Obtaining The Vista Installation Discs
The most important thing you need for this procedure is the Vista installation disc itself. Like many previous versions of Windows, the disc is often not shipped along with your computer in an obvious form. Sometimes it is hidden in plain sight, and other times it is hidden on the hard disk. It's also very possible it was not given to you at all. You need to obtain the disc using one of the following options:
* Anytime Upgrade Disc: The Anytime Upgrade disc was being shipped with new computers, and is exactly the same as an installation disc. It may have come in the box with your laptop. It's in a dvd case inside the box with all the manuals. Unfortunately many companies have stopped shipping this disc with new systems. You have a few options to obtain it:
o The disc can be ordered online (legally) from various places for less than $10. CompUSA used to have them, but now they are going out of business. It is very cheap because it is just a disc, and does not include a license. You can try to search for "Vista Anytime Upgrade" at online stores.
o Unfortunately, Microsoft has discontinued the Anytime Upgrade program, so you can no longer order the disc from them. You may be able to find the discs elsewhere online, but those will also probably stop being sold as Microsoft shuts down the program.
o Some people have reported they are being sold on eBay, but they are a little more expensive.
* Already on your hard drive?: Some manufacturers are now copying the contents of the Anytime Upgrade DVD directly onto the hard disk of the computer (sometimes in a hidden folder called "WAU"). The problem is that you cannot directly burn this to a DVD and then boot from it to do a clean install -- you first need to burn the files as a bootable DVD in order to use them. To create a bootable DVD from these files:
1. Download, install, and run vLite
2. Select the location with the WAU folder
3. Select your vista version
4. Select the ISO button and make the ISO - you can create an image or directly burn to DVD.
Now you should have a bootable Anytime Upgrade DVD you can use for a clean install. Thanks to seven11 for the steps. (Note: You can do a lot of other things with vLite too, but avoid messing with other things in there until you know what you are doing with it).
Here are some places you might find the folder on your system:
o C:\Windows\sonysys\wau (hidden folder)
o Please let me know where you found it on your system!
You can see if it might be on your system by doing the following:
o Click Start > Windows Anytime Upgrade > Choose your edition
o Under the upgrade option a message will display whether your laptop is pre-configured for Anytime Upgrade
You will not have the "Anytime Upgrade" option if you have Vista Ultimate, but you might still have the folder on your hard drive. Take a look around for it. (Thank to coolguy for these steps)
seven11 has created a PDF with screen-shots that can walk you through the process: PDF Walkthrough
* Borrow a Disc: If you know someone else who has an Anytime Upgrade disc, a retail Vista disc, or an OEM disc, you can use any one of those as well. Make sure that you USE YOUR OWN LICENSE. The license is not tied into a DVD, it's tied to the computer and the product key you use.
* Download from Windows Marketplace: According to MyDigitalLife, one can download the Vista installation media from Digital River, who is Microsoft's partner in online distribution of Vista. You'll have to download 3 files, one of which is over 2GiB, and when you're done you'll have the Vista files you need to do the installation. Make sure to burn a BOOTABLE DVD with these files -- burning directly to disc will not work for a clean install.
o Information on 32bit Vista files:
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2007/0...download-link/
o Information on 64bit Vista files:
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2007/1...ownload-links/
o Information on making a bootable DVD:
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2007/0...nloaded-files/
Thanks to Kingb33 for links/information about this.
MD5 sums for the downloaded files: (NOTE: I can only verify them as I have received them. Unless someone at Digital River can confirm them (highly unlikely), we'll have to compare what we have and come to a consensus)
32 bit:
o b120c78ff6e37ed9aea16d757bf217a0 X13-49120.exe
o e216559f4bf82528979c0f98a23cad5d boot.wim
o d5704d2cf5515bcee94027dc08714503 install.wim
o 350aded2386943f801da99eb1e226758 [32bit ISO File]
64 bit:
o 61439ff5fb372a1084751ec990cf1d23 X13-49121.exe
o 4d2a6612e4487a625cd41b2d94f1a3c3 boot.wim
o b31c4eaed6ab5ab10d6f98a6f5f2144c install.wim
o d2cedc1ace5144d0734b230eb6a58f35 [64bit ISO File]
To burn the resulting ISO file to a DVD, use the image burning function in your DVD burning software. Alternatively, you can use ISO Recorder, which is free. Once you install it, right-click on the ISO file and select "Copy image to CD" (You'll need a DVD for this, not a CD).
* OEM Re-Installation Disc: (This one requires a bit more fiddling than the others, so consider it for more advanced users) Some OEMs ship their systems with a "re-installation disc". This disc may be be customized by the OEM to install only one version of Vista, but those customizations can usually be "undone" using vLite, and then will allow you to install any version (that you have a license for) from that disc. This modification removes some of the custom scripts that an OEM uses to automate the Vista installation. Sometimes they also customize the windows install files, but I think they just add drivers to them. Using this method does not give you a "pristine" install disc, but it should be enough to work. An example where you could do this is if you have a Dell Vista Business disc at work that only allows you to install Vista Business. You can modify this disc to allow you to install Home Premium on your home laptop.
o For Dell discs:
1. Copy the entire Dell DVD to a folder on your hard drive
2. In the "sources" folder, there is a folder called "$oem$". Delete it
3. In the "sources" folder, there is a file called "pid.txt". Delete it.
4. Open vLite and burn a new disc using those files
5. Install vista. It should now allow you to choose a version of Vista to install, and also will not install the dell product key and activation files
(Thanks to Silas Awaketh for the info that helped me figure this out)
o Dell is currently the only OEM I have info for. If you have a disc from another OEM, please let me know and we can figure out how to add it.
Procedure:
1. BURN RECOVERY DISCS. If you don't do this you aren't nearly as clever as you think you are, and probably much less so. Do not use the recovery discs you bought from HP!!! Use the recovery manager tool to burn them yourself!!! Burning them yourself is the preferred method to obtain the recovery discs, and many people have found that there are bugs in the HP discs that cause the recovery to fail. DO NOT USE THEM!
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.
