LEGAL Windows 7 Download Links (Just like Vista before!!!)

I've download the x64 version and It was a success.

 

Excellent work, kammy. I knew you could do it.

Thanks for letting us know of your success.

 

Mr. Fox, is there anyway someone can give me another link to a win 7 32bit ? the ones at the beginning of the thread don't seem to be working for me, for some reason.

 

hey buddy... here's a direct link to the 32bit ISO. This link will initiate the download for you.

 

Does it matter if I download an English version even if my orginial installation is Norwegian? Is this just a cosmetic thing? Just curious since I see spanish, german, korean etc versions on the first page..

 

Wow, so last time I did a clean install on a laptop, it went very smoothly. This time, however, I screwed up pretty badly apparently. I guess my computer isn't detecting any hardware (I'm assuming because it doesn't have any drivers anymore). For example, I can no longer choose a 1080p resolution (max is 1280 x 1024), and my network adapter isn't detected, so I can't connect to the internet.

I was running an OEM Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit before I did the clean install. I installed a new Win 7 Home Premium 64bit and ran the ABR program to reactivate it. If it matters, my other system specs include:

dv6tqe
i7 2630qm
8 GB ram
6770m 1gb


Where did I go wrong? Please help me.

EDIT: K, I installed a network adapter driver and I can connect to the internet now, so that's good. Is my problem that I simply don't have any drivers, or did I actually do something wrong? Also, is there an easier way of getting all the drivers I need at once?

 

More than likely it's just that you didn't install the drivers. Win 7 will install a lot of generic drivers that will provide basic functionality by default, but unless you install all of the vendor specific drivers you'll probably never get full functionality.

 

All the DV6TQE drivers are in the folder SWSETUP in the DV6 C: drive. I always make copy of it and save in another place.

Your Win7 64 bit should have a lot of generic drivers but not the new drivers specific to the DV6.

 

Yeah, I spent a few hours installing lots of drivers; had a bit of trouble getting the graphics card driver working properly, but everything seems to be in order now. And now I know about this swsetup folder too. Thank you sir.

 

I cannot say with certainty whether the product keys are tied to a specific language version of Windows, but if I were a betting man I would bet that it does not matter. You might try googling that to find out.

The primary reason I think it does not matter is that you select the language during installation. My Alienware came with what seems to be a Dutch version Windows 7 installation DVD because the default language is German and I have to select English during installation.

 

EDIT: just found the answer to my questions here
Ignore my post below


Hi.
I used ARB Beta to backup my license.
But the backed up license doesn't match the key on the label, on the bottom of my laptop.
If i have a legal key why use a different one?
Also if i have the win 7 iso, won't it work if i just put the serial of the label instead of backup up/restoring licenses?

 

The key on bottom and in Windows from an OEM never match. Use the serial on the label is fine, but you will have to call MS to activate. But iirc, I extracted my key from Windows, did a fresh install, and no activation necessary. But ymmv.

 

Hey guys, I'm glad I found this thread. I have an Asus G-series laptop and they didn't give me Win7 cd for me to do a clean reinstall. So I've followed the steps, but I've run into a problem.

I'm trying to download ABRbeta.exe from the website that was mentioned in the instructions on the first post:
ABR (Activation Backup and Restore) | directedge.us

But I get this error saying that "the source file could not be read."

Anyone else have this problem? Anyone wiling to upload a copy?

 

I just tried it and both of the links (to the zip and the exe files) worked perfectly for me.

 

Me, too. Not sure what happened for balloonfish.

 

Just used this method and it worked perfectly except for one thing: the Windows registration backup/recovery thing. One of the files were missing, but thankfully the OEM-key activation worked without problems.

 

Vooon - cool! Happy to hear it worked well. Thank you for letting us know.

 

im so tired of this !!! i my 3week old G73SW couldent load windows a couplde of days ago so i did a recovery install.. after this the trackpad is messed up.. so i upgraded allllll the updates listed above and it´s still not good.. it´s works fine for 5minutes and freezees a second or two.. sooo i guees i have to do this clean instal thing to.. it bugs me thoe.. wanted to make music about now.. thanks for this forum thoe...peace.

