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Windows 7 student upgrade HELP

bozz2006

bozz2006

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Aug 24, 2007
2,530
0
Minnesota
Hello all,
I decided to take advantage of the $30 Windows 7 student offer. I am now wondering whether I threw my money away. I downloaded it, which I had to do in parallels, and now that I have it I am thinking that the only thing it will do is upgrade a pre-exisitng version of Windows. Can this even be done with only a parallels XP installed? I appreciate any help.
 
Hi bozz, I'm not sure I understand your question. I'm not very familiar with the conditions of that deal but Win7 should not make a difference in a native or a virtual installation.

If you want Win7 native you may have to use your XP license prior to putting Win7 on. But that will probably have to be only a very rudimentary install. Win 7 should look only for a prior installation and then go ahead. It will probably not recognize a virtual install if you try to bootcamp it.
 
More clearly, (hopefully) the problem is that the only Windows install I have on my Mac is a parallels XP machine. The download was an upgrade only, and I don't know if i can make it work as a standalone install. I have no idea how to unpack the download, and when i click run, it goes through an "unpacking the box" sequence, only to tell me i don't have privileges for such an action. So, I have the upgrade downloaded, but that's where I am stuck. I would be happy to just create a new Win 7 parallels machine, but I can't do anything with the download. it isjust sitting on my windows XP desktop right now.
 
It probably needs a native install to recognize it. I wonder what kind of file you got there. It may be an executable file that unpacks an .iso which would be burned to a disk for installation. Can you check for the file type?

If it doesn't create an .iso you will not have much luck. It will only work for native Bootcamp Windows. You may have to install your XP License with Bootcamp anyway to unpack it.
 
After downloading it, I followed the dialog box of "unpacking the box". It generated three files on my desktop. one of them is

setup1.box

another is

setup2.box

and the third says

Win7-HP-Retail-en-us-x64

The first two are listed as BOX files in properties. The final is listed as a "Windows marketplace Box" and is an application
 
Uhu, that sounds very strange. You will probably only have a chance with a bootcamped XP. That would perhaps even upgrade to 64-bit. Did the offer specify whether it applies to XP and Vista or Vista only?
 
it is supposed to work for both xp and vista. I am beginning to think I can only upgrade a bootcamp install... but I think I may be screwed here because there are issues with installing 64 bit windows 7 on the 2006 mac pro. the workaround includes setting up a parallels machine and modifying the Win 7 ISO.
 
I've just used the same Windows 7 upgrade to upgrade one of my other computers.

On another forum I'm on someone else is having the same issue, except they have a PC running Windows XP. It appears that to upgrade from XP you need to do a clean install which the download version doesn't appear to support, to upgrade from XP you need to buy the additional upgrade disk.

In the FAQ section of the Microsoft Education Student Offer it says:-
if you need to perform a custom (clean) install on your PC, we recommend you purchase the back-up DVD.
Click to expand...

As far as I know the in-place download upgrade only works if you are going from:-
Vista Home Basic/Premium > 7 Home Premium
Vista Business > 7 Professional

I've just done the upgrade by installing Windows Vista Business first (didn't bother entering a serial number even though I have one) and upgraded from there. As my disk hasn't arrived yet.

There is also a small possibility that you can run the update from a separate hard drive/memory stick/partition though I wouldn't bet on it.
 
bozz2006 said:
it is supposed to work for both xp and vista. I am beginning to think I can only upgrade a bootcamp install... but I think I may be screwed here because there are issues with installing 64 bit windows 7 on the 2006 mac pro. the workaround includes setting up a parallels machine and modifying the Win 7 ISO.
Click to expand...

This software distribution doesn't seem to rely on isos. That is why I thought you may get away with a 64-bit upgrade once you get it working at all. The EFI32 issue is about booting from a DVD and if this thing isn't making an ISO and installs right from the download it would not cause the EFI bootloader issue.
 
gugucom said:
The EFI32 issue is about booting from a DVD and if this thing isn't making an ISO and installs right from the download it would not cause the EFI bootloader issue.
Click to expand...
Whats the EFI bootloader issue?

I have a Mac Pro 1.1 (2006) and have never really had any issues installing OS's on it, such as 32/64bit Vista, 32/64bit Server 2008, 64bit Windows 7 Beta, 64bit Linux etc... though sometimes finding drivers have been an issue.

Most of the Windows versions I've installed were from MSDNAA though.

The only issue I've had is that I can't boot most of the install disks from a SATA optical drive, which is why I have one PATA drive installed.
 
Dark Dragoon said:
I've just used the same Windows 7 upgrade to upgrade one of my other computers.

On another forum I'm on someone else is having the same issue, except they have a PC running Windows XP. It appears that to upgrade from XP you need to do a clean install which the download version doesn't appear to support, to upgrade from XP you need to buy the additional upgrade disk.

In the FAQ section of the Microsoft Education Student Offer it says:-


As far as I know the in-place download upgrade only works if you are going from:-
Vista Home Basic/Premium > 7 Home Premium
Vista Business > 7 Professional

I've just done the upgrade by installing Windows Vista Business first (didn't bother entering a serial number even though I have one) and upgraded from there. As my disk hasn't arrived yet.

There is also a small possibility that you can run the update from a separate hard drive/memory stick/partition though I wouldn't bet on it.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I emailed them asking whether I can buy the DVD after the fact. I'll post back regarding whether they let me buy the DVD now, after I already purchased the download only.
 
