Newsletter Archives

• Windows 7 full install DVD won’t boot on some systems – Error 5

  Posted on October 17, 2009 at 09:26 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  Reader JE writes:

  I am an MSDN subscriber and as such have early access to the new Windows 7 release. I decided after playing with it on my test machine that I would install it on my wife’s machine. She is currently running Vista and I thought I would do a clean, fresh install of Windows 7 rather than an upgrade.

  Easy enough, download the .iso file, burn it to a DVD, boot and install. Right?

  All went well up to the Boot stage where the DVD refused to boot. Instead it gave me some strange code 5 error message.

  JE searched high and low and finally discovered that the DVD was a good one, but for some reason it wouldn’t boot on his wife’s machine.

  After much searching on the internet I finally found this on the German unawave site:
  

  During the boot from the Windows 7 installation DVD on some PCs the error message “Error Code 5 – can not boot from disk” appears. Affected are primarily computer with older motherboards of the company “AsRock” or “MSI”. Other DVDs on these PCs can boot without problems; e.g. from a Windows Vista installation DVD. And the Windows 7 installation DVD is also OK, because this DVD can boot on other computers. Also the replacement of the DVD drive does not help. And booting from the USB stick does not help either. The error seems to be an incompatibility of “AsRock” motherboards with the DVD boot sector used by Microsoft in Windows 7 installation DVD.

  As luck would have it, I had an MSI motherboard.

  I followed their instructions which amount to pulling the boot sector off of a Vista install DVD and creating a new DVD with the vista boot sector and the Windows 7 files and all was well. It booted, it installed and no more problem.

  Every new version of Windows brings its own, uh, special challenges and you can expect Windows 7 will be the same. I’ll keep you posted on inscrutable problems as they come to my attention.

  Windows News DVD installation problem, Error Code 5, Windows 7

• What we don’t know about Windows 7 – and one thing we do

  Posted on October 17, 2009 at 07:40 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  I’m getting tons of questions about the Windows 7 upgrade. The fact (as I mention in the next post) is that there are still a lot of unanswered questions. Here’s a sampling of what we DON’T know:

  Will I be able to install the Win7 upgrade on a clean hard drive? (I read a rumor that the Upgrade DVD isn’t bootable.)

  Can I perform a clean install using only the upgrade media, the same way I could with the Vista upgrade?

  Will an activated copy of the Release Candidate qualify for an upgrade?

  What if I upgrade a system then decide that I need to re-format the hard drive, or my hard drive dies? Do I need to go back and install a qualifying earlier version of Windows, activate it, then install the upgrade?

  There are dozens of ancillary questions, of course.

  Customers are spending millions on upgrade offers (both in the US and in Europe), without knowing what they’re buying.

  One thing we do know for sure. In spite of Microsoft’s earlier announcement, the 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 7 will ship on separate DVDs. How do we know that? DVDs aren’t big enough to hold both!

   

  Windows News Windows 7 unanswered questions

• Lingering questions about Windows 7 upgrades

  Posted on October 17, 2009 at 07:20 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  We still don’t know a lot about the Windows 7 upgrade DVD, which should be on store shelves on the 22nd.

  Reader DG wrote to me:

  I hope I didn’t miss this valuable information, but with the imminent release of Windows 7 are we able to perform a clean install using an upgrade version of the OS?

  If you’re asking whether you can use the upgrade DVD to install a clean version of Windows 7 over the top of an existing registered “genuine” copy of Windows XP or Vista, the answer is yes, providing you upgrade along one of the prescribed paths.  Ed Bott posted an excellent remake of Microsoft’s confusing chart that tells you what you can and can’t upgrade.

  But if you’re asking whether you can perform a clean install in other situations, it’s a damn good question. That’s one of the questions that, at this point, we don’t know the answer to.

  Hard to believe, but with less than a week to go until the Windows 7 official release, nobody’s seen the upgrade media. Or at least, the ones who have seen it haven’t talked about it. There are at least a dozen open questions that should be answered by about 12:01 a.m. on October 22. Yours is one of the most important.

  MS has an official announcement about upgrades on Brandon LeBlanc’s blog, but I, for one, don’t believe this statement:

  The Windows 7 [upgrade] setup process will look for a previous version of Windows on the computer during installation and if a previous version is not found, activation will not complete successfully using the Product Key for the upgrade license.

  I think we will find that the truth is far more subtle…

   

  Windows News Windows 7 upgrade

• Windows XP Mode saga

  Posted on October 3, 2009 at 09:42 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  Microsoft just announced that the final version of Windows XP Mode – the XP-in-a-box solution for companies worried about upgrading to Windows 7 – will be available on the same day that Windows 7 is available, namely October 22.

  The people I know who have tried WinXP Mode like it. Which surprises me because running WinXP in a Virtual PC session seems like a very tenuous idea for inexperienced corporate users. But, hey, I don’t have to support a thousand people running antiquated mission-critical software that hasn’t been updated in the past four years, and is inexorably wed to a nearly-ten-year-old operating system.

  The WinXP Mode announcement is just as notable for what it doesn’t announce: obviously MS must have made important changes to Virtual PC, they just didn’t bother to talk about it in the announcement. Paul Thurrott has an insightful take on the situation:

  Microsoft announced today via its Windows Blog that it has released Windows XP Mode (and presumably, Windows Virtual PC–these guys never explain anything correctly) to manufacturing… Notice there isn’t a single mention of Windows Virtual PC in there. Microsoft? [knock, knock] Anyone home?

