Accidentally have 2 Win 7s

kylith

A few years ago I upgraded from Vista to Win 7 with no problems, and partitioned it. Due to some problems recently I decided to reinstall Win 7 but it installed to the 'other side' of the partition, so now I seem to have Win 7 on both my C drive and my D drive, and have pretty much bugger all memory left. I've tried to format when booting from the installation disk but it's not giving me that option and when I go into device manager it won't let me format either partition.

Any help much appreciated.

ArtyM

What kind of disk do you have? Is it retail or oem, and is it an upgrade disk or the full version?
Is this a laptop or desktop?

kylith

It's retail, and is full version. I have a Toshiba laptop.

ArtyM

Thats a messed up scenario you got there.
I assume you you chose the custom option during the install as per these instructions below:

1. On the Install Windows page, enter your language and other preferences, and then click Next.
   
   
2. On the Please read the license terms page, if you accept the license terms, click I accept the license terms, and then click Next.
3. On the Which type of installation do you want? page, click Custom.
4. On the Where do you want to install Windows? page, click Drive options (advanced).
5. Click the partition that you want to change, click the formatting option you want to perform, and then follow the instructions.
6. When you've finished formatting, click Next.
7. Follow the instructions to finish installing Windows 7, which include naming your computer and setting up an initial user account.

If that doesnt work do you still have the option to do a factory restore on your laptop or have you deleted the restore partition? Maybe you created the restore cds/dvds back in the day. I know it will take it back to vista but it will be clean and you can just do what you did the last time and upgrade again. Obviously, do a full backup first.

Alternatively, you could download a harddisk tool from the manufacturer(of harddrive) and burn it to bootable disk. This would allow you to wipe/format the drive after which you can do the Win7 install.
Obviously, do a full backup first.

Anyway, Good luck. Hope you get sorted

kylith

ArtyM wrote: »

Thats a messed up scenario you got there.
I assume you you chose the custom option during the install as per these instructions below:

1. On the Install Windows page, enter your language and other preferences, and then click Next.
   
   
2. On the Please read the license terms page, if you accept the license terms, click I accept the license terms, and then click Next.
3. On the Which type of installation do you want? page, click Custom.
4. On the Where do you want to install Windows? page, click Drive options (advanced).
5. Click the partition that you want to change, click the formatting option you want to perform, and then follow the instructions.
6. When you've finished formatting, click Next.
7. Follow the instructions to finish installing Windows 7, which include naming your computer and setting up an initial user account.

If that doesnt work do you still have the option to do a factory restore on your laptop or have you deleted the restore partition? Maybe you created the restore cds/dvds back in the day. I know it will take it back to vista but it will be clean and you can just do what you did the last time and upgrade again. Obviously, do a full backup first.

Alternatively, you could download a harddisk tool from the manufacturer(of harddrive) and burn it to bootable disk. This would allow you to wipe/format the drive after which you can do the Win7 install.
Obviously, do a full backup first.

Anyway, Good luck. Hope you get sorted

That did the trick. Thank you very much.