Downgrading to Windows 7

swarfega said:

Windows 7 Extended support will end on 14th January, meaning no further updates from Microsoft leaving you vulnerable.

End of support only means that there will be no more updates.
Win 7 will work as it does today.
I still have an old laptop with win XP. It works as it did before M$ support ended.

I have already recovered a windows.old
Does windows old has all files and folders of a win 7 installation? How big is Windows.old folder?
If windows.old folder has all files and folders from your previous Win 7 installation, you can recover.
- Backup all your data on an external disk.
- Backup windows.old on an external disk.
- Boot a Linux USB disk or Kyhi excellent tool. Windows 10 Recovery Tools - Bootable Rescue Disk
- With Explorer delete all Win 10 files and folders and with mini tool partition delete other partitions (like Recovery) leaving on only Windows.old folder.
- Extract all files and folders from Windows old folder to C:\
- Make sure the windows partition is set as Active.
- Reboot. It should boot from your previous win 7

Megahertz said:

End of support only means that there will be no more updates.
Win 7 will work as it does today.
I still have an old laptop with win XP. It works as it did before M$ support ended.

I have already recovered a windows.old
Does windows old has all files and folders of a win 7 installation? How big is Windows.old folder?
If windows.old folder has all files and folders from your previous Win 7 installation, you can recover.
- Backup all your data on an external disk.
- Backup windows.old on an external disk.
- Boot a Linux USB disk or Kyhi excellent tool. Windows 10 Recovery Tools - Bootable Rescue Disk
- With Explorer delete all Win 10 files and folders and with mini tool partition delete other partitions (like Recovery) leaving on only Windows.old folder.
- Extract all files and folders from Windows old folder to C:\
- Make sure the windows partition is set as Active.
- Reboot. It should boot from your previous win 7

Hi there
having XP is fine for some legacy programs / hardware but it's not of much use if you want to access the Internet -- some sites won't even accept any version of IE at all, or some other browsers of releases a few back from where they are now.

It's absolutely OK running as a Virtual Machine provided you are aware of security considerations. Same will be true of W7 after support ends.

Cheers
jimbo

Megahertz said:

End of support only means that there will be no more updates.
Win 7 will work as it does today.
I still have an old laptop with win XP. It works as it did before M$ support ended.

I have already recovered a windows.old
Does windows old has all files and folders of a win 7 installation? How big is Windows.old folder?
If windows.old folder has all files and folders from your previous Win 7 installation, you can recover.
- Backup all your data on an external disk.
- Backup windows.old on an external disk.
- Boot a Linux USB disk or Kyhi excellent tool. Windows 10 Recovery Tools - Bootable Rescue Disk
- With Explorer delete all Win 10 files and folders and with mini tool partition delete other partitions (like Recovery) leaving on only Windows.old folder.
- Extract all files and folders from Windows old folder to C:\
- Make sure the windows partition is set as Active.
- Reboot. It should boot from your previous win 7

Hi,
Didn't Heidoc used to have an app to do this if windows.old folder still existed
Can't find it anymore.

Didn't Heidoc used to have an app to do this if windows.old folder still existed

Not that I can find, but Microsoft have instructions for manually restoring the OS from Windows.old. You'll need to have a recovery drive or an install usb so that you can boot to a Command Prompt to do it.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/...windows-instal