Installing Windows 10 - Upgrade vs Clean Install

[Cyber Akuma]

I have 5 systems I am planning to upgrade to Windows 10, they are Windows 7 and 8 based systems.

I have a few questions about doing a clean install vs an upgrade install.

First of all, is it even possible to do a clean install with that free Win10 offer? Is there any way you can boot into the Win10 installer, then it can check if you already have 7 or 8 installed, then allow you to format the drive and install fresh? I prefer clean installs to upgrade installs in most cases.

One of the systems however due to many apps and settings I have configured on it, I would prefer to do an upgrade install, and I have some questions about that too. First of all, this may be incorrect information, but I was told that it only keeps some of your settings such as your drivers if you choose NOT to keep personal information. That doesn't sound right... So anyway, what does and doesn't it keep? I wanted to do an upgrade install for this system because of all the settings I wanted to keep, will all my apps still be there?

Speaking of which, this system also runs off a SSD, so space is a concern. How large is the Windows.old folder it creates? Can you remove it? I am planning to image the drive before I upgrade to 10 so I can always image it back to 7 anyway, I don't need a downgrade option.

And finally, speaking of drivers. I have a VERY old printer that I do NOT want to replace, by some miracle, the XP64 drivers (the latest OS it had drivers written for) work fine in Vista and 7, they gave me no trouble. (Not sure about 8 as I never installed that printer on a 8 system) but when I tried it on a Win10 system, it complained that the drivers weren't signed. I have run into this annoying signed drivers issue before, but if neither Vita64 or 7 64 complained about them, why would 10? Would it refuse to use my printer if I do an upgrade install to 10?

[Skyfrog]

You can do a clean install, but you must first do the upgrade so that it can verify you have an eligible license. After you have upgraded and activated you can then format the drive and do a clean install. When it asks for a key during the clean install just choose to skip it; your license information is stored online and it will recognize your computer and activate automatically. When upgrading all of your settings and personal files will be saved. The Windows.old folder should be the size of your current Windows installation. You can use disk cleanup to remove it.

As for unsigned drivers this page will tell you how to use them: How to disable driver signature verification

Edited August 2, 2015 by Thrackerzod

[onewarmslime]

Yeah when I did the upgrade it saved absolutely everything, all my files, programs and settings. It's impressive how seamless the update was. I might have never used windnows 8 on this computer.

[Mando]

I have 5 systems I am planning to upgrade to Windows 10, they are Windows 7 and 8 based systems.

I have a few questions about doing a clean install vs an upgrade install.

First of all, is it even possible to do a clean install with that free Win10 offer? Is there any way you can boot into the Win10 installer, then it can check if you already have 7 or 8 installed, then allow you to format the drive and install fresh? I prefer clean installs to upgrade installs in most cases.

One of the systems however due to many apps and settings I have configured on it, I would prefer to do an upgrade install, and I have some questions about that too. First of all, this may be incorrect information, but I was told that it only keeps some of your settings such as your drivers if you choose NOT to keep personal information. That doesn't sound right... So anyway, what does and doesn't it keep? I wanted to do an upgrade install for this system because of all the settings I wanted to keep, will all my apps still be there?

Speaking of which, this system also runs off a SSD, so space is a concern. How large is the Windows.old folder it creates? Can you remove it? I am planning to image the drive before I upgrade to 10 so I can always image it back to 7 anyway, I don't need a downgrade option.

And finally, speaking of drivers. I have a VERY old printer that I do NOT want to replace, by some miracle, the XP64 drivers (the latest OS it had drivers written for) work fine in Vista and 7, they gave me no trouble. (Not sure about 8 as I never installed that printer on a 8 system) but when I tried it on a Win10 system, it complained that the drivers weren't signed. I have run into this annoying signed drivers issue before, but if neither Vita64 or 7 64 complained about them, why would 10? Would it refuse to use my printer if I do an upgrade install to 10?

I'm usually exactly the same as you, but i've done 5 inplace upgrades, one retaining all my files and apps (games box) and the rest i told do not keep files or apps, all with free upgrade. All apps and files on my gamesbox were retained and all work like they have just been installed post W10 (very impressed), the only aaddition i did was manually install the latest W10 Nvidia drivers.

All inplace upgrades went amazingly well and each machine feels very quick and slick, after install/licence activation, you can then do into disk tools/advanced and delete remaining OS files from previous build, very neat and cleanly. I forged ahead and used the Media creation toolkit, as none of my machine would install W10 despite being reserved.first one i did as an inplace upgrade, other machines i downloaded the kit and created bootable usb media for inplace upgrade, both methods worked perfectly. im at a loss why MS are still stating you may not get it for a week or so, errr use the media toolkit for instant access??

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

You can then tell W10 to factory reset the machine, which is a clean install, i didn't bother with any as they are performing superbly out of the box. 

re: xp 64 drivers, if they worked in 7 and 8, there is no reason why they wouldn't work in 10.

MS deserves credit for getting the inplace upgrade process so polished tbh, havnt found an issue yet with the process.

I have however had 1 laptop throw a wobble and present just a flashing black cursor, but i suspect its more the laptop than W10 setups fault.

Edited August 2, 2015 by Mando

[Cyber Akuma]

As for unsigned drivers this page will tell you how to use them: How to disable driver signature verification

The problem with that is it re-enables it every boot. I know through console commands you can enable Test Mode... but that forces an annoying watermark to appear on your screen. Also from what I heard, you can't sign drivers yourself anymore in newer versions of windows can you?

You can then tell W10 to factory reset the machine, which is a clean install, i didn't bother with any as they are performing superbly out of the box. 

re: xp 64 drivers, if they worked in 7 and 8, there is no reason why they wouldn't work in 10.

I would rather avoid a "factory reset" as that's not a real clean install, do you know if the method Thrackerzod mentioned would work?

And I know, that's why it's confusing! I have Windows 7 64bit and the drivers installed fine, despite being made for XP64. But when I tried to install them on the beta of Windows 10 64bit I had on my VM, it said it refused to load the driver because it's not signed.

[+Warwagon MVC]

I did a Windows 10 upgrade on my Original Windows 8 RTM (upgraded to 8.1) Install. Running smooth as could be. I fracking Loath reinstalling Windows on this machine. Takes a while to set everything back up.

[John.D]

Yup I upgraded. I mounted the ISO in 8.1 and upgraded

I did a clean install (so I thought), but after Win10 was installed, I couldnt delete the windows.old folder. And it didnt appear in disk cleanup

So, I wiped the hdd completely. Started again. Then I couldn't activate it. Then I read online that you could use a generic key. So I did, then went to Go to store, and it activated