HP Win8 laptop to Win7.......

segasega

Got a new laptop, I'm really not a fan of Win8 and was reading into installing Win7. Just not sure everything will work properly as HP calm that by doing so, they cant guarantee everything will work as it is build as a Win8 machine. I call bull on this?

beauf

Just install classic shell. Then it looks and works like W7.

jhud

They do this as they dont want to support issues with the setup. I get business hp laptops and desktops and we get told the same but we downgrade all laptops and desktops when we get them its just a pain to reset all the bios before you run setup. I have yet to find one with issues.

beauf

If you can get the drivers you can install anything you want. It's not rocket science.

I don't see the point. W8 and W7 are too similar. Spending a few hours to achieve something you can do in a minute with an App.

If you don't like IE11 you install Chrome or similar. You don't roll back to IE8.

Overheal

Same story with every os. People don't like change but rolling back is not free of issues. There is no way to guarantee your drivers, or future updates for your drivers, will work as intended for an unsupported OS.

There are few critical differences to the general consumer; it's just a matter of iteration that UI and features will vary over time. Windows 10 is also slated for release this year, which will bring yet more UI changes, some of which pay more respect to desktop and laptop hardware than windows 8 did.

Windows XP introduced system restore to me, vista ha a more powerful start bar, as did 7, and made much better use of system ram. and windows 8 has some of the best improvements I've seen in a while when it comes to searches and to small improvements like a better task manager and file transfer interface. It's also designed to boot and sleep much better, windows 10 even more so.

Also, windows 7 will definitely not support directX 12, it has been confirmed. Probably not that big of a deal to your laptop really, however, it's just 1 of many native system supports you may lose by rolling back

segasega

This is the laptop in question:
http://www.pcworld.ie/product/hp-15g092sa-156-laptop-black/318132/104.10

I just feel like its not running as smoothly as it should considering its specs. I thought it may run better under Win7. I think I will wipe it to clear bloatware etc and do a fresh install, then see how I feel about Win8.

beauf

Not liking W8 and wanting a clean install are two entirely different things. Fresh install always a good idea. If you have the drivers.

Overheal

I would do a clean install using Windows 8's system refresh. Windows 10 is only a couple months away at most, and will be offered as a free upgrade.

yoyo

segasega wrote: »

This is the laptop in question:
http://www.pcworld.ie/product/hp-15g092sa-156-laptop-black/318132/104.10

I just feel like its not running as smoothly as it should considering its specs. I thought it may run better under Win7. I think I will wipe it to clear bloatware etc and do a fresh install, then see how I feel about Win8.

Windows 7 is slower in general than 8/8.1 so I doubt the downgrade would help. Plus it's a lot of money to splash out for an older OS. Classic shell will convert 8/8.1 into a Windows 7 like system if desired.
Also make sure you accept the free Windows 8.1 update. This vastly improved 8 and made it more user friendly using non-keyboard & mouse setup. See here for info.

nick