Windows Vista Forum / Installation & Compatibility / Vista Technical / Help! Vista upgrade / Latest Posts

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

WAW8 — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 10:08:30 GMT

From my experience, you can only use that procedure before your 30-day trial ends. After that, you're stuck in reduced functionality mode. MS may have changed that to now allow later usage, but this is how it used to work.

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

doghucat — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 18:36:24 GMT

When the 30 days are up people try this and MS says it alright to use this procedure.
But it turns out there's an officially supported way to turn that 30 day evaluation period into 120 days.You can "re-arm" the trial period for another 30 days, and do so up to 3 times. Here's how it works:

1. Click on the start button and type "Cmd" into the Start Search box.
2. Press Ctrl-Shift-Enter to open the command prompt.
3. Type "slmgr -rearm" and hit enter.
4. Reboot the computer.
5. Make sure to re-arm the system again 29 or 30 days later.

Obviously this feature was built into Vista by Microsoft, and the company has confirmed that extending the evaluation period is not a violation of Vista's end user agreement.

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

WAW8 — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 09:08:58 GMT

OK - the sequence of events, in the case where you don't activate in time, is typically the following:
1) Popup indicating you have 72 hours remaining to activate
2) Reset into Reduced Functionality Mode (RFM) -- involving removal of the Start button, removal of ability to browser files using Windows Explorer
3) Limiting of machine to only connect to Microsoft, and then, only to the page that allows you to purchase a license. Constraining of machine to 1 hour's use per 24 hours.

So, are you operating under RFM now? Or are you still fully functional but just no longer have internet access?

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

audistarr — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 12:14:15 GMT

Now I have another problem. I was going to wait another day to install Vista for a second time...But then randomly when I was visiting these forums my internet cut out...It was working for up to a month before today and now it says Im connected locally but to an unidentified network so it wont connect to the internet...Ive tried changing routers too. I know its not the card because its been working all up to this point and even connects to other networks in the building. What happened! It was all out of no where too, I didnt modify anything, I was just surfing the web when it turned off like that.

But finally, I did re'installed Vista and it hasnt asked me to activate it and it seems like it worked. But now I have this no internet problem. Any suggestions? Thank you

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

WAW8 — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 10:39:06 GMT

Let us know if the in-place upgrade actually works. Like I said, the process is intended to be used in those situations where a product key is NOT provided during the first installation. I don't recall whether or not you provided a product key when you installed it. But it you did, this will be an interesting test to see if this in-place upgrade works in such a situation.

If it does, that will be great news. We'll then need to pin the instructions on the forum so others will see it.

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

Jason — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 10:38:11 GMT

Oh the old upgrade trick. Wonder when MS will catch on to that.... You should not lose your files in an upgrade.

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

audistarr — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 08:41:44 GMT

Thanks for the help, you answered it very clearly. Yeah, I waited until the last 2 days of activiation to ask for help (dumb of me). I hope the 28 day gap won't cause any problems with the second pass installation. But I will backup just incase. Thank you! Ciao

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

WAW8 — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 08:27:24 GMT

The procedure I liked to is designed to install Vista clean in two passes, the first pass being without using a product key, the second pass using a product key.

With Vista already installed, you only have to run the second pass. It's not supposed to wipe out any applications or data files, but the procedure is intended to be done in rapid succession, that is, one pass right after another -- before you install applications or create data files.

So, to be safe, I would copy any data files, including things like "favorites" to external storage before you try the second pass.

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

audistarr — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 01:59:11 GMT

If I do this, but I have files and a few games on my current Vista will it delete/format them or the HDD?

RE: Help! Vista upgrade

WAW8 — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 13:19:32 GMT

The following link shows how to do an install over an existing Vista install and thus "upgrade" Vista to itself:

[url] http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=5932 [/url]

Help! Vista upgrade

audistarr — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 11:35:40 GMT

Hello everyone, okay,

I had a fresh new harddrive and I installed Full version of Vista onto it. However I only had the key for an upgrade from XP. Now its asking for a Key and I cant afford a key for the full version. Is it possible to somehow just activate it by calling microsoft or something? I have XP...Well actually 2000, upgraded to XP...So I really couldnt be bothered with installing 2000 again, and then XP, and then vista. Is there something I could do?