how do I go back to media center 2004?

[michael e dziatkowicz]

I installed Vista Home Premium today. I like it but none of my programs are
on it and I have no sound on it plus it's not showing what bill gates was
showing at ces (that nice waterfall desktop). Ok I had to do a clean install
for some reason the RTM upgrade was greyed out. Anyways since none of my
settings from media center and programs have transferred to vista. Is there
a way to transfer these settings from media center to vista or to go back to
media center and do the upgrade so that the settings and programs are
transferred into vista this time? It did save windows.old if that helps.
thank you

 

[Mike Brannigan]

I installed Vista Home Premium today. I like it but none of my
programs are on it

You may need to reinstall these if you did not do an inplace upgrade.

and I have no sound on it

You need the Vista driver for your sound card or on board sound
capability fo your nmother board.

plus it's not showing what bill gates was showing at ces (that nice
waterfall desktop).

That is a forth coming feature of a Windows Ultimate Extra

Ok I had to do a clean install for some reason the RTM upgrade was
greyed out. Anyways since none of my settings from media center and
programs have transferred to vista. Is there a way to transfer these
settings from media center to vista

Yes the Windows Easy Transfer Tool in Vista will do a lot of this for
you. But this is usually for moving form one PC to another not
inplace on the same device.

or to go back to media center and do the upgrade so that the
settings and programs are transferred into vista this time?

Yes that should work. As Media Center is a candidate to inplace
upgrade to Home Premium.
see http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/upgradeinfo.mspx

 

[Max]

If you did not start the Vista setup from your Windows Media Center/XP
desktop (but booted from the DVD instead), that's why 'upgrade' was not
available to you, and nothing was 'transferred'.
Nobody has the 'active' DreamScene yet, as it was not yet released as an
Ultimate Extra :
http://windowsultimate.com/Blogs/Extras/Default.aspx
and may not be available for your edition anyway.
Sound is a driver issue--you may need to locate Vista compatible drivers for
your particular sound hardware (if they do not come through Vista Windows
Update) .

The short and easy answer is 'no'--it's too late to 'recover' anything in
your situation with your experience level (no offense intended). If you want
to try to upgrade again, you will have to format your drive (delete
partition, actually), reinstall your XP edition, reinstall all your
applications and setup everything how you like, then run the Vista upgrade
from your XP desktop.

Or you can locate Vista sound drivers, install them, then re-install any
applications you want in Vista. Either way, you will be doing a lot of
reinstalling.

 

[michael e dziatkowicz]

it told me something about how i had to delete the users group to enable the
upgrade path. Why would it tell me this?

 

[michael e dziatkowicz]

there has to be a way for me to do it without losing everything on my
computer. I have $2000 worth of itunes and musicmatch songs on this thing
and i'm not going to throw them away because of microsoft. Plus i have
emails i need to save and websites i need to save also that i'm not going to
lose because of microsoft.

 

[Chris]

If the music and emails were on the main C: drive when you installed
Vista, then there will not likely be anything you can do. The C:
partition was wiped when you did the clean install. (Can't really blame
MS, since I believe that this was mentioned on the option you chose when
you installed.)

If your music and email were on a different partition, such as D:, then
you can simply point your system music folder to the old music folder
and use that, or simply import the old emails.

But, again, if you had your data on the C: drive, then you should not
install anything like an OS without a thorough back-up.

 

[michael e dziatkowicz]

it never told me it was going to FORMAT my hard drive when it installed
vista.

 

[michael e dziatkowicz]

hold on everything is still on my c partition. It still only shows 6gb free
out of 106gb partition why is that with a CLEAN install?

 

[Chris]

I am just going on what I saw on mine. My choices were upgrade and
custom. Maybe the choices are different on the RTM if it is an upgrade.
Anyway, custom was essentially a clean install. If you have only 6 gb
free on a 106 gb partition, something is on there for sure.

 

[Robert Firth]

Yes, custom is a clean install - except that it does save all your files in
a windows.old file, even the old windows folder from the previous install.
It does format the hard drive, but keeps the files by moving them around.
Move your music and other files out of the windows.old file when you are
ready - those are perfectly safe.

An upgrade is similar, except all the files are put where they belong
instead of in the windows.old folder. In addition, your programs will still
be installed.

A true clean install would require you to format the drive. There is an
option for this in advanced disk options. There really is no way to
accidentally format your hard drive, they made it reasonably difficult to do
unless you know what you are doing. Like you said, you did not explicitly
tell it to format, so it didn't erase your data. It is safe.

