You want it. You need it. You waited for it. Here it is
Smasherbasher's Guide to installing Windows 7 upgrade with a clean install first.
NOTE: This has already been approved by ENTERPRISE via PM. Any discussion over the legality of this or TOS will result in being reported.
This guide assumes that you have the downloadable upgrade. It also assumes you will be installing from a USB stick.
Step 1: Create a bootable USB drive. If you do not know how,
instructions can be found here.
Step 2: Download the Windows 7 download manager. (Link provided in confirmation email.)
Step 3: Navigate to where you saved the above download manager. Run it and it will start the Windows 7 download
Step 4: Once complete, run the executeable file that downloaded and it will "unpack the box". Once that is done, you will have a new folder called "
ExpandedSetup". This is the critical folder you need.
Step 5: Copy the contents of the
"ExpandedSetup" folder onto your prepared USB stick.
Step 6: Reboot and set your BIOS to boot from USB. Once that happens, save changes and reboot again. Once the system reboots successfully, you should see the splash screen to install Windows 7.
Step 7: Install Windows as you would a full retail version and do
NOT enter product key this time around when prompted. Also uncheck
Activate Windows as soon as I am online box. Install this time shouldn't take very long. Once installation completes, proceed directly to step 8.
Step 8: Upgrade! This should be a no brainer. Launch Windows Setup once you are at your desktop and let it upgrade. This time, enter your product key and activate as you normally would.
Step 9: Walk away. This will take quite some time to finish. Once it completes, install your antivirus, any programs and anything else you like.
I hope this guide helps clear some of the fog surrounding the "can I do a clean install with the downloadable upgrade?" question. Perhaps someone can repeat this guide with instructions for those of us that are going to use DVDs instead of flash drives to make this as effective and efficient as possible. 