Windows 7 to 10 Upgrade? Windows could not parse or process

johnmw1 said:

I had a look in Belarc advisor to find her license key.

I hope the laptop was not volume licensed through her school, that would make this complicated. Anyway, I doubt that.
EDIT: Saw you posting it's Windows 7 Home, it can't be volume licensed so the above is of no concern.


You should find the correct product key in so called COA sticker, usually located on bottom of the laptop, sometimes hidden under the battery:

See this tutorial for instructions in clean installing Windows 10 using your Windows 7 product key: Clean Install Windows 10 Directly without having to Upgrade First - Windows 10 Forums

cereberus said:

Other forums are getting flooded with help requests. It is inevitable that somebody will miss the boat (mixing my metaphors), and if somebody reading this gets prompted into action sooner rather than too late, the comment has value.

I agree. This is an important reminder now with only 11 days to go!

NavyLCDR said:

This is how I would try the upgrade. Do you have the ISO file saved on the computer that needs to be upgraded? If not, save it there.

That option will not work in OP's case; the screenshot in first post clearly indicates that instead of Windows 10 upgrade, somehow Sysprep has been run. It has been run from within Windows 7. The error in screenshot tells that answer file is faulty and Windows cannot continue setup.

Exiting from that situation is only possible with repair or clean install, even repair does not work in most cases because setup is still reading instructions from answer file that wont work.

As it is now, OP has no chance to get to Windows 7 desktop to download ISO, mount it and start upgrade.

NavyLCDR said:

@Kyhi - in order for the unattended answer file to interfere with the upgrade, doesn't the answer file have to be in the Windows installation media file structure? Or can an unattended answer file that is stored somewhere else on the computer interfere?

Not wanting to sound egoistic but judging by the context I assume you meant me?

If sysprep command was run without /unattend:PATH_TO_ANSWERFILE switch, no answer file would be used except if folder C:\Windows\System32\Sysprep contains one with exact name unattend.xml.

If sysprep was run with /unattend:PATH_TO_ANSWERFILE, it can be located anywhere and have any name.

In this OP's case, in both above scenarios it will be located on the Windows 7 laptop. Theoretically it could work to boot the laptop with a WinPE media, remove the answer file and reboot; however this fails more often than works.

In any case I would no longer even try to rescue the underlying Windows 7 because a failed sysprep has already left it marks.

Kari