 

Hello!!

I recently found this forum and tried to dl Windows 7 to replace my Windows Vista 64 bit Home Professional. Everything seemed to be working fine as I was upgrading to Windows 7 64 bit Ultimate however I ran into a problem at the end of the installation saying that the hardware could not support Windows 7. The thing is that my Dell Inspiron 1545 laptop used to have Windows 7 on it before I broke the hard drive and had to replace it. The people at Dell wouldn't give me Windows 7 but instead gave me Vista SP1 which I've had immense difficulties updating (Windows Update won't work). I thought that perhaps trying to skip right to Windows 7 would be my best option but it seems that is not the case so far. I also downloaded the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor to make sure everything was proper but the laptop passed and it said that Windows 7 could be run... HELP!!!

I followed the instructions properly - downloaded the 3 files, removed the .cgi file, made the .iso and saved it to run onto a usb drive. When I attempted to boot from the usb drive, it worked but during the install windows said to open the file on the desktop... so i tried that and well.... yeah.

Do you think that it won't work because my Vista is not completely updated? Or maybe that I have to do a clean install? The only reason I did not do a clean install is because I have lots of tunes that I can't afford to lose and I do not have a external harddrive at the moment (considering buying one tmrw).

Any advice or help would be greatly appreciated!!
Thanks

 

Try shrinking the Windows partition on your existing hard drive and create a second partition to store your data files. Then make sure you install Win 7 into the original Windows partition.

 

That should do the trick for dstum. Good advice. And, here's a free utility to accomplish that. LINK

 

I've just got an Asus G73SW - very swanky, but hard drive filled with drek. So, if I can find the time, I'd like to do a re-install so that it's not (in the words of an old advertisement) "nearly clean" but "really clean". I don't want the remnants of one Office version hanging around when I install another. I've now got some issues I would like to check:

1. I have managed to download setup1.box (c.2.8GB) and setup2.box (c.144MB) - are those sizes correct (I've had a couple of glitched downloads recently)
   
   
2. I got all of Win7-P-Retail-en-us-x64.exe (79MB - I hope) before I realised that it was not what I really wanted. There are several languages listed on the site, but not the English (British) version. Is there any way I can get this, or alternatively any way I can adapt the US version to UK?
   
   
3. If I do find a UK version, does this mean that I will need another version of the "box" files.
   
   
4. (This last just a matter of curiosity) I've never come across the ".box" extension before - what are "box" files (leaving aside jokes about where you file the invoices!)?
   

I can see my downloading list getting very long - fortunately my ISP has a provision whereby between midnight and 8 a.m. your downloads don't count against your standard allowance.

 

Seems you have downloaded the update material. The ISO images would have been better. You might have another look at the very first post of this thread since there are useful instructions how to work with the files you have now.

Michael

 

Thanks... now how would I go about doing that lol

 

I just downloaded the program that you linked, Mr. Fox

 

Good deal! I think you'll find it easy to use.

Once you create a new partition, format it and move your data over to it. Then you can install Windows to the space currently occupied by the primary partition (C:\). During the Windows installation you can delete that partition and install to the newly created free space.

Let us know how it goes.

 

Okay sorry I'm not familiar with the idea of a partition... so what exactly am I going to do?

 

Resize/Move partition or copy partition? lol

 

You want to resize, friend. Make it smaller. If your drive is less than half full, make it 50% smaller and that will create free space for a new partition of equal size. You can then create your new partition in the free space, format it and then copy your data over to the new partition created in the free space.

 

I am beginning to understand this now. So I am creating a new partition on my hard drive to store my data.. is it correct that I will be installing Win 7 onto the original C: partition that I just shrunk and why is it that this will work in comparison to what I did before (leaving my computer as is and doing an install upgrade). Not doubting it, just trying to learn the theory behind the method. I can't thank you enough for the help !!

