So I went back to the website from which I downloaded the Windows 7 iso to find a Windows 10 iso: https://tech-latest.com/download-latest-windows-10-iso/
Unfortunately the links under 'method 1' on this site didn't work. I gave 'method 2.1' a try.
What method 2.1 does, it basically makes your web browser behave as it is in a non-Microsoft environment. So it kind of tricks the Microsoft website and allows you to download the correct iso file. All the steps are clearly explained on the webpage so I will not copy-paste them here.
Once you have downloaded the iso file you can go back to the instructions of the movie. These are: 1. extract the iso file with 7zip. 2. Once you have extracted them, double click on the 'setup' file to start the windows update. From here on you just follow the instructions from Windows which appear on your screen.
Once installed you can go check Start>settings>update&security>activation and you will see that your Windows 10 version has been activated!
I have read that your old Windows 7 key has now been linked to Windows 10 by Microsoft so you should be able to install Windows 10 directly with this product key in the future.
After running Windows 10 for a few days on this laptop I must say that I am quite satisfied. It is probably working a little slower than Windows 7 but it is not really bothering me.
What is really noticeable is that it takes a looooot longer to boot and to login. Once logged in and you give it enough time to get all processes going, it works just fine.
Microsoft says it will support Windows 10 up to October 14, 2025. (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle/products/windows-10-home-and-pro) This is fine for me, by that time I think it will be necessary to look for a new laptop anyway. (and maybe try some light Linux version on this one...)