  Windows News

• Netbooks can ship with any version of Win7

  Posted on September 29, 2009 at 10:35 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  Actually, this isn’t new news at all. But TG Daily reports that Microsoft UK has confirmed that netbooks can ship with any version of Windows 7.

  Far as I know, that’s never been a question. It’s just that Starter Edition is considerably cheaper than other versions of Windows 7. Microsoft has placed hardware restrictions on Starter Edition – netbook manufacturers can only sell Starter on certain kinds of (generally skimpy) hardware. But as far as I know, there’s never been a restriction on selling any of the mainstream versions of Windows 7 pre-installed on any piece of hardware.

  (The TG Daily article also mentions that the three-application limit has been removed from Starter Edition, but that happened a long time ago. I talked about it four months ago, on May 23.)

  I’ve long advocated running Windows 7 Home Premium on netbooks. I used an ASUS 1000H with Win7 Ultimate all through the beta and RC versions, without a hiccup. In short, as I explain in Windows 7 All-In-One For Dummies, there’s no reason to get Starter Edition with your new netbook, unless you absolutely can’t afford Home Premium.

  UPDATE: I’m seeing this report pinging all over the Internet, and I’m aghast. Nothing has changed. Why is this “news”??? Microsoft set MAXIMUM hardware requirements for Starter Edition: I talked about that in my June 4 Top Story in Windows Secrets Newsletter. Netbook manufacturers who wanted to sell their wares with Windows 7 Starter installed couldn’t pump up their netbooks very much, as I explained last month. But there’s never been a hardware restriction on Home Premium, Business or Ultimate.

  Windows News Windows 7 Starter Edition

• Windows 7 Launch Event Miami

  Posted on September 25, 2009 at 10:29 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  Reader MC went to the Miami/Ft Lauderdale/Tampa/Orlando Windows 7 Launch Event on September 24 – and lived to tell the tale.

  The Launch Event was held in a movie multiplex. They used three of the movie rooms. Each session was 3/4 to almost full, maybe 150 to 200 in each room. The theory of “get there early – first come first served for the FREE software” is marketing hype. Everybody got the freebies, and you got a ticket when you arrived, so you knew that you would get to see the show.

  Windows 7 presentations were in two rooms, Win Server in the other. There were four Win 7 sessions. One of the rooms took them in order, 1-2-3-4. Confusingly, the other room had the same sessions in the opposite order, 4-3-2-1. Softies Blain Bar and John Baker gave two sessions each, then ran to the other room to give the other two sessions. Confused the daylights out of everybody, including the presenters.

  Blain was very forthcoming. “I’m only the messenger, but we got Vista wrong.” We really wanted the Windows 7 features in Vista, but they didn’t make it. We waited to ship Windows 7 until we got it right.

  Mostly it was “see what you can do now” PR, but that’s OK. Blain quoted Ed Bott many times in his slides. (Is Ed getting a cut from this? HA!)

  The goodies included a T-shirt and a DVD with the final version of Windows 7 Ultimate, 32-bit version. I didn’t get a 64-bit version. And they didn’t hand out Windows 7 Home Premium, which is what I really wanted.
  

  Overall it was worth going to, but it was exactly what I expected, kind of a “Yeh! Microsoft! Aren’t we great!” kind of thing.

  Windows News

• Windows 7 All-In-One For Dummies is shipping

  Posted on September 23, 2009 at 20:41 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  Amazon has my new book in stock. Windows 7 All-In-One For Dummies should be on store shelves momentarily.

  When you see it, please drop a line here and let me know when and where!

  Windows News Windows 7 All-In-One For Dummies

• Have an .edu email address? Get Windows 7 for $29.99

  Posted on September 18, 2009 at 05:39 CDT by woody • Comment in the Forums

  Microsoft just announced an amazing deal on Windows 7, but it’s only available if you have an email address issued by a recognized educational institution, or if you are going to a university or college that’s on Microsoft’s list.

  If you qualify, you can get Windows 7 for $29.95.

  This offer is good only to eligible students who attend an educational institution geographically located in the United States. This offer is non-transferable. One of each product may be purchased per eligible student (but not required).

  The following conditions serve to define student eligibility for the Promotion:

  1. .edu: Individual must possess a valid e-mail address at a U.S. educational institution which contains the domain suffix .edu; OR

  Pre-Approved School List: Enrolled in a U.S. educational institution included on the pre-approved school list; OR

  Submission of school enrollment: Submit verifiable school enrollment via the validation process; AND

  2. Individual must be a student at a U.S. educational institution and must be actively enrolled in at least 0.5 course credit and be able to provide proof of enrollment upon request.

  Microsoft or an appointed vendor may contact you to verify that you are a current student. If documentation is not provided indicating that you are a current student, you will be liable to reimburse Microsoft for the difference between what you paid and the estimated retail price of the software.

  Offer expires on January 3.

  Combined with Office 2007 Ultimate for $59.95, for qualifying students only, you can put together a full system for under $100. That’s a hell of a deal.

  There’s a similar offer for students in UK.

  Microsoft is serious about Windows 7.

   

   

  Windows News Windows 7 student discount
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