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I recently got a copy of Windows 7 Ultimate because it was due time for a reformat on my machine anyway. Even though I built my machine a few years ago, it still exceed the specs Microsoft has on their site.

I have not formatted my hard drive yet, so I still have XP on it. I put the W7 disk in, reboot my machine, then it takes a couple seconds to load components. Then it goes to the blue and teal background where a dialog box should be prompting me what to do next. Instead, it decides it is just going to sit there.

I thought it had froze the first time, so I restarted it. It didn't move any faster the second time. I left it alone for about an hour and a half while I ran some errands, and when I came back the dialog box was finally there.

I clicked repair windows because I wanted to see if there was a utility in there to format my drive but now it is sitting at the same screen again. I am currently waiting for the next dialog box to come up.

Does anyone know what might be going wrong? I do know that my C:\ is pretty much full...if that is causing it to be god awful slow, I could format my drive with my XP disk and then reboot with the W7 disk.

Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated!

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2 Answers 2

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Is this a Microsoft DVD or an .iso that you burned yourself? If the latter, it may be a bad burn. The installer may be hanging on reading from the disk.

Also, since you built the machine yourself, you may need to verify that the individual components are on Microsoft's hardware compatibility list. I think the general rule of thumb here is that if the hardware supports Vista (driver-wise, not specs.), it should support Windows 7.

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  • I burned it myself, the burn is fine. I installed it on a laptop with no issues whatsoever.
    – Anders
    Commented Dec 3, 2009 at 10:56
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Doubtful that it's your hard drive. It sounds like there is something wrong with your DVD drive providing slow reads. Check the drive's configuration settings in the BIOS.

The Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor tool will tell you if you meet all the requirements, in case you are a bit skeptical.

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  • Sorry for such a long delay...Lots of other things happened at once that made reformatting my tower a low priority. Anyway I ran the advisor, here are the results: imgur.com/TmMOT.gif What do you make of that?
    – Anders
    Commented Dec 3, 2009 at 11:11
  • Basically Ensure your drive is over 16GB for 32-bit and 20GB for 64-bit. It doesn't take that much for the install, just it leaves room for programs later. That's why those were warnings rather than errors. You'll also need to perform a custom installation as an upgrade doesn't appear to be supported. Just boot from the DVD and go through the installer.
    – user1931
    Commented Dec 3, 2009 at 16:00
  • You mentioned in your original reply that my DVD drive could be dying. Here is a link to the newegg page (mine is the silver faceplate, same drive): newegg.com/product/product.aspx?Item=N82E16827152058 . This drive should have no problems correct? What settings should I be checking in the BIOS? Thanks again !
    – Anders
    Commented Dec 3, 2009 at 23:40
  • In the BIOS set your DVD drive as number 1 in the boot priority list, so it is checked first. Then you can boot from the DVD and you're good to go.
    – user1931
    Commented Dec 4, 2009 at 4:28
  • Yeah I have it set like that. I have a website to set up so after that is done I will give the formatting then installing to a clean drive a whirl.
    – Anders
    Commented Dec 5, 2009 at 0:47

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