This is how I do it, which might not be the best way. Yet it works for me 🙂
Check the hard drive / system health.
Hitting F12 as a dell system boots to access the system diagnostics utility – this will check the disk and the entire system. Some computer manufactures tools don’t do a disk diagnostic. It’s still a good thing to do.But I would run a diag on any system before spending much time on it. You can google how to run a system diag on your system if its not a Dell. If your system doesnt have disk diag – follow the next paragraph. If you have a Dell skip to “Backup – Create a full image for restoration” below.
Most hard drive manufacturers provide free tools for checking hard drive health. To find hard drive make hold down the windows key and tap “r” on the keyboard. Then type “devmgmt.msc” (Device Manager) and tap enter. Open the “Disk drives”, in this instance note the letters “WDC”. Google “WDC Disk Tool” to provide the Manufacturer’s name. So in this case I googled “WDC” (No quotes) and found this drive tool:
https://support.wdc.com/downloads.aspx?p=157
If disk is good proceed, if the disk is bad but the system is less than 4 yrs old – buy a new hard drive or you really love the computer, then create an image of the operating system using Veeam to reinstall your operating system on the new hard drive. Hitting F12 as a dell system boots to access the system diagnostics utility – this will check the disk and the entire system. Some computer manufactures tools don’t do a disk diagnostic. It’s still a good thing to do.But I would run a diag on any system before spending much time on it.
Backup – Create a full image for restoration
There are many tools that can back a computer and create an image for restoring the operating system. One needs this image so if anything goes wrong with a computer, the operating can be restored to the point it was at on the day the image was created.
After you have created a Veeam account, download the WIndows free backup client currently located here:
https://www.veeam.com/windows-backup-free-download.html
How to create an image:
https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/agentforwindows/userguide/image_create.html?ver=30
For the scope of this article I am not going to write the entire process. Since this is well documented on the internet already.
But the steps are: Install Veeam, create a veeam iso (cdrom image) – burn a boot cd, select an external drive to create the image on and create it. Then boot to the boot cdrom (Google the last sentence with your systems manufactures name to figure out how to do this). Install the previously backed up image to your hard drive. Google “Restore veeam image windows” for the restoration process.
Windows 10 upgrade
A quote from ZDNET “If you have a PC running a “genuine” copy of Windows 7/8/8.1 (Windows 7 Home, Pro, or Ultimate edition, or Windows 8.x Home or Business, properly licensed and activated), you can follow the same steps I did to upgrade it to Windows 10.” Follow the link above using the Windows Download tool linked below. This link might change but the tool looks this:
Follow the instructions from the ZDnet article to upgrade Windows 10.
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Well this is how far I got tonight. Will update soon. Keep checking back 🙂
