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Use any version of Windows 7 free for 120 days Page 2 of 5
When that number gets perilously close to zero, you can extend the free period another 30 Tighten your Facebook
days via the following steps: privacy settings 4.14
iTunes account theft strikes
■ Step 1: Click Start, All Programs, Accessories. Right-click Command Prompt and close to home 4.13
choose Run As Administrator. Enter your administrator password.
ATL flaw makes IE
■ Step 2: Type the following command and press Enter: vulnerable to attack 4.13
MS patch causes BSOD if
slmgr -rearm PC has Alureon malware
4.13
Note the space after slmgr and the hyphen in front of rearm.
Microsoft releases a taxing
■ Step 3: Restart Windows 7. week of patches 4.13
Delete files that Windows
Once the OS restarts, the Properties dialog described above will indicate that Windows 7's labels 'undeletable' 4.13
activation grace period has been reset to a full 30 days.
Should you move to 64-bit
Windows 7? 4.13
You can run the -rearm trick a total of three times. If you perform a -rearm at the end of
each 30-day period, you end up with 120 days of full, unfettered Windows 7 use without Windows, solid-state disks,
having to supply an activation key in the interim. and 'trim' 4.13
How much security
How to install Win7 Ultimate now, pay less later software do you really
need? 4.12
When the activation grace period runs out — whether it's in 30 or 120 days or somewhere
in between — you need to feed Windows 7 an activation key. That's when many Windows ISPs block some outgoing
7 customers will find themselves in trouble. e-mail unexpectedly 4.11
How to pick and optimize
Let me clarify up front that the 32-bit and the 64-bit versions of Windows take the same your home router 4.11
keys. A key that works for 32-bit Windows 7 Home Premium also works for 64-bit Add Windows 7 PCs to
Windows 7 Home Premium. However, different keys are required for Ultimate vs. Pro vs. Vista and XP networks
Home Premium. 4.1
(I assume you won't want to install the exceedingly limited Windows Home Basic, which is Freeware outdoes
intended primarily for developing countries. And you won't be installing Windows Home Windows' built-in system
Starter, because you can't buy a key for it. The Starter version is available only when tools 4.1
preinstalled on a new netbook.) My productivity-enhancing
keyboard shortcuts 4.1
Say, for example, you install a free trial of Windows 7 Ultimate. However, when the time
comes to pay the piper, you want to shell out your shekels only for Win7 Home Premium.
(That's the version most individual users will choose, and it's considerably cheaper than
Win7 Ultimate — which isn't worth spending more for, as I see it.)
If you installed a trial of Win7 Ultimate without knowing the secret, you're stuck. The Home
Premium key won't activate an Ultimate PC. Your only option is a complete reinstall of
Windows using the version that matches your bought-and-paid-for key — Home Premium,
in this case.
The best solution is to install in the first place the version you probably want to end up
with. If you expect to pay for Windows 7 Home Premium, you should install Windows 7
Home Premium. The same goes for Windows 7 Professional, which is for use in corporate
domains.
Fortunately, there's an easy way to install either Windows 7 Home Premium or Pro from a
Windows 7 Ultimate CD: simply delete a single file. Hard to believe, but true.
However, if you first delete a tiny file named ei.cfg before making the installation DVD, the
Win7 installer will give you the choices shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1. Delete or rename ei.cfg before burning a Windows 7 installation DVD, and
a menu then allows you to select which version to install.
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Use any version of Windows 7 free for 120 days Page 3 of 5
In fact, no matter
which Win7
installation DVD
you have —
Ultimate, Pro, or
Premium — if you
delete the ei.cfg
file from the disc,
you'll be offered
the same choices
and can install
any version of
Windows 7.
At the moment, only a small number of people have received a physical DVD containing
Windows 7 Ultimate. Instead, most current Win7 users downloaded an .iso file, which
includes everything on the Windows 7 Ultimate DVD: boot settings, file-structure details,
etc. You burn the .iso file to a DVD. Then you either boot your PC from the DVD or run the
setup program within an older version of Windows to kick the Win7 installer into gear.
If you have a Windows 7 Ultimate .iso file, it's easy to delete ei.cfg. First, get a 30-day trial
version of the gBurner utility, which is available from the program's download page at
CNET's Download.com. Then install and run gBurner, open the Windows 7 .iso file, and
delete (or rename) \sources\ei.cfg. Piece o' cake, although it can take 20 minutes to save
the altered .iso file.
You can then use either gBurner or Alex Feinman's ISO Recorder program (available from
Alex's site) to burn a version of the .iso file without ei.cfg to DVD.
What if you do have a physical Windows 7 installation DVD, but you don't have an .iso
file? In that case, use either gBurner or ISO Recorder to rip the DVD into an .iso file. Then
follow the instructions above to delete the ei.cfg file and burn a new DVD.
Get the right version of Windows 7 going now and you won't have to reinstall it — or pay
an exorbitant price — later.
(My thanks to all-around good guy Seth Bareiss for his help in researching this topic.)
UPDATE 2009-11-12: In the Nov. 12 Top Story, Woody Leonhard describes how to
clean-install Windows 7 from the upgrade disc and also answers other reader
questions about Windows 7.
Woody Leonhard's latest book, Green Home Computing For Dummies, just hit store shelves. His
encyclopedic Windows 7 All-In-One For Dummies will be available in most bookstores and computer
stores worldwide in October.
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