This blog entry is an ongoing diary of the steps taken and how things went...

I removed some unused programs and files to make the needed 16 GB of free space.... got it to about 21 free GB of hard drive space. I also copied the full contents of the hard drive to an external drive.

Installation

10/9/09 - with the computer running, I inserted the disc and selected Setup from the menu that popped up. It took a bit over 3 hours to do the installation and initial setup....

• it first copied 'temporary files'
• then checked online for updated files... the disc was pretty new but it got a few files
• I accepted the license terms
• I selected the 'upgrade' path, keeping the things already installed and running under Vista
• it checked for compatibility and said there were 3 items that might be issues
            - ATI Catalyst could be reinstalled after the upgrade
            - iTunes would need 'deauthorizing' before the upgrade
            - Skype might not work properly
• OK > it said it might take a few hours and restart a number of times during the upgrade... it took over 3 hours. It proceeded to:
      - copy Windows files
      - gather files, settings and programs already installed (this part took a long time)
      - expand the Windows files
      - install features and updates
      - transfer files, settings and programs 

That got me to the starting window of Windows 7, where there were a few easy things to do...

• enter the product key - on the folder with the disc....
• I opted for it using the recommended settings... whatever they are
• time zone - Eastern time... that was a positive surprise.... I don't remember an installation that knew I was in the Eastern time zone
• it finalizes things
• the first startup showed my users and passwords were as they were in Vista
• it then prepared the desktop with the destop image and icons as they were in Vista.... mostly... don't see the Live Mail icon
• I signed in to Windows Live Messenger OK... it had no issues connecting to my linksys home wireless network... secured with a WEP key
• I opened Windows Live Mail... it set it up and showed my inbox still full of stuff.
• I opened WMP... it had to do some setup but opened and worked fine

Looking around to see what video apps survived the upgrade or were added...

• Movie Maker 6 was gone
• MM2.6 was still there and working
• Photo Story 3 was there and working.... I had an open issue with not being able to download or install it on my other Windows 7 Ultimate system... one back road to getting it in Windows 7 is to upgrade a Vista system that already has it installed.
• the Vista Home Basic doesn't include the Media Center or Windows DVD Maker. Both are now on the laptop even though it's such a low end model that it doesn't have a TV tuner or a DVD burner.  

I was surprised to see my hard drive having a few more GB of free space after the upgrade.

That ends the initial installation and setup.... things are looking good. I'm now thinking of staying with the upgrade instead of doing it all over with a clean reformatted hard drive.

Windows 7 Ultimate - Toshiba Laptop Diary

10/9/09

Now I'm diving into using the laptop with Windows 7. When I turned on my systems this morrning, I moved a 500 GB external hard drive to the Toshiba. It had no problem seeing it and making it ready to use. But I've run into some kind of issue setting up the laptop to share some folders and the external drive with other users on my home network. I access my Windows 7 desktop routinely from my XP laptop, but for some reason I can't do the same with the Toshiba.

I skipped the activation step when I first set it up, not knowing fully that I'd be keeping it on the Toshiba.... now it's counting down the days I have left... '29 days to activate'.

Later that night... the first trip to Barnes & Noble with Windows 7

Getting online with the B&N free WiFi service was unevenful. It was working (many nights it's down) and the laptop connected as usual.

I have two routinely used email accounts.... a Hotmail one and a Charter. Opening Windows Live Mail to check for new ones resulted in a request for my charter email name and password, followed by about 400 emails flowing down. I guess they needed to download again into the Windows 7 environment.... maybe the same ones previously downloaded in Vista didn't count. It's better to have too many than too few. There were 2 new ones in the batch of 400.

User names and passwords for websites that I frequent had to be re-entered. I guess cookies in general got wiped out by the upgrade.

I gave the B&N manager a sign to put in the entry way advertising the party on Thursday Oct 22. He said he'd also be posting fliers in strategic places such as the shelves of books about Windows 7.

After returing home I thought about tackling the network sharing issues... but instead got carried away watching videos on the external drive. It's a small sized Toshiba 500 GB drive that is USB connected, and it has a number of the full 13 GB DV-AVI files from my mini-DV tapes. They played in WMP so smoothly at full screen that I got absorbed in watching some.... tomorrow I'll tackle the network issues. 

10/10/09

I'm focusing on my networks today... at the starting point I'm sitting here with 3 computers trying to work alone and with each other, an XP laptop, Windows 7 Ultimate desktop, and the Toshiba Windows 7 laptop that's getting ready for the party. Each is working fine alone. 

• They each connect to the internet for websites, Instant Messaging, etc... the two laptops are wireless to the Linksys router. The desktop is hard-wired into the same router.
• The XP laptop was the first one to have setup a home network, called a 'Workgroup'.... for my computers and Bernadette's downstairs. They've been sharing files and printers for years.
• When I setup the Windows 7 desktop I sort of skipped over the option of setting up a 'Homegroup'. I had it join the existing workgroup and things were going fine reaching back and forth between shared folders on the XP laptop and the Windows 7 desktop. 
• The Toshiba laptop running Vista also joined the existing workgroup and shared stuff.
• I figured I'd setup the Toshiba laptop the same way, simply joining the existing workgroup. But I found I could see other computers from the Toshiba, see the Toshiba from the others, but didn't have permission to go into the Toshiba folders I had setup for sharing.

I compared the settings of the two Windows 7 systems and noticed the desktop said it was also part of a Windows 7 homegroup.... and the Toshiba wasn't. I explored that next to see what happens when it joins that group.

By typing 'Home' in the start menu search field one of the items listed is Control Panel > HomeGroup. Here's the window it opened on the desktop system. It was the first Windows 7 system to be setup so it was in charge of the homegroup.... at least when it comes to the password that the Toshiba was asking for when I tried to add it to that group.

See the link called 'View or print the homegroup password'. The Toshiba told me to get it from PapaJohn, and I had skipped over setting up the homegroup and didn't know the password. By going to the Win7 desktop and clicking that link, I found the current password, which I then entered on the Toshiba to join in.

What happened? My two Windows 7 computers are now friends. They see and can use each others shared files. My XP laptop can still access the Win7 desktop but not the Toshiba laptop. It seems the 'workgroup' computers have one relationship, and the 'homegroup' computers another.... and the two groups are not friends of each other. 

Now that I have the two Win7 systems being friends I'm getting off on another tangent. The newly setup laptop can see the shared folders on the Win7 desktop. I tried run a couple apps by remote control.... VirtualDub worked fine. I was able to open it and play an Avisynth script. MM2.1 also opened but I didn't try a project yet. Lots of things to play with.

10/11/09

I met Alex, another Windows 7 user, at B&N a week ago as he went thru a big Windows 7 book studying 'bit locker' at the table next to me. He'd been successful using it on a thumb drive but not his main C drive. That was last week... last night he said it was working fine. He's happy with bit-lockker and Windows 7 performance overall.

At this point I'm sharing Alex's enthusiasm.

Virus Protection note.... the Toshiba had the free Avast version 4.8 home running on it when it was a Vista system. It made it through the upgrade without me having to do anything.

10/12/09

FRAPS users often run into codec issues with Movie Maker.... the good news is that FRAPS installs and works well in Windows 7. Any codec issues you have are probably going to be the same. The AVI video files produced by FRAPS are compressed with the FRAPS specialty codec. On my XP and Windows 7 systems, Movie Maker 2.1 and WLMM can use the FRAPS files in projects.

Type PSR in the start button entry field and you'll see the psr.exe program. That's a Problem Step Recorder that helps you show your screens to one who can help.  The recording is basically a website page packaged in a zip file. Here's a sample...