upgrade to 10, revert to 7, then back to 10

Odysseus · 18 Jul 2016

Thanks very much for that.

I am interested in your take on 10 compared to 7 and 8.1. Is it your primary OS and if so, what are the top 2 or 3 reasons you prefer it over the earlier versions?

EDIT: Have d/l'd and installed Macrium which is new to me. The first option was to create a "rescue" disk (I think) which I did and the total space used on the DVD was only about 173MB. I am reluctant to boot it up for fear that it might overwrite my installation. Can anyone guide me on what this is?

The Macrium software on the desktop shows:

1-System (none) NTFS active 384 MB (I assume this is the boot partition
2-Windows (C) NTFS Primary 68.12 GB / 919 GB
3-HP Recovery (D) NTFS Primary 10.06 / 11.32 GB
4-HP Tools (E) FAT 32 (LBA ) Primary

I assume the latter two came with the computer

There are two options:

Clone this disk and Image this disk

For purposes of implementing your suggestion, which of these should I use?

NavyLCDR · 18 Jul 2016

First, Macrium Reflect. You can boot from the DVD you made to make sure it works. It will just boot directly into Macrium Reflect. Then you can just exit to reboot if you want to.

You want the disk image option. But, you will need a storage location that is big enough to handle the used space of at least the first two partitions. For most people that means a second hard drive or SSD, either external (USB or eSATA) or internally installed - or a network storage location (either NAS or second computer connected to the network with a shared location).

I have 11 computers at my house - everything from tablets, a "stick" computer, low powered and old netbooks, laptops and desktops. The oldest was running Windows XP and the newest came with Windows 10 from the factory. They have all been upgraded to Windows 10 - with both flavors - Home and Pro, 32-bit and 64-bit. For me Windows 10 has been the most solid and fastest OS of them all. I hated the Windows 8.1 interface and glad to see the desktop and taskbar back in Windows 10 as the main interface. I have found that the older and less powerful the computer is, the bigger performance increase I have seen from Windows 7 to Windows 10. I just love Windows 10 over the others and even my elderly in-laws that live with me have had no problems converting to Windows 10 (and my mother-in-law still runs her little bookkeeping business via old fashioned fax machine).

Windows 10 has one major flaw in my house (and most other reports too). That is backup and restore imaging is very unreliable. Most "old timers" here use Macrium Reflect Free for our backup images (or other third party imaging programs).

Odysseus · 18 Jul 2016

Many thanks. That is very helpful in getting me to a decision. I was leaning toward just going with 10 mainly for the reasons put forth earlier, but also because it is taking too much time running three different versions and I want to consolidate my learning how to do things rather than splitting three ways. Your well-informed endorsement adds weight to my decision.

There is also the possibility that MS might decide that if the upgrade isn't in place by July 30, then it will be the same as not upgrading. Most seem to feel that won't happen, but I can't find anything from MS which says it will not.

I have had two occasions so far of very specialized software that ran perfectly (under 7 for one and 8.1 for the other) don't want to load under 10. I know this is a vague question, but is it your feeling that any program that ran properly on an earlier version will work under 10, it just being a matter of working through and finding the problem?

NavyLCDR · 18 Jul 2016

Odysseus said:

I know this is a vague question, but is it your feeling that any program that ran properly on an earlier version will work under 10, it just being a matter of working through and finding the problem?

Well, there are always a few programs that won't run on a new OS when it comes out until the author of the program fixes it. Have you tried compatibility mode?