Windows 7 > Windows 10 Upgrade

[nelliott]

Hi All,

 

I'm considering updating my tech laptop to Windows 10 for testing.

Is it possible to upgrade to Windows 10 without losing programs and user data?

 

Thanks for your help in advance!

[Callum]

The way I've always seen it when it comes to installing Windows:

 

Upgrade = Change the OS but keep your files/programs

Wipe = Start from scratch with a default setup

 

I'd imagine it's like any other Windows upgrade, which do indeed preserve your data.

[nelliott]

Might give it a try tomorrow, all of my data is backed up on a network drive...

Thanks for your advice @Callum

[ITGURU]

Whilst I've never carried out an upgrade between OS's and always installed from clean, we've had several staff come to us that have upgraded their home PC/Laptop to Windows 10 and experienced issues.

 

2 managed to wipe their entire machine - not sure how!

1 upgraded to windows 10 and the start menu no longer worked

1 had graphic driver issues.

1 upgraded to 10 and all the desktop icons disappeared.

[davethetekkie]

I did an upgrade install from 7 Enterprise on my tech laptop and it made an absolute horlicks of the network drivers to the extent that I had to do a restore and lost all my installed software anyway. I'm sure I'm in the minority but it didn't get my relationship with Windows 10 off to a brilliant start! The laptop lasted a fortnight on Windows 10 but is now back on our standard Windows 7 image. I had trouble getting offline folder sync to behave and I just didn't have time to waste on it!

[XiJ]

After testing on one it co-ord laptop I upgraded 5 X laptops from win 7 pro to win 10 education. All done within an hour.

 

It co-ord tested them logging on to the domain and reported all good. A few days later told me they could get a clone output to the whiteboards! An install of latest chipset driver from Intel fixed that.

 

Overall I've been pleasantly surprised at how straight forward an upgrade it was. No data lost.

[3s-gtech]

After testing on one it co-ord laptop I upgraded 5 X laptops from win 7 pro to win 10 education. All done within an hour.

 

It co-ord tested them logging on to the domain and reported all good. A few days later told me they couldn't get a clone output to the whiteboards! An install of latest chipset driver from Intel fixed that.

 

Overall I've been pleasantly surprised at how straight forward an upgrade it was. No data lost.

 

Edited because original post doesn't make sense.

 

My home PC was done as an in-place upgrade, because I have lots of programs and old games that have been modified to work on newer OSs and didn't want to go through getting them working again. No problems for me, but I did image the Windows 7 install onto a spare SSD first just in case.

[Boredguy]

I've upgraded both my home computers from Win 7 to 10.

My main PC upgraded without any major issues, but there was a few niggles so I decided to do a "clean" install from within Windows 10 itself which sorted everything out (I couldn't be bothered playing with DISM to fix the issues)

 

Earlier this month I upgraded my second machine from W7 to 10 and this time it went without any issues.

 

Unless you have the W10 media and key, you have to do an in place upgrade the first time so that the hardware SSID gets registered, but you can then do a fresh install if you want to.

[jmak]

A temporary and probably minority issue: the anti virus I had installed (home PC) didn't support windows 10, so when I did an in place upgrade the AV disappeared with no warning. The in place upgrade worked very straightforwardly for me, but I always intended to clean install once I'd obtained the machine licence. The other thing I'd suggest is visiting your manufacturer's website and downloading all of the drivers before running the upgrade - it should all "just work", but if your network drivers don't update, it's much easier to have a copy of the new versions to hand.

 

As ever, always backup data before making any significant changes.

[jmak]

all antiviruses has an updated version supporting Win10 on their website

 

Yep - just didn't spot straight away that the in place upgrade had completely got rid of the one installed. No warnings and no sign that any had ever been installed.

[jonnykewell1]

I've done clean installs on a few machines for friends and family recently because the machines were running so slow after an upgrade. I would advise people to upgrade home machines first though to ensure the machine registers with Microsoft, then do a fresh install afterwards so it activates.