Clean Install Windows Vista® using the Upgrade Media (DVD)    1 / 11 

Before beginning the step-by-step tutorial and with all its details, you need to know what you are doing and why. So read this page first .. then scroll down to start the step-by-step tutorial.

Please note: the technique(s) described in this tutorial are intended for those who have purchased a copy of and use Windows Vista in a legitmate manner only.

 The essential outline of this process

1. Clean install Windows Vista - do not enter Product Key nor Activate.
    
2. "Upgrade" Windows Vista with Windows Vista - enter Product Key
    
3. Activate
    

In other words, here's what you are doing

You are installing Windows Vista twice. The first time you install it clean - on a blank drive, say - but you are not going to enter the Product key during the installation routine and you will not activate that copy of Windows.

Then you will turn right around and do an "in-place upgrade" of that installation with the same version of Windows Vista i.e. install a second time - upgrading the first copy with a second - installing Windows Vista right over Windows Vista as an upgrade. The second time you will enter the product key and you can activate if you like.

 
Here's why

You have to do this in order to get Windows Vista to activate online. If you try to activate Windows Vista after the first clean install using the upgrade media, the activation routine will detect it was installed clean and detect that it was installed from upgrade media and so will refuse you. You must upgrade the first copy with a second, so that activation will work. The second time it will detect that the media was the upgrade media and that the install was an upgrade install. It should then activate online.

 
Here's why this is OK

Windows Vista, even when upgrading, installs itself clean, mostly*. It sort of rolls its image out onto the harddrive. Previous versions of Windows would tie into the previous copy when installing .. but Vista rolls itself out on your harddrive first then brings in information from the old copy only after. Since you are turning around and installing a second copy right away, you end up with essentially the very same thing as the first .. you end up with essentially a clean copy of Windows even if you upgrade the first copy with a second - the same thing smack over itself. Thereafter, you can install all your 3rd party software and so on.

* After an upgrade install of Vista over Vista there are two extra hidden folders created which can be safely deleted; and the registry entry indicating the type of install indicates, of course, an upgrade.

 
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