Adam Caudill's Blog » MSDN http://adamcaudill.com Adam's view on technology, software development, and world domination. Sat, 04 Feb 2012 19:01:06 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Upgrading Windows 7 Pro VL http://adamcaudill.com/2010/06/18/upgrading-windows-7-pro-vl/ http://adamcaudill.com/2010/06/18/upgrading-windows-7-pro-vl/#comments Sat, 19 Jun 2010 03:42:05 +0000 Adam Caudill http://adamcaudill.com/?p=600 While performing some testing on a Windows 7 Professional workstation running a VL build from MSDN found that a feature I needed was missing – the new Multi-Monitor RDP support. After a little research I found that only the Ultimate and Enterprise editions support this feature; which thanks to Windows 7′s Anytime Upgrade [...]]]> While performing some testing on a Windows 7 Professional workstation running a VL build from MSDN found that a feature I needed was missing – the new Multi-Monitor RDP support. After a little research I found that only the Ultimate and Enterprise editions support this feature; which thanks to Windows 7′s Anytime Upgrade feature I assumed this would be no issue.

But, it was an issue.

It turns out that the build of Windows 7 I was using was missing WindowsAnytimeUpgradeUI.exe and the other related files needed to make the Anytime Upgrade work – and copying the files from another box doesn’t work. It seems this build simply can’t be upgraded in this fashion. So I tried a few other tricks, hoping to find something that would work:

  • Reactivate Windows with an Ultimate key; fails with an error indicating that a Professional key is required.
  • Run Ultimate edition installer from Windows; fails with this error indicating that you can’t perform edition upgrades.

So being stubborn and determined not to re-install Windows to make this feature work, I started looking for other options. Thanks to a hack for upgrading the RC builds to Final, I found what I needed.

I edited the EditionID and ProductName to reflect Ultimate instead of Professional, rebooted, and then ran the Ultimate installer from within Windows. This time the installer ran without issue and after an hour and a couple reboots it was done. This in-place upgrade/repair procedure allows you to jump to a different edition with fairly little pain. A couple of Windows settings needed to be corrected (primarily display related) and Visual Studio 2010 had to be re-installed, though otherwise everything worked just as it did before.

This is the only method for upgrading these Windows 7 builds that I’ve found, the only other option is to re-install Windows from scratch.

]]> http://adamcaudill.com/2010/06/18/upgrading-windows-7-pro-vl/feed/ 0 Vista Available via MSDN http://adamcaudill.com/2006/11/16/vista-available-via-msdn/ http://adamcaudill.com/2006/11/16/vista-available-via-msdn/#comments Fri, 17 Nov 2006 02:56:28 +0000 Adam Caudill http://adamcaudill.com/2006/11/16/vista-available-via-msdn/ For those interested, Windows Vista is now available via MSDN Subscriber Downloads. Hurry up and get your copy while there’s still bandwidth left.

Have fun

]]> For those interested, Windows Vista is now available via MSDN Subscriber Downloads. Hurry up and get your copy while there’s still bandwidth left.

Have fun :)

]]> http://adamcaudill.com/2006/11/16/vista-available-via-msdn/feed/ 0 Microsoft Office 2007 Pro Available via MSDN http://adamcaudill.com/2006/11/12/microsoft-office-2007-pro-available-via-msdn/ http://adamcaudill.com/2006/11/12/microsoft-office-2007-pro-available-via-msdn/#comments Mon, 13 Nov 2006 00:04:35 +0000 Adam Caudill http://adamcaudill.com/2006/11/12/microsoft-office-2007-pro-available-via-msdn/ For those interested, and those that have an MSDN subscription, Office 2007 Professional is now available for download. The 411MB ISO contains the following applications:

Microsoft Office Access 2007 Microsoft Office Excel® 2007 Microsoft Office Outlook® 2007 with Business Contact Manager Microsoft Office PowerPoint® 2007 Microsoft Office Publisher 2007 Microsoft Office Word 2007

Hopefully [...]]]> For those interested, and those that have an MSDN subscription, Office 2007 Professional is now available for download. The 411MB ISO contains the following applications:

  • Microsoft Office Access 2007
  • Microsoft Office Excel® 2007
  • Microsoft Office Outlook® 2007 with Business Contact Manager
  • Microsoft Office PowerPoint® 2007
  • Microsoft Office Publisher 2007
  • Microsoft Office Word 2007

Hopefully the Ultimate edition will be made available soon.

Update: Microsoft has announced that Windows Vista will be available on Nov. 17th.

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