Which is better to use Windows 10 clean install vs OEM vs Rootkits?

[weeanon]

windows 10 clean install vs OEM vs rootkits

hi, I have a Dell machine running Windows7 and I plan to upgrade to Win10 when available.

but forums say that a clean install is not exactly possible and that I will have to upgrade to Win10 and then ask for an installation reset/clean/recover (I'm not sure the name).

afaik, this clean/recover function just resets my Windows to it's original state, but this is not as effective as formatting my drive.

my concern is, for example, that if I have a virus or a rootkit, it will not be removed by the soft reset after upgrade. that's why the format and new install would be a safer thing to do

I know that by doing a clean install I might have missing/outdated driver problems, but this is a minor risk for me when compared to leaving a rootkit I could get rid of. I'm not assuming I have a virus or something, but I would love to use the opportunity to be sure of this (by formatting my system).

all this said, I whish somebody does not me suggest to do a factory reset from my recover partition. this is probably the safest thing to do, but doing this will send me back several years behind of updates to download, before I can upgrade to Win10.

since Microsoft extracts some kind of hardware signature to handle activations along with hardware changes, is it really absolute sure that a clean install from an ISO using my OEM license will not possible?

 

[a5cent]

Re: windows 10 clean install vs OEM vs rootkits

No. A "clean install" refers to the act of installing Windows on a clean (formatted and empty) storage device. There is no special "clean install" feature.

What Windows does have are reset, refresh and restore capabilities, but these have absolutely nothing to do with the update to W10.

 

[weeanon]

Re: windows 10 clean install vs OEM vs rootkits

yes, I understand that "clean install" is not a feature.

my point is: is it absolutely certain that it will NOT be allowed for me to format my hard-disc and install win10 from an ISO file (via dvd, usb, whatever) using my currently valid windows7 OEM license?

 

[a5cent]

Re: windows 10 clean install vs OEM vs rootkits

No. The opposite is certain. However, you will have to activate you W10 upgrade first. Basically, you'll have to use your current (and genuine) W7 or W8 installation and upgrade it to W10. This will associate a W10 license with your machine. After that you can format your system and clean install W10 from an ISO as many times as you want, although the same restrictions as with any other OEM Windows license apply.

The only thing we don't know is if you'll still require your previous Windows key to install W10 (assuming that was required to begin with). From what I understand such keys will no longer be required for consumer versions of Windows, but I could be mistaken about that.

 

[a5cent]

Re: windows 10 clean install vs OEM vs rootkits

On yeah, here's a free tip for everyone:

If you're planning to upgrade your system soon, particularly if you're thinking about changing your motherboard, you shouldn't reserve or associate your free W10 upgrade with your current PC. You should wait until you get the new system and then associate the free W10 license with that. W10 licenses will apparently all be (more or less) hardware locked to the machine they were licensed for.

If you get your W10 upgrade and then buy a new PC two months later, you might very well have just wasted your W10 upgrade on your old machine, even if you owned retail versions of W7 or W8.