--
/* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
* Robert Firth *
* Windows Vista x86 RTM *
* http://www.WinVistaInfo.org *
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * */

 

[Rock]

I installed Vista Home Premium today. I like it but none of my programs are
on it and I have no sound on it plus it's not showing what bill gates was
showing at ces (that nice waterfall desktop). Ok I had to do a clean
install for some reason the RTM upgrade was greyed out. Anyways since none
of my settings from media center and programs have transferred to vista. Is
there a way to transfer these settings from media center to vista or to go
back to media center and do the upgrade so that the settings and programs
are transferred into vista this time? It did save windows.old if that
helps.
thank you

There is no clean install with Vista. There is an upgrade or a custom
install. If you did the custom install, the only way to get back to XP is
to do a clean install of XP

 

[Max]

Well, you can (and should) look through the contents of your windows.old
folder and subfolders to see if any of your DATA was saved before you do
anything (assuming all your data files were on the same partition as your
Windows install)--then either back it up, or move/copy it to the appropriate
folder(s) within Vista...depending on how you wish to proceed. But as far as
any applications or settings, they will all have to be re-installed and/or
reset no matter what.

 

[michael e dziatkowicz]

well i need my emails and I also need my favorites how do I get them back in
vista? There is no way to import my application settings into vista? I know
there was a way with xp.

 

[Rock]

well i need my emails and I also need my favorites how do I get them back
in vista?

I'm not sure what you are asking. Are you asking how to get the data from
the current Vista installation? Or are you asking how to transfer settings
and data from your XP installation to the Vista installation?

If you did a custom install then I would expect all your data and programs
are gone. Not sure why you would have a windows.old folder when you did a
custom install, but look in that folder to see if the data is there.

I know it's after the fact but you really should image the XP system before
installing the new OS, that way you can restore the old image if needed and
be back and running. I am guessing you didn't do that.

A different preventative tack is to backup all your data. One should always
have a full and complete backup at all times. Did you backup important data
before doing the Vista install?

There is no way to import my application settings into vista? I know there
was a way with xp.

Yes prior to installilng Vista run the Windows Easy Transfer Utility, WET.
This is the evolution of FAST in XP. WET will transfer the data and
settings from an XP installation to a Vista installation.

Windows Vista Migration Step-by-Step Guide
http://technet2.microsoft.com/Windo...9de8-4b94-b254-586a61843a041033.mspx?mfr=true

 

[Jane C]

A custom install, provided that you don't go for the advanced options and
format, will rollup the existing OS into windows.old folder. It even tells
you that that is what it is going to do.

 

[michael e dziatkowicz]

no because I was planning on doing a upgrade. I don't know what caused me to
go ahead and do a install without the upgrade option. Maybe seeing the
windows.old thing in the dialog made me not cancel the install? But with it
being there and all of my other programs and files still being on my hard
drive i'm assuming this install was really an upgrade but for some reason it
didn't transfer the files over thus it acted like a custom installation.
Thus my dillemma I need my emails and favorites from my xp installation
transferred over to my vista installation or at least to go back to my xp
installation so I can figure out how to upgrade. Another question, why would
it tell me that my users folders would have to be deleted to upgrade?

 

[Rock]

A custom install, provided that you don't go for the advanced options and
format, will rollup the existing OS into windows.old folder. It even tells
you that that is what it is going to do.

Ok thanks. Been awhile since I did the install, I forgot that.

 

[Rock]

Look in the windows.old folder to see if you can get your data back.
Always, always, always have a full and complete backup of data. Data loss
is an issue of when, not if.

 

[michael e dziatkowicz]

everything is there but how do i transport it back into windows vista. Vista
is a completely different beast than xp. Xp made it so much simpler than
Vista does. With xp you just clicked a few buttons and it transferred files
and programs like that vista makes it like getting wisdom teeth pulled out
or passing a kidney stone (each of which i did last year by the way). If
this is the way vista is going to be the ordinary joe won't want to touch
vista with a 5mile stick.

 

[Rock]

everything is there but how do i transport it back into windows vista.
Vista is a completely different beast than xp. Xp made it so much simpler
than Vista does. With xp you just clicked a few buttons and it
transferred files and programs like that vista makes it like getting
wisdom teeth pulled out or passing a kidney stone (each of which i did
last year by the way). If this is the way vista is going to be the
ordinary joe won't want to touch vista with a 5mile stick.

It is just as easy in Vista. XP was not just click a few buttons. In XP
There was the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard tto move data from one
installation to another, or you could do an upgrade. With Vista FAST is now
called WET, Windows Easy Transfer, and you can also do an upgrade. So the
same options are there.

The problems you are running into are because you didn't do the upgrade, you
did a custom install, and you did not backup your data before hand. I'm
sorry but you can't blame Vista for that. And even if you did the upgrade,
sh*t can happen. So you have to be prepared beforehand for that
possibility.

Maybe someone can step in here and help, but I don't know how you can import
the data in the windows.old folder into Vista settings. You can copy the
email data and the favorites from windows.old to CD or flash drive, then
reinstall XP, and restore this data to the XP installation. Then do a Vista
upgrade.

You violated a basic principle of computing. At all times you must have a
backup of important data. Data loss does occur. And it is especially
important to backup before doing anything as extensive as changing an
operating system.