Windows 7 (Business PC) refuse to Win10 upgrade have many issues....Help needed.

[Redsiskin]

So the back story is that my friend asked me to help with is PC(win7) that was running super slow and wouldn't open some certain files need for is work like PDF and Word,

I managed to fix that from file association and managed to clear some startup programs to speed it up a bit.

Windows 7 have become very buggy for him to work with.

 

The problem is that i can't do full format since he has programs related to the business which he doesn't have or remember the product keys/user+login and they cost ton of money.

I tried to update to 10 directly from the PC and failed.

I tried to Run Win 10 from USB boot and failed.

 

Is there anyway to bypass this issue and ending up with windows 10 at the end ? (still leaving is software's and files untouched)

 

I was thinking about adding another drive with Win10 and leaving the current drive as is, is it a good idea ?

 

 

PC spec:

HP, i3 with stock fans, MB with two Sata slot,4GB ram.

 

[whispous]

Every single thing you touch has a risk of screwing it forever.

 

Do not attempt to upgrade or fix a PC that he cannot lose or have changed.

 

Do not help him with this.

 

The only sensible path is for him to buy a new PC and move his workflow to new or reinstalled software.

 

This is described as business critical and you will open yourself up to a world of pain, possibly even legal pain if he's so stupid as to have leaned on this single point of failure for so long. Do not get involved in his utter failure.

[GoStormPlays]

I’ve had this issue before. You’d first want to check what hard drive mode the hard drive is in (ACHI, IDE, etc.) and make sure it’s in ACHI. I’ve noticed that when I have it on IDE windows tends to not want to boot.

 

3 minutes ago, whispous said:

Every single thing you touch has a risk of screwing it forever.

 

Do not attempt to upgrade or fix a PC that he cannot lose or have changed.

 

Do not help him with this.

He does have a fair point though. 

[whispous]

To reiterate: there's always a chance that any hardware or software upgrade fails, and if it does, at best it could destroy your friendship to have been the "last guy to touch the pc" before his business was ruined.

[Redsiskin]

6 minutes ago, GoStormPlays said:

I’ve had this issue before. You’d first want to check what hard drive mode the hard drive is in (ACHI, IDE, etc.) and make sure it’s in ACHI. I’ve noticed that when I have it on IDE windows tends to not want to boot.

 

He does have a fair point though. 

ACHI, Toshiba SSD 240GB.

It does boot but won't install Win10 with existing files, ask to wipe the drive.

whispous does have good point that goes against my nature, i really love to help people.

[Needfuldoer]

13 minutes ago, Redsiskin said:

whispous does have good point that goes against my nature, i really love to help people.

Sometimes being helpful can come back to bite you.

 

Your friend needs a whole new computer. Run both of them in parallel until they can find their licensing information for their software.

[Poinkachu]

1 hour ago, Redsiskin said:

The problem is that i can't do full format since he has programs related to the business which he doesn't have or remember the product keys/user+login and they cost ton of money.

Can't he like, get the keys from the software developer since he paid for it.

 

56 minutes ago, Redsiskin said:

whispous does have good point that goes against my nature, i really love to help people.

Just wanna remind that before helping we best think far ahead and consider the risk, for both ourself and the recipient.

Because if it ends up ruined, that's not helping.

 

In essence : At the very least make sure s/he fully understand that shit can happen and he may lose it in the attempt. Friendship might be ruined still, but at least less chance of legal pain.

 

Oh yeah, make a clone of (atleast) the OS before attempting anything.

[Brando212]

biggest question that hasn't been asked yet. Is this a personal computer that he uses for work or was this a corporate supplied PC and software?

 

if this is a corporate provided PC then they really should be providing a replacement/upgrade path as Windows 7 isn't compliant for corporate use anymore.

[Kid.Lazer]

As an addendum to what the others have said, if a software change even has a remote chance to bork your 1-and-only functional system, make an image of the current drives to fallback on in case of a critical error. I personally think trying to do an in-place upgrade to Windows 10/11 is worth the try, BUT you need to have a fail-safe in place in case you royally screw things up.

[Redsiskin]

6 minutes ago, Brando212 said:

biggest question that hasn't been asked yet. Is this a personal computer that he uses for work or was this a corporate supplied PC and software?

 

if this is a corporate provided PC then they really should be providing a replacement/upgrade path as Windows 7 isn't compliant for corporate use anymore.

This PC is the office (Office =him and is helper/secretary) and he has a lot of insurance+accountant software's that he said cost all together more then 300USD.

 

he had few "PC Technician" that did a mess and only took is money but they did not changed or helped in anyway i seen some left HDD drives unplugged and replaced with SSD for unknown reason and PSU cables that been cutout for some reason.

that also why he reached out to me with this issue.

