Loren Pechtel

If you can get the drivers needed for your machine you can wipe and upgrade to ver 7. Go to the manufacturers website and download all the ver 7 drivers first, though--you very well might find you can't find them. Manufacturers get lazy about such matters, last year I threw perfectly good hardware away due to a lack of drivers and I had to jump through hoops to configure a printer that's not all that old.

pseudoswede

Question: after reading this article, can I upgrade a Windows 10 Home computer to Windows 10 Pro by simply entering a Windows 7 Ultimate key?

cblaisd

I would not use Windows these days without ClassicShell. And it's free.

I have it set up to emulate the XP style start button et al in my Win7 Pro machine. When I need particular Win7 features, shift-click gives access.

LIH Prem

You can change the behavior of win 10 to your own preferences.

ie, to get rid of the tiles, right click on each one and select unpin. When they are all gone, no more tiles or space for them. You can add them back anytime you want to.

Just search for each thing you want to change.


-David

Letitride3c

Use Classic Shell - on Windows 8/8.1 and W10 machines, both desktop & NB's - although the latest W10 build do offer more user customization to hide, turn-off and uninstall some of the features.

HP's support site should have all the necessary drivers for the PC and unless there are specific HP apps/functions that are needed (unlikely, IMO, on a "Home" edition except for bloatware) - I would opt for a clean & fresh install from an USB stick, skip using the recovery/restore as that has all the "junks". Once it's up - activation should be simple & automatic as it's an OEM license and should be MB/hardware based - recognized by $S's server. Tweak the settings, especially personalization and disable those designed "extra".

Take a snapshot/screenshot of what's preloaded or installed currently, rather not to start off with all those trial-wares & pop-ups marketing pitch to ... machine would run a litter faster and of course, the OS is on C:\ and just about everything else are on the D:\ - a fun weekend project while not on the road or doing MR

Lastly, of course - configure Classic Shell.

gfunkdave

How do you get an ISO for the USB stick? I thought Microsoft stopped making the downloads available as with Win7.

unmesh

Download the ISO using the Media Creation Tool from Microsoft itself. (May need to do this from a machine running Windows 7 or 8.x). One nice thing is that it lets you download both 32-bit and 64-bit versions into the same ISO to have a master installer.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/soft...load/windows10

Mary2e

Thanks for all the suggestions. I"m going to finish unistalling stuff and getting rid of all those tiles and then see where I am.

I hate getting a new computer... it always takes me days to get it up and running the way I like it.

DenverBrian

You'll then have the computer for years, and Windows 10 is it for Microsoft, so you'll never have a similar upgrade headache again. (Windows 10 will continue to automatically update, and in the aggregate, it's a pretty nice, stable OS.)

Mary2e

Hey, I'm still on Vista. My current machine is approaching 10 years old. My needs are not that great. I only replaced it because Vista is out of support and I can't go higher than IE9, though firefox works.

I just don't want all that garbage floating around my desktop.

Now, who the heck is Cortana, and why would I want her monitoring my activies so she could "help"?

pseudoswede

https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10

Mary2e

Thanks!

gfunkdave

Cortana is Microsoft's intelligent assistant, like Siri for iOS. It can do a bunch of stuff similar to Siri. Here's a sample list: http://www.howtogeek.com/225458/15-t...on-windows-10/

Mary2e

Thanks! But I doubt I would ever talk to my desktop computer. I hardly use Siri, though she does come in handy at times

ajGoes

Does Windows 10 come with a really usable migration tool? My biggest headache is moving to a new machine. I remember a migration tool came with Vista or Win7, but as I recall, it was severely lacking. As a developer, my needs are far more complex than the average user's.