 

I am beginning to understand this now. So I am creating a new partition on my hard drive to store my data.. is it correct that I will be installing Win 7 onto the original C: partition that I just shrunk and why is it that this will work in comparison to what I did before (leaving my computer as is and doing an install upgrade). Not doubting it, just trying to learn the theory behind the method. I can't thank you enough for the help !!

 

I've read that first post - actually downloaded the files from their links. I used the "3 files" method, partly because it came first. I can give the iso method a go, but it does not seem to be any different from the "3 files" method when it comes to language packs.

That first post goes on to say later

So I went to that site, where there were many additional language packs listed, including 2 for Portuguese (Portugal & Brazilian) but there was only one file for English, http://download.windowsupdate.com/msdownload/update/software/updt/2009/08/windows6.1-kb972813-x64-en-us_483a3e51038f1a369bc5b5cdf5fc32df3ea4ad27.exe

Further googling just seemed to produce more frustrated British English users, and a few sites aimed at those with more technical sophistication than I aspire to (msdn amongst others). So I wondered if there were some other process that a forum member might be able to point me towards where UK English (and perhaps many other varieties) might be found. MS used to provide you with lists of an amazing number of different varieties of English - I think there were at least three from the West Indies alone.

There are no varieties of French (not even for the Quebecois!) or German, or even Arabic (which I believe varies very widely) - only Portuguese and Chinese. Strange.

 

Yes, you've got it!

Here's an analogy to make it easy to understand or explain to someone else. Think of your hard drive as one great big room. You have living room and bedroom furniture all mixed together in this big room. The bedroom furniture represents your data files such as music or Word docs, videos, etc. The living room furniture represents your Windows OS. You are buying new living room furniture (replacing the old OS, not upgrading).

You decide that you want to build a wall down the middle to create a bedroom and move that furniture to the new room. The original room is now shrunk to half its previous size. You get rid of all of the old living room furniture to make room for the new living room furniture, but your old bedroom furniture is safely stored in the other room and not getting in your way.

 

I still have the explanation written for novice users by the (then) pathbreaking Partition Magic. A quick Google search shows that the entire contents of that good explanation is now online.

Partition Basics

A word of warning. This was written back in the days when Windows 95 ruled the roost, so there will be some notable gaps and blasts from the past.

Wow - 20GB, just imagine a whole 20 GB!

However, it still remains an excellent explanation, starting out with the assumption that the reader doesn't know very much at all. I think this is still useful because, as the old proverb has it, "What hurts you ain't what you don't know, it's what you do know that ain't so!"

So if you really want to understand the principles behind partitioning, you could do a lot worse than start there. All the rest of the explanations seem to start with the assumption that you already know what a partition is and that what you need to know how to adapt your linux box.

It starts in with "What is a hard disk?" - which sounds as if it thinks you're a real beginner, but that's just being sure that you understand the difference between different partitions and different physical drives - many people used to come unstuck on that one in the early days. However it's no bad thing to start with things you know.

Neither I, nor the guide I recommend, assume that you are stupid, just that it really helps if you have a secure grounding in the basics before you start altering fundamental structures on your hard drive. After that you can dive into other places that will get you up to date, since you'll understand most of the lingo.

However, I would not suggest that you bother with all of that chapter, since some of it is now seriously outdated. Get up to the section labelled "Understanding drive letters", read that and leave the rest for the time being.

Good luck

EDIT: I wrote this before the previous post appeared. Mr Fox's analogy is a good one, but link I gave includes some useful stuff - about drive letters, for example.

 

A few quick questions:

1) The opening post said, "If you currently have an OEM activation (a factory installed Windows 7), then the easiest way to reactivate is to use this program to backup the activation before clean-installing and to restore the activation after clean-installing. This way, you will not have to use the key on the bottom of your laptop, and you will not have to call microsoft to activate windows."

So does this mean if I do the clean install with the key at the bottom of my Asus G53SW laptop, I will need to call microsoft to activate it? @@''

2) Does doing this clean install on my laptop delete the Recovery Partition on it? Or do that Partition stay there forever til i decide to delete it?

