windows 7: upgrade or partition?

currently I have the windows 7 beta installed on a seperate partition, but i really like it, and i am considering just upgrading from vista to it. Would this be a bad idea? it seems to me like it would be. Would I have to reinstall all of my programs, or does it retain all of that?

oh also, the beta i currently have intalled is the leaked 7000 build. Is there any differance between that and the public beta? i don't want to install the public beta if it is no differant

 

I personally would dual boot as win7 is a beta. There may be some bugs and problems in the future which may cause major issues, and if it's your only OS, then you could be screwed.

 

get the public bet and do NOT use it as your primary os. its a beta for a reason

 

Personally, I think you should keep Vista as your primary OS until the final comes out. You certainly can make your own choice, though. I plan on keeping Vista, even after I upgrade to Win7. I've been running Vista, but I still have XP tucked away and log in from time-to-time.

 

yeah...i don't think i'll overwrite my vista install....but the public beta is indeed the exact same as the leaked beta, so luckily i can stick with what i have....

 

virtualize it !

 

It would be a bad idea to overwrite your _Vista installation with the Win7 beta; as someone else said, it's called a beta for a good reason, which means that you'd be putting yourself at a significant risk of having to wipe your drive and reinstall _Vista right at the worst moment.

 

Also, the Beta doesn't last forever so why use it as your main OS?

 

What's wrong with keeping the dual boot?

 

I'm using it as my primary OS myself, I already re-install Windows every 1~4 months so I don't care. If it crashes on me I just install Linux on my free 15GB partition, use it if I'm at school, and backup everything before re-installing Windows. I've already used Milestone 3 as my primary OS for a month.

 

imo its stable enough to run every day but as others said once the beat ends if they dont provide another solution then back to vista you will have to go

 

It is a beta, but it's probably the best beta Microsoft has ever released. And I mean it's solid as a rock. I'm using it as a primary OS and with a few tweaks (remove watermark, send feedback) you can't tell the difference. I find two OSes on the same system counterproductive.. you lose efficiency. As for it expiring, I think by then there probably will be an upgrade path from the beta to the final version, and I sure as hell am buying this when it's released.

 

I wish I can do that, but I have spent a lot of time setting up my main machine to the way I like it. I'll be waiting for the final release before I fathom changing my main machine.

 

I'd also recommend dual-booting - no problems when it expires, less of a risk if you do hit a bug, and because fresh-install OS'es run better (if even by a little bit) than upgrade-installed OS'es. If you decide to use Win7 almost exclusively, just set it as the default and set the boot delay to 0 or 1 second(s) in EasyBCD. Vista's boot manager is rock-solid, so there's no need to worry about dual-booting there. It's a bit more difficult to configure than XP's, but EasyBCD will take care of that.

 

Is it possible to upgrade from a "beta" to a retail version once the retail version is available?

Basically, I want to keep all my files and software already installed and loaded into Win7 Beta. And when a retail version is available, all I have to do is pop in the DVD and click "upgrade" correct?

Or, do I have to format and lose all my files and software?

 

always save/back up your data to a seperate partition/physical disc

ghost your present o/s

upgrade it to win 7 beta, that way you will keep all your apps and files, hardware drivers

if youre not happy or have problems, go back to your ghost image

thats the method Ive adopted with my home pc's laptops

when win7 becomes available you will once again be able to use the upgrade method if you wish

Many people will tell you it is best to go for a format and clean install (and they are correct, nothing beats a clean install) but it is not a necessity, the upgrade path is fine.

 

I would definitely partition it. No matter how stable it is (and it is stable) it is still in beta.

 

Question by someone who's never done a partition before:

Say I wanted to do a partition on my laptop HDD (specs in sig) for windows 7 to play around with it. I think i understand how to partition and install it ok, but here's what I'm curious about:

Once the beta is over, or if I become "done" with Windows 7, can i somehow delete that partition and re-incorporate that available storage?

Also I read if you do the windows beta that you shouldn't play any Mp3's cuz they corrupt the files in windows 7. I have subscription music thru Zune and dont wanna mess it up, so I was wondering what the story with all that was?

 

Yes, you can delete the partition and restore your main drive's storage size. Useful tools that help in this is gParted, or you can use Windows Vista's Disk Management tool in the Computer Management applet in the control panel.

For the MP3 issue, Microsoft released a patch that you can apply to fix the problem. Should be able to Google for it. There is a patch for the 32-bit version of Windows 7 and another for the 64-bit, so choose the appropriate version.