M17X R4 Looking to downgrade from W8 to W7 (Advice needed)

Hey guys, I'm sure it's the same old story, but yeah I'm another one of the few looking to downgrade. My system is a W8 factory install, but I have a W7 disc. I understand I have to disable secure boot before I go ahead and try install W7, but what's the best option for Legacy/UEFI? what boot order should I go with?

The only other question the is regards to my sata operation which is set to RAID (Although my system currently only has one HDD, I plan on picking up another soon) should that be an issue, or am I reading other threads too much?

Looking for any advice I can be given at all, as I've installed W7 before, but never from a newer OS, and certainly not on an Alienware lol

Thanks!

 

Howdy Newbie. Welcome to the forums. :hi2:

Go with Legacy. UEFI is used only in Windows 8 anyways so going back to legacy mode will minimize the number of issues you could have with a downgrade. The boot order should always have your hard drive first, except when you are installing Windows, then you need to put your disc drive (or USB drive) first so the installer will boot to the Windows installer first. As far as the RAID mode, the drive needs to be set to RAID mode if you use an mSATA drive for caching. Otherwise the cache drive will not work.

 

I just downgraded back because the metro interface is killing me.
I just like the desktop view old style so I reiinstalled windows 7.
Just disable fast boot and secure boot and you are readt to go.


Sjoerd

 

Great stuff! Will I need to have the sata drivers at hand when installing W7 from scratch?

Also, I've noticed quite a few partitions on the drive, is it advisable to delete them when installing from scratch?

 

Depends on what are on the partitions. The first partition is usually there for alignment purposes. It will be 100MB for Windows 7. Windows 8 has a larger one. That one should be deleted if you're downgrading from 8 to 7. If there is a recovery partition, then you need to decide if you want to keep that recovery partition or not. AlienRespawn needs that partition and I don't know if you can just recreate it so easily. The other partition(s) will be for your C: drive and whatnot. IMO, downgrading from 8 to 7 would warrant starting fresh and formatting your drive, but the choice is yours. Windows will use it's own SATA drivers for installation and stuff, but the better SATA drivers will be installed when your install Intel RST.

 

Thanks so much for your advice, I'll let you know how I get on

 

This will help you a lot if you experience issues installing W7.

LINK

 

Do I change to legacy boot before installing W7? I read around that changing to Legacy with W8 still installed will give a fail to boot screen?

 

Yes, change it to legacy, it will do that but you don't mind about that because you won't be using Windows 8 anymore.

 

I changed to legacy mode there, but received a black screen, with text telling me something along the lines of, a cable was not found or something (It wasn't a power issues), and was told to press any key to reboot. I kept getting the same error, so powered off the machine and change to boot settings back to UEFI in the bios. Sorry, for the lack of a decent description, I didn't manage to take a picture in my panic.

Again, thanks for any advice.

 

If you boot from the DVD after turning on legacy mode you should be good to go.

 

Yeah, I was wondering if that's all I needed to do. Cheers.

 

That's normal, once you get to that loop just boot from the Windows 7 disc and continue with the installation.

 

Just want to post a thanks for all the help given in this thread. I'm back on Windows 7, and very happy

Thanks again everyone!