I'm just afraid i'll screw up the clean installation and if i do i wana be able to use a Recovery Partition to go back to the factory state.

Thanks in advance.

 

Hello, Selenarious.

1) Yes, you may have to call Microsoft for activation if you do a clean install using the COA product key. I've done that many times and it's not a big deal whether automated or a live person. It's quick and painless.

2) Yes, your recovery partition should still be available to restore from during boot up unless or until you delete it. However, any shortcuts that existed within Windows to launch a recovery operation or create recovery media will be gone. There is always a possibility of screwing something up by making a mistake. If you have created recovery media, that might not be a huge problem. There is probably an Asus utility within Windows to create recovery media. That method of restoration is the equivalent of using the restore partition.

You should always create recovery media because your drive could fail and leave you with no means of restoring Windows to a factory state. However, the downloadable files on this thread, together with your COA product key, would allow you to do a clean installation without any Asus software.

You should also consider creating a drive image (clone) with all partitions, including the recovery partition. There are a number of free programs on the web to do that. Two that I have used with success are Macrium Reflect and EASUS. An external USB HDD is the best place to create and store a drive image.

Hope you find this useful.

 

I've worked through all the steps, but my laptop doesn't seem to recognize the burned ISO as a Windows installation disc. When I restart with the disc, 'press any key to boot from CD' never comes up as an option.

I tried out my Windows 7 Professional disc and it worked, so I'm guessing it's a problem with the ISO. I'd just use this CD but the OEM version was Home Premium, so I don't think that would work?

 

Did you set your boot order in the BIOS for the CD/DVD drive to boot before the HDD? If not, you will not get the prompt to boot from CD. Some computers have the option of pressing an F-key to get a one-time boot menu and that would also work without having to change any BIOS settings.

Edit: I see you mention your Windows 7 Pro disc does boot. It sounds like there is a problem with the disc your burned.

 

Yeah, must've been a problem with the CD. I'm not sure where it went wrong, so I'll just try to get my hands on an Anytime Upgrade disc or something. Two new questions:

1) I bought a Windows 7 Professional upgrade disc from Microsoft's student program. I used it on my last laptop (which was using Vista) to install a fresh version of Win 7 Pro. If I want to do a clean install now, will I run into any problems because my key is for an 'upgrade'?
2) If a computer has 7 Home Premium from OEM, would a 7 Pro upgrade work for a clean install or is that only for upgrading from XP/Vista?

I'm only asking because of this paragraph of the Microsoft website refers to errors when input the product key: "3) The product key is for an upgrade version of Windows 7 and a previous version of Windows wasn't on your computer when Windows 7 was installed. To install an upgrade version of Windows 7, Windows Vista or Windows XP must be installed on your computer. If you formatted the drive before starting the installation process, you won't be able to use the upgrade product key to activate Windows 7. To activate Windows 7, you'll need to install your previous version of Windows, and then reinstall Windows 7."

 

Without me reading 90 pages, I can download Windows7 legally without paying, I don't believe this.

 

You are not getting anything for free. All you are doing is downloading the installation media. Without the license (product key) the downloaded media is worthless. This is only a solution for people that have a license to install. Where this is most useful is for computer owners that did not receive Windows installation media with the computer they purchased. They can create their own media and use the product key on the COA label attached to their computer. This is a better option than a "restore disc" or user-generated "restore CDs" that reinstall branded bloatware and crap nobody wants. And yes, it's totally legit and Microsoft is A-OK with this.

 

Mr Fox has explained the deal.

I will add that you would have found this out yourself by reading the first post and then maybe a couple of pages to get the how as well as the why.

Picking the title of a thread, deciding on the basis of the title alone that the whole thing must be ridiculous and then posting on that thread to say so - and all without reading even the first post (which usually explains a thread) is hardly sensible or courteous.

 

I ordered a "windows 7 anytime upgrade" but have not opened it yet because I realized it isn't what I need since I am running the Windows RC client.

