Restore previous windows after install Windows 7

Supposing you need to restore your previous OS after you have installed Windows 7. Provided that you didn’t format the partition during Windows 7 installation, you should be able to restore back to your previous OS!

Here’s what you can do…

• Make sure there’s sufficient space on Drive C
• Double click Drive C and make sure a folder named Windows.old exists!
• Make sure Windows.old is smaller than the free space available on Drive C… ( duh!!! )
• Then place the Windows 7 DVD and reboot.
• At the Install Windows window…click Repair Windows.
• At the System Restore Option windows, choose your Windows 7 version to repair and click Next.
• Then still at the System Restore Option windows, click Command Prompt.
• In the cmd window, type the following commands :

C:

Md Win7

Move Windows Win7\Windows

Move “Program Files” “Win7\Program Files”

Move Users Win7\Users

Attrib –h –s –r ProgramData

Move ProgramData Win7\ProgramData

Rd “Documents and Settings”

• Then move the files in Windows.old by typing the following commands

move /y c:\Windows.old\Windows c:\

move /y “c:\Windows.old\Program Files” c:\

move /y c:\Windows.old\ProgramData c:\

move /y c:\Windows.old\Users c:\

move /y “c:\Windows.old\Documents and Settings” c:\

• Finally you need to restore the boot sector of the previous OS
• If your previous OS was Server 2003, XP or 2000 type the following in the command prompt – X:\boot\bootsect /nt52 c:
• If your previous OS was Vista, type – X:\boot\bootsect /nt60 c:, where X is your DVD drive. Replace with appropriate letter!
• For XP/2000 you need to type the following command also –

Attrib –h –s –r boot.ini.saved

Copy boot.ini.saved boot.ini

• Exit command prompt and restart your PC.

Source: InstantFundas