Daz Loader is good I recommend it to people but no way is it better than a bios mod, by saying this you're basically saying Daz Loader works better than a legit store bought Windows 7 lol.
imo i would mod the bios. best and strongest chance of staying genuine. and whatever you do DO NOT INSTALL COMODO for her... while its a good free suite it will kill her with pop ups constantly asking her what to do till it learns all of her answers. comodo works based on a auto "default deny" system that means any thing its unsure of gets denied or automatically sandboxed. and she will constantly have to answer a pop up asking if she wants to run this or that trust me for a 70 year old this will be torture. i am a pc tech. i deal with older people ALL THE TIME where i am... she would be FAR better off with avast free (or suite) or even norton internet security which is a bit paraniod but better anyway for her. im sure she will not be click happy being 70 (though i have seen it) but for her use ill bet avast free will do just fine. just put her being a router.. daz loader is awesome but imo the best long term is a bios mod overall.
Original poster has not replied when i had asked had his mother used xp before, anyway as reguards to installing it he only need to run oembios.exe to see if SLP 1.0 is there for XP if not he can use DMI boot cd, also the problem with setup errors you mention could have been due to needing sata drivers. There is absoulutly no way it should not be possible to install XP.
If you are not here, then the safest option is to buy a key. By default, kb971033 is not offered (unticked) and thus no chance of accidentally installing it. Even installing kb... has no impact on genuineness with Daz or IR4. Remember, all activation cracks are not `once done, forget forever' which is usually the case with genuine purchased key. Suggest this: 1. install win 7. 2. install all updates till date (kb971033 is unticked by default). 3. Make a system image of 2. Also make a system repair disc. 4. install all necessary software on top of 2. 5. make a new system image. In case, anything goes wrong, she can revert to it. Just write down instructions. IR4 should also work, but then she should be more technically proficient. System image tip: By default, windows 7 makes a system image called `WindowsImageBackup'. This is a folder which opens into `computer name-pc'. Thus if you name your computer as ADMIN, `windowsimagebackup' will open to a new folder `ADMIN-PC'. If you rename `w..i..backup' to remember what it contains, win 7 will not recognise it and restoring from image will fail. However, you can rename the folder `ADMIN-PC'. How does this work. Say you name your computer at install as A. Thus, computer name will be A-PC. Make system image on any drive. Assume it is F: Win 7 will save it as `WindowsImageBackup/A-PC. Rename A-PC as say A-PC STAGE 1 (for image made in 2). thus, your F will contain `WindowsImageBackup/A-PC STAGE 1'. Now, when you make a new sys. image on the same drive, the new image will be named A-PC. Rename it as say A-PC STAGE 2. When restoring from image, win 7 will now recognise both images. Just select which you want and go on.
At 70 years old. I would just go with a license. She cannot troubleshoot and if you are not around to help. She will be screwed. Using a loader takes the user to be more "informed" with what is happening to it with future releases.
I think everyone here is missing the point member said his mother hates Vista so i doubt very much if she will like Windows 7 (We are not talking here about whether windows 7 is easier to use or is better that Vista she was probably used to XP ) But original poster did not reply to that question, or in fact even replied to whole thread.
Hi everybody. The old BIOS mod vs Loader discussion again. This is how I understand things to work. Normal and modded BIOS During booting the BIOS copies it's ACPI tables from the ROM into RAM (memory) in a memory segment that the BIOS will map as reserved so when the OS interrogates the BIOS memory map it knows not to use this memory for it's virtual memory. These tables are also probably compressed in the ROM and will have to be uncompressed to be copied. One of these ACPI tables will be a SLIC if present to enable OEM activation to take place. After Windows boots it looks for these set of tables in RAM. It cannot check that the tables also exist in the BIOS ROM as it they may have been compressed. A loader. So the BIOS has copied it's tables into RAM but there is no SLIC table. So the loader looks for these tables and quietly adds a SLIC in there making sure all OEM header information is consistent. After Windows boots it looks for these set of tables in RAM. It cannot check that the tables also exist in the BIOS ROM as it they may have been compressed. Same as before. The end result is that Windows has no way of knowing how the SLIC was put into memory and therefore no way to know that a loader was used. The loader is usually based on the GRUB loader. GRUB is a popular loader so it's presence cannot indicate to Windows that a SLIC loader was used either. KB971033 detects many activation methods which usually tamper with files, DeathWAT and RemoveWAT are such methods so you would not want to install KB971033 if you use those methods. Also know that if you install Vistalizator it also tampers with files which KB971033 will object to. Please note I have not advocated which methods to use just tried to provide some information for you. I hope this helps you decide.
Hm didn't know the slic in bios is compressed, is all data in the rom compressed? That indeed improves the strength of loaders a lot.
With all due respect; It's one thing if you do not want to pay for your own licenses, but if you care for and love your mother you should buy her a license.
Wow, I went away for the weekend and came back to a lot of helpful suggestions. You guys are AWESOME! Thanks!
I guess Urie I just remember that when my friend tried to get it to work it did not and HP support said it was not possible to install XP but failed to explain.
Can I suggest one thing: if you are not sure, buy a Home Premium genuine DVD with key. That is much cheaper should suffice for 100% of most people's requirements. Make a system image of that. If you want Ultimate (not much need for an average light-user), use daz or IR4. By the way, the trend of declining prices has stopped for Win 7, at least in India. Prices have increased by 4-5% over the last 1-2 months. I bought a win xp pro licence in mid-2008 for Rs. 4,000 (US$90). Right now, Ultimate is retailing at Rs. 9,000-10,000 in India (>US$200). By the time, prices go down substantially, there would be time for Windows 8. I think I will skip buying Windows 7.