Vista - Simple install question

[durns82]

I searched, but couldn't find an answer to this precise question.

I currently have a 200gig hard drive, split into two 100gig partitions. One partition contains windows XP and various utilities (and steam, grrr), the other my games, pics, etc.

Now i want to get rid of windows XP, and replace it with vista (premium 32bit oem). Do i have to:

A) Reformat my entire hard drive, and then put the vista disk in and run it from startup

B) Reformat the windows partition, then put the vista disk in and run it from startup

C) just put the vista disk in and it will format the partition for me, install etc.


Now i'm hoping for C), but if its A) or B), how do i do the reformat thing, and is there anything i need to watch out for?

Thanks for any help!

p.s. if i keep my games partition, will they run ok without the registry keys in windows and such? (don't really know what i'm talking about here!)

 

[Jimi]

Just boot from the Vista disc and partition your hard disk from within the Vista installation.

 

[FidgitUK]

If you want vista can and will do it all for you. It even installs itself and moves all your old windows files (literally everything, i reinstalled then kicked myself as i didnt back up some of my media but found it all again) in a file called windows.old

It is really user friendly i guess. I prepped for a full reformat, backed everything up to my external drive,created a 'must have' program disc ect ect, just followed the instructions and it ended up doing it all for you and saving everything in a tidy little folder. Kinda wish it didnt but oh well, must be handy for some.

 

[Albaba]

Heres what i would do...

Lets say you have drive c:\ and drive d:\
Get everything you dont wanna lose off the c drive and chuck it on the d partition. Then boot from your vista dvd. it will give you the option to format any partitions. Get it to format the C partition and then go with a clean install

Unfortunatley the games installed on the D drive will more often than not need reinstalling. But dont worry all your saves/configs should be able to be saved.

Hope i have been of some help

Albaba

 

[rob5ta]

I searched, but couldn't find an answer to this precise question.

I currently have a 200gig hard drive, split into two 100gig partitions. One partition contains windows XP and various utilities (and steam, grrr), the other my games, pics, etc.

Now i want to get rid of windows XP, and replace it with vista (premium 32bit oem). Do i have to:

A) Reformat my entire hard drive, and then put the vista disk in and run it from startup

B) Reformat the windows partition, then put the vista disk in and run it from startup

C) just put the vista disk in and it will format the partition for me, install etc.


Now i'm hoping for C), but if its A) or B), how do i do the reformat thing, and is there anything i need to watch out for?

Thanks for any help!

p.s. if i keep my games partition, will they run ok without the registry keys in windows and such? (don't really know what i'm talking about here!)

Option C will work fine.

1. Set your DVD drive as first boot device in the bios.
2. Boot from DVD when the press any key message appears
3. Enter the product key, blah blah blah
4. Choose the drive / partition to install to.
5. Select drive options
6. Format your current XP partition
7. Vista will commence install

As far as your games partiton goes i would personally reformat from within windows once installed and start again. Im not a gamer, but would imagine that they would not run properly without all the necessary registry entries that are produced on install.

Also if you are a gamer, then i would consider holding back with Vista until it has settled in and patches/updates are available for games. I have read posts on forums that have stated issues running certain games on Vista at the moment. XP is still the ultimate gaming O/S, and until Vista has "bedded in" then you may run into issues.

Other gamers may correct me on that, cause im not one but am only going on info that i have heard. Just wouldnt want you to install Vista, then have to reinstall XP and all your games again for nothing....

Hope that helps

Rob

 

[durns82]

Thanks for the speedy responses all, glad option C) is possible!

Does anyone have any experience with Steam regarding this sort of thing. I.E. can i move the folder to my games partition, then just put it back after Vista install? I'm guessing no, but really don't want to go through all those game downloads again...

 

[.:MBK:.]

steam works fine without reinstalling it

running it atm from a previous format, just dump a steam.exe shortcut on your desktop or in startup and off you go (bar the startup issue steam currently seems to have)

no idea bout moving though, aslong as the file layout is the same i wouldnt have thought thered be too many issues