Hey Techies

[Ankari]

So I bought a new laptop and an SSD Drive. Laptops no longer come with Windows installation DVDs for me to install windows onto my new SSD. I think I've downloaded an Windows 7 ISO but when I burned it to a DVD and then tried to install it on my SSD it didn't boot. Can anyone give me some pointers on what I'm doing wrong?

I've downloaded the Windows 7 ISO from here.

Do I need to do something special to make that file a bootable disk? I just burned it to a DVD. Is that not enough?

 

[Steerpike]

Did you burn it as an image? There are usually options for that when you are burning the CD. If you just burned the ISO file to the CD, it may not work. If your current software is unclear on that, download Imgburn for free and use that. Also, is your computer set to try to boot off the optical drive before looking to the hard drive?

 

[Ankari]

You know what, I've made a Windows 7 install disk before and when I went to the Imgburn website I remembered downloading it before. Thanks Steer. I'll take care of it tomorrow, have to buy more blank DVDs.

Thanks again.

 

[Steerpike]

Cool. No problem

 

[Steerpike]

You know what, I've made a Windows 7 install disk before and when I went to the Imgburn website I remembered downloading it before. Thanks Steer. I'll take care of it tomorrow, have to buy more blank DVDs.

Thanks again.

Oh...FYI, the Windows 8 Preview is out a well, and you can download that free if you're interested. The Metro interface is interesting (though better suited to tablets), and the integration of IE into it is nice. The only thing I don't like is the drop into the legacy Windows desktop for non-Metro apps. It seems kind of clumsy. But since you are re-installing anyway, you might be interested in checking it out.

 

[grahamguitarman]

Oh...FYI, the Windows 8 Preview is out a well, and you can download that free if you're interested. The Metro interface is interesting (though better suited to tablets), and the integration of IE into it is nice. The only thing I don't like is the drop into the legacy Windows desktop for non-Metro apps. It seems kind of clumsy. But since you are re-installing anyway, you might be interested in checking it out.

One thing to be aware of with windows 8 is that because it is beta there are a few driver problems, for example my wife installed it on her laptop and now her Ipod doesn't show up as a drive - meaning she can't access video files on there

 

[Ankari]

From what I understand Windows 8 is primarily geared towards tablets. Will laptop users benefit anything from using Windows 8?