Valid Install

bozz2006 said:
More clearly, (hopefully) the problem is that the only Windows install I have on my Mac is a parallels XP machine. The download was an upgrade only, and I don't know if i can make it work as a standalone install. I have no idea how to unpack the download, and when i click run, it goes through an "unpacking the box" sequence, only to tell me i don't have privileges for such an action. So, I have the upgrade downloaded, but that's where I am stuck. I would be happy to just create a new Win 7 parallels machine, but I can't do anything with the download. it isjust sitting on my windows XP desktop right now.
Click to expand...

I downloaded the student discount version as well. It is still a full Win7 install but it doesn't come as a bootable iso file or anything like that. It's a program that extracts and installs over your current windows os. You do need a validated copy of windows xp or vista to run the upgrade. You have two options during install, a simple upgrade or an overwrite feature (custom install). This package will not let you reboot to format your partition like you would with a bootable iso.
 
I found something I didn't see before. There is an "expanded setup" folder. It is about 3GBs. It contains folders for "boot", "sources", "upgrade", "efi", and "support". It also contains at "bootmgr" file, "setup" windows installer, "bootmgr.efi" EFI file, and an autorun.

Can anyone help me use this to either A) setup a new bootcamp machine B) upgrade a 32bit Win XP bootcamp machine or C) set up a new parallels machine?
 
nanvinnie said:
I downloaded the student discount version as well. It is still a full Win7 install but it doesn't come as a bootable iso file or anything like that. It's a program that extracts and installs over your current windows os. You do need a validated copy of windows xp or vista to run the upgrade. You have two options during install, a simple upgrade or an overwrite feature (custom install). This package will not let you reboot to format your partition like you would with a bootable iso.
Click to expand...

do i need to have a bootcamp machine set up for this? I only have a parallels Win XP 32 bit machine at the moment. I don't imagine I can upgrade a parallels xp machine to win 7...
 
bozz2006 said:
do i need to have a bootcamp machine set up for this? I only have a parallels Win XP 32 bit machine at the moment. I don't imagine I can upgrade a parallels xp machine to win 7...
Click to expand...

i ran the upgrade in fusion and it worked fine. if you use bootcamp, change your startup disk to the windows partition so you don't have to old "option" every time the install restarts.

also check this site if you wanna make a bootable iso:

http://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/30470-make-bootable-iso-student-d-l.html
 
Dark Dragoon said:
Whats the EFI bootloader issue?

I have a Mac Pro 1.1 (2006) and have never really had any issues installing OS's on it, such as 32/64bit Vista, 32/64bit Server 2008, 64bit Windows 7 Beta, 64bit Linux etc... though sometimes finding drivers have been an issue.

Most of the Windows versions I've installed were from MSDNAA though.

The only issue I've had is that I can't boot most of the install disks from a SATA optical drive, which is why I have one PATA drive installed.
Click to expand...

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/467704/

You must be a lucky man. In 2006 Microsoft started to use ISO9660, UDF 1.02. compatible DVD images. Those images can contain versioned files with semicolon delimited file version names. The EFI32 boot loader stalls on such files.

All 64-bit distributions with anytime upgrade option and all 64-bit OEM System Builder Editions did have versioned files.

Apple fixed the issue with EFI64 in 2008 but did not issue firmware updates for older machines. The classical work around is Jowie's tweak which uses the Imgburn app to make the file version names compatible.
 
bozz2006 said:
Can anyone help me use this to either A) setup a new bootcamp machine B) upgrade a 32bit Win XP bootcamp machine or C) set up a new parallels machine?
Click to expand...

If you have no luck with getting the DVD version you can try by simply installing your XP via Bootcamp.

It should best go on a separate HD using the bootcamp utility in OS X. The best version for this is XP SP2. Using other SPs will cause certain complications. So check if your install CD is SP2 first.
 
I do have XP sp2. but I also have a windows 7-64 download sitting on my parallels desktop that i have no idea what to do with. I wouldn't even know how to go about upgrading a bootcamp XP install with this download.
 
Your seven download obviously has a 64-bit option which may install on the bootcamped XP. So this is what you can try:

  1. Fit a new empty HD in one of the drive sleds or into the optical bay. Make sure all SW RAID arrays are disconnected.
  2. Run the bootcamp utility in Leopard or SL to set up the new HDD for a Windows partition only.
  3. Continue the bootcamp program by inserting the XP SP2 disk and make sure you format the bootcamp partition with NTFS quick mode. Be carefull not to partition at all in the Windows install menu. It would wreck your new partition. Let the XP install and push the option key every time Windows reboots during installation. Select the Windows hard disk symbol for the two reboots.
  4. Install Bootcamp drivers 2.1 or 3.0 from the Leopard or SL install DVD. The safest way to do this is browsing the DVD in Windows explorer and find a folder named Intel. Run the chipset utility from this folder to make sure your MP can use USB peripherals. After this you can simply run the setup to install all drivers.
  5. Copy the downloaded Seven package from your Parallel desktop to the Windows HDD. You can use the new XP for this if you have Bootcamp 3.0. It contains a HFS driver that lets you read files from OS X drives. You can also use an NTFS driver to do this from OS X. Paragon does a commercial driver which can be used in test mode for some days.
  6. Now activate your executable package in Bootcamp XP and try to run the 64-bit upgrade. Remember to push the option key every time the system reboots.
  7. Use Bootcamp64.msi file from the Apple folder to install the 3.0 drivers in 64-bit version. You may have to right click the program and make it compatible to Seven prior to installation because the drivers are meant for Vista in 3.0.
 
I did the same student discount today and mine wasn't just an upgrade option. When installing I had the choice to upgrade or have a fresh copy of Windows.
 
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