Driver updates for win10 install

[the_hamster2]

Hello...this question is actually a reprise of a question asked ca. 5 yrs. ago, archived, but links in the answer no longer are active.  Question is: I would like to migrate to Win10 from Win7 Home Premium on a laptop for which HP no longer provides “tested” upgrades .  This is a Pavilion dv6-1253cl that has memory upgrade to 8GB, a 512GB ssd, and other minor changes, and is robust in all its functions.  I’m on the Internet constantly, have Malwarebytes  Premium + Windows Defender malware/AV protection, but recognize that Microsoft has bailed on Win7 support, so the prudent choice here is moving to Win10, right?  The archived answer referenced above included links to 9 driver update executables, but doing a search of this support site came up empty.

So, for all you experts out there, what are my options here, and how may I proceed with OS upgrade without crashing my system.  I might mention here that I’ve partitioned SSD for Win10 install, should that become feasible.  Thanks in advance for any and all help provided..

[WAWood]

@the_hamster2 

I updated my DV6 to Win10 years ago and while it worked OK, it simply would NOT activate, even though I used the Upgrade option and had a valid license.  It took me a while to rework that, so I wrote the following to advise folks of the issues and what to do to prevent them and to deal with them:

While you CAN upgrade to Win10, but you must be prepared to do four things:

1) Make a complete image backup to external drive or large capacity USB stick,
2) Make changes to the reserved system partitioning scheme on your hard drive,
3) Use a different approach than Windows Update to do the Upgrade,
4) Be prepared to do a clean-install, if the Upgrade does not work.

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1: Image Backup:
This is VITAL because the machine is likely to fail the upgrade, and when it does, you will learn that the Win10 GoBack function is NOT reliable, and that can leave you with a corrupted machine that will require factory reset, and losing everything on it, to get it working again.

You avoid this by making an image backup to an external drive or USB stick using Macrium Reflect (MR) which provides a FREE version that can be used to image and restore partitions or entire drives.

What I recommend is the following:
1) Download and install Macrium Reflect (MR)
2) Run MR and choose the option: "Create an image of the partition(s) required to backup and restore Windows" to write a full backup to an external drive or USB stick
3) Use the option to create a boot USB stick or CD

NOW, you have the means to restore a full working system from the external drive or USB stick in only a few minutes.
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2: System Reserved Resizing:
There is a small partition on the hard drive of Win7 preinstalled machines known as System Reserved. This holds something known as the boot loader code. It is 100MB in size -- all that is needed for Win7. But Win10 needs 350MB, and, in some cases, is NOT able to resize this on its own. IF that happens, you have to manually use a partitioning tool to resize it yourself.
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3: Use a different Upgrade approach:
Windows Update is the easiest, but least reliable, way to do the Win10 Upgrade. A much better, and more reliable way, is to use the Microsoft Media Creation Tool: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

In my case, I created Win10 install media on USB, inserted that, and tried to do the Upgrade while still in Win7. That failed -- miserably!!

So, I ended up having to Restore my PC to Win7 (using the MR backup I had made prior to the Upgrade), and follow the details in step 4 -- and that worked!
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4: Prepare for clean-install:
If you do all this, and after the upgrade, your PC is only partially functioning, that means that the Upgrade did not go well and stuff is still there from the prior OS corrupting the functionality of Win10.

You MIGHT be able to fix this by doing a clean-install of Win10. Problem is that a clean-install often does not recognize the prior activation, even though it should.

So, BEFORE you do the upgrade, follow these instructions from the community Win10 forums about creating a genuineticket.xml file: http://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/23354-clean-install-windows-10-directly-without-having-upgrade-fi...

You will need this later to activate your Win10 pc after the clean-install.

NOTE: I did the clean-install, and even though the product-key was SUPPOSED to work to activate Win10, it did not. And, calls to MS about this were wastes of time -- since the MS idiots said I could not activate Win10 with a Win7 product key!!

What DID work was using the genuineticket approach documented in the tenforums thread. I copied that from the USB stick where I saved it, rebooted, and after that, my DV6 was activated.

[the_hamster2]

Hello, WAWood...thanks for the reply, and I’ve already done steps 1-3, having created a USB-bootable ISO file of Win10.  I’m going for dual-boot setup, keeping the Win7 partition active in the (likely) event of a failed Win10 clean install.  My concern is with the drivers required by Win10 for graphics, sound/audio, display, etc.  Since  my particular laptop has been out of support for quite a while, it’s a fair guess that the old drivers probably won’t work with Win10.  What was your experience in this regard?

[WAWood · Accepted solution]

@the_hamster2 

All the drivers in my DV6 got replaced by MS and the PC continues to work well to this day.

You DO need to do the GenuineTicket stuff because there is a possibility that Win10 will not reuse the Win7 license for activation, and if it does not, there is no other way to activate Win10.

[the_hamster2]

@WAWood

Good to know re: drivers.  Also, I have a retail copy of Win7 Ultimate, never before installed, whose license key I plan to use in order to activate a clean install of Win10 Pro.  Interesting to see how well that goes.

Again, thank you for your helpful and encouraging comments.