Upgrading an Extensa running Vista to XP or to 7

quovadis

Hi , I am trying to upgrade an extensa from vista to XP (ideally 7) however when I boot up from the xp disc it says the sytem ( vista)  is newer than the one I am installing ..OR it says compatability issues ... spoke to Acer today an they confirm its a software issue ...but I know that people have made the jump so there must be a way to do this ...can anyone help on this issue but in a simplistic way to follow please 

 

Kind regards 

JackE

As long as your vista recovery partition remains intact, you might try to let the XP installation proceed despite the warnings. Yes, vista is newer than XP. But newer sometimes doesn't mean better. 8^) If XP doesn't work out as expected, you should be able to restore to vista factory fresh condition from the recovery partition. Then you can try Win7. Yes, vista is older than
Win7. But newer sometimes does mean better too. 8^)

 

Jack E/NJ

quovadis

The vista recovery is in deed still there, but cannot get the XP to install despite booting from the Cd .. messages range from its not compatable etc and stops at this point I have even tried to start the sytems and launch from there but again no go . Having looked at other postings the incompatability deemd to be the sata hardrive and needs software to correct this, but to me its not clear how to do this . The reason for the upgrade is that Vista is extremely slow and having upgraded other laptops  I have always found it more benificial , But I do need to get an answer as to how to uprgade as many other people have done just that 

 

Thank you for you input though, much appreciated 

 

regards 

 

Paul 

JackE

OK, try this. At the Acer logo, press F2 to get into the bios menu. Change the advanced SATA controller setting to the "'compatibility" setting. Save and exit. Then re-try installing XP.

 

Jack E/NJ'

quovadis

Hi I had a look at this and when I look at advanced tab all I see is Infrared ( enabled) and ASF ? configuration ? 

 

If I look into ASF i SEE mInimum watchdog timeout (60) BIOS time out(0) OS boot timeout (o)and Power-on wait time (60) ? 

 

The other tabs dont offer any further advances 

 

kind regards 

JackE

Check out all the other bios menuitems and submenus. The SATA HDD settings may be buried in there somewhere depending on the bios mfr.

 

Jack E/NJ 

n2gc

With XP not being supported in the near future from MS and more than ever more vunerable

to malware attacks, an upgrade to W7 would be your best bet. The software for the upgrade

is really cheap and one can then use the better OS. I imagine you're running Vista 64 bit

and both W7 Upgrade 32 or 64 bit is easily had. I use BRANDED OEM Windows 7 software

all time and it works great at very decent prices. I've used this place a few times with

no problems. All come with legal COA and disc.

 

http://www.snaggstuff.com/microsoft-windows-7.html

 

The way I do an install if using a new drive is go into BIOS and make sure the drive

is set on IDE INSTEAD OF AHCI, then go from there via the CD option in BIOS until

the OS is loaded.

 

With a valid W7 update disc, you should be able to simply insert the CD and follow

the prompts to update from Vista to W7.

 

This might help. It tells of how to downgrade.

 

http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-UPGRADE-from-Vista-to-Windows-XP-on-an-Acer/

Thedeathofxp

$100 bucks for W 7 is not cheap....with over 300 million pc still running xp and support end April 8th

n2gc

$100.00 for W7 is high, but one can install W7 Home Prem [branded] for $64.00 and whatever

shipping is. Branded simply means the disc itself make have a Dell or HP label on the disc.

The software is Microsoft OEM and comes with a valid, legal COA. It will install, update,

and do all the things full retail version save for MS support, but there are so many legit

W7 sites avail like Windows 7 Forums that provide help regarding everything a person

would want to know about W7, that the branded OEM version is a safe and inexpensive

option to an upgrade.