Windows 7 Fresh install Question...

[KM Richards]

Been looking at a Lenovo laptop that is one of those ones that has Win 7 Pro 64bit installed when you get it, but has Win 8 license embedded I guess on the mobo so it's ready to upgrade to 8 which I'm not interested in doing.

My question is this... how do I obtain the license keys for the copy of Win 7 that is running on the laptop?

I want to do a fresh install to eliminate the bloatware without having to go out and buy an OEM copy of Win 7.

Is it possible to find out what the Win 7 license keys are? Surely they can be found somewhere on the system.

Any ideas / directions on how to do this would be greatly appreciated...

 

[Jimbo22]

In the windows 7 environment you have to use label on the bottom of the laptop or a 3rd party software like Belarc or Magic Jelly Bean. There are a few sites left that have the ISO for windows 7 (all versions) to download. Although I'm not sure the OEM key will work to clean install using the ISO.

http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html

http://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder/

http://www.mydigitallife.info/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-from-digital-river/

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

Everyone should have a copy of Belarc Adviser.
Everything you ever wanted to know about your computer, and all the serial numbers for all of your installed software.

I've used it for many years, and it's free!

Mike

 

[badrobot]

In the windows 7 environment you have to use label on the bottom of the laptop or a 3rd party software like Belarc or Magic Jelly Bean. There are a few sites left that have the ISO for windows 7 (all versions) to download. Although I'm not sure the OEM key will work to clean install using the ISO.

http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html

http://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder/

http://www.mydigitallife.info/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-from-digital-river/

In addition to above, if you find an ISO and planning to burn it on disc, use the slowest burn speed possible to avoid errors. I downloaded an ISO long time and this was one of the problems I encountered when I can't clean install Win 7 successfully. I just re-burned the ISO at low speed.

 

[Joe S]

Besides Belarc Advisor, Speccy http://www.piriform.com/speccy is another handy program that pulls up a lot of useful info about your PC.

 

[Pauli]

Ref. to badrobot, OS discs shouldn't be burned with higher than 3x speed - a problem is, newer burners don't work with less than 8x.. May depend on burner / software, but it's like we say, Suo siellä, vetelä täällä = Swamp here, supine there.