Does anyone know if the windows anytime upgrade it comes with a license key? And if so would it be valid to use in this process after downloading the installation media?? I do not want to open the box for fear of voiding the return policy.

 

Hello Gentlemen,

I have been an owner of a DV6-6096 for less than a day and I am in great trouble, i would really appreciate your help.

I have been using a 4 year old Pavillion with 2GB RAM and Nvidia 8400M, and the screen had started showing nothing but red and blue pixels recently.

Yesterday i grabbed the last DV-6096 in my City, as all 6000 models are replaced by the 61xx models. It was on Display and it had 280GB of unallocated space!! (out of 1TB)

So i burned the recovery media - 4 dvds- and then installed Paragon Partition manager to fix the unallocated space issue and here where i did a HUGE mistake. As soon as i launched paragon it popped up a message asking me if i want to fix a problem in "an incompatible table size for each volume" including the RECOVERY drive D:

I made an uneducated guess at 5am and hit YES. Now the recovery drive lost its partition name ( D: ) but kept its label RECOVERY and disappeared from my computer; furthermore, the recovery manager cant detect it anymore and says it has been deleted. However, I can still see the 14.5GB recovery partition in the disk manager but it is inaccessible. Even Worse, the recovery disks dont recognize my system for some weird reason, i cant do a factory reset anymore!!

AND, i wasn't able to partition the unallocated 280GB!

So now I am on a laptop that has around 650GB instead of 1TB and a malfunctioning recovery volume and useless recovery disks.

I decided to do a Clean install of Windows 7 by formatting the hard disk. I have already backed up the drivers folder SWSetup and backed up my windows and license keys and burned a bootable Win7.iso (using this guide)

The problem now is: The boot up win7 installation cannot detect my hard drive and keeps asking me to browse for my driver. i tried everything.

the Intel SATA AHCI RAID Controller driver (iaStor.sys) wasn't recognized by the installer. it wants a .info driver.

Inside SWSETUP>Drivers>Chipset>ALL there are many drivers including SATA chipset yet still no devices have been identified by the installer. I have the stock Toshiba 1 TB hard disk. I cannot proceed with the clean install!!

Please help. this is my first decent laptop in 4 years, its really sad.

Anyone tried a clean command prompt format followed by a fresh windows 7 installation? (not using the recovery disks)

 

Mr. Fox you seem pretty knowledgeable, I appreacitae it if you can help me and let me know if theres a way to get the Win7 bootup installation its required "media drivers" in order to proceed with my installation and delete all partitions and merge them into one...

I got intel H65 chipset with a 1TB SATA Toshiba HDD in an HP Pavilion DV6-6096.

 

ah nvm. i plugged the bootable USB with the Win7 setup in the USB 2.0 port and everyhting went fine. the USB 3.0 was causing all the trouble.

proceeding with the format.

 

I was about to jump in to offer some help and see that it looks like you have things under control now. Awesome. Shout if you need something. I check my subscribed threads at least once every 24 hours.

 

yes you're doing a great job Fox.

Are there any ISO links for the SP1 version of Win7? it took me almost 4 hours to install several gigabytes of downloaded updates (with tons of restarts) after the clean install.

 

I don't know if the ISO is SP1 or not. If not, grab the SP1 package here:

Download Details - Microsoft Download Center - Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1 (KB976932) as a separate download. That will save some time.

 

If it hasn't been mentioned yet (and good news is always worth repeating anyway ), this procedure worked perfectly with a product key from a 32-bit Windows 7 Professional OEM DVD bought from Amazon.com and a homemade 64-bit DVD. The 32-bit had previously been activated on a MacBook Pro using Boot Camp. Boot Camp Assistant was used to remove and rebuild the Windows partition and the 64-bit was installed. As soon as I had internet access, I activated the operating system and repeatedly ran Windows Update until there were no more updates. During any of these update checks, Microsoft could have cancelled the activation if the update servers detected any monkey business. The acid test was running Microsoft's Genuine Windows verification tool. The MacBook Pro passed with flying colors.

Click the screenshot to see it full-size.