[GoStormPlays]

44 minutes ago, Redsiskin said:

The problem is that i can't do full format since he has programs related to the business which he doesn't have or remember the product keys/user+login and they cost ton of money.

 

Couldn't you just copy and save the application and appdata files and just transfer them to a new pc??

[whispous]

21 minutes ago, Poinkachu said:

In essence : At the very least make sure s/he fully understand that shit can happen and he may lose it in the attempt. Friendship might be ruined still, but at least less chance of legal pain.

 

Oh yeah, make a clone of (atleast) the OS before attempting anything.

In writing. In writing that he can't delete later like in a whatsapp message. It has to be extremely clear in writing that you are not responsible for any unintended changes or problems that occur, even if it appears to work for a time afterwards.

 

Also, the act of imaging also carries a risk of changing something or breaking something in the data.

7 minutes ago, Kid.Lazer said:

As an addendum to what the others have said, if a software change even has a remote chance to bork your 1-and-only functional system, make an image of the current drives to fallback on in case of a critical error. I personally think trying to do an in-place upgrade to Windows 10/11 is worth the try, BUT you need to have a fail-safe in place in case you royally screw things up.

The act of imaging also carries a risk of changing something or breaking something in the data.

3 minutes ago, Redsiskin said:

This PC is the office (Office =him and is helper/secretary) and he has a lot of insurance+accountant software's that he said cost all together more then 300USD.

 

he had few "PC Technician" that did a mess and only took is money but they did not changed or helped in anyway i seen some left HDD drives unplugged and replaced with SSD for unknown reason and PSU cables that been cutout for some reason.

that also why he reached out to me with this issue.

If he finds $300 once in over a decade to be "too expensive", then he's not ready to use IT in his job. Given the age and this mentality, I would take his judgement of another tech with a pinch of salt. Huge red flags.

[Redsiskin]

2 minutes ago, GoStormPlays said:

Couldn't you just copy and save the application and appdata files and just transfer them to a new pc??

the question is if it would also transfer the keys i thought they are also in the registry? not a bad idea.

[whispous]

2 minutes ago, Redsiskin said:

the question is if it would also transfer the keys i thought they are also in the registry? not a bad idea.

Please please do not TOUCH that computer until he has confirmed in writing that you are not responsible for any issues that occur now or later in the machine's life.

 

"YOU were the last person to touch it" is a VERY REAL and VERY COMMON thing to occur, even months or years later - especially with people who don't understand that you need to ugrade once a decade.

[Poinkachu]

4 minutes ago, whispous said:

In writing. In writing that he can't delete later like in a whatsapp message. It has to be extremely clear in writing that you are not responsible for any unintended changes or problems that occur, even if it appears to work for a time afterwards.

 

Also, the act of imaging also carries a risk of changing something or breaking something in the data.

The act of imaging also carries a risk of changing something or breaking something in the data.

If he finds $300 once in over a decade to be "too expensive", then he's not ready to use IT in his job. Given the age and this mentality, I would take his judgement of another tech with a pinch of salt. Huge red flags.

Lol, I just got back from washing dishes and about to add "preferably in writing / text" too.

[GoStormPlays]

5 minutes ago, Redsiskin said:

the question is if it would also transfer the keys i thought they are also in the registry? not a bad idea.

I mean, if there's enough documentation on the software in question you can probably find some way to get the keys for the software and/or successfully transfer the software to a new machine. 

 

4 minutes ago, whispous said:

Please please do not TOUCH that computer until he has confirmed in writing that you are not responsible for any issues that occur now or later in the machine's life.

 

"YOU were the last person to touch it" is a VERY REAL and VERY COMMON thing to occur, even months or years later - especially with people who don't understand that you need to ugrade once a decade.

But please do this first.

[Redsiskin]

2 minutes ago, whispous said:

Please please do not TOUCH that computer until he has confirmed in writing that you are not responsible for any issues that occur now or later in the machine's life.

 

"YOU were the last person to touch it" is a VERY REAL and VERY COMMON thing to occur, even months or years later.

Yap you are right seems like it this one is too much for me to handle.

Thank you all very much for everything

[Kilrah]

If the PC already runs like trash with 7 upgrading in place to 10 would likely be even worse.

[venomtail]

47 minutes ago, Redsiskin said:

This PC is the office (Office =him and is helper/secretary) and he has a lot of insurance+accountant software's that he said cost all together more then 300USD.

That's like one year's worth of license for one piece of software out of many I myself alone use a year :DD 

 

There's a reason he's an accountant I guess...