How to install windows 8 consumer preview
How to install windows 8 consumer preview
In my previous post I have explained how to download windows 8 consumer preview, in this post I will tell you how to install windows 8 consumer preview in your PC with dual boot with windows 7.
For dual boot purpose you require a new empty partition of hard disk to install windows 8 consumer preview. You can see my post for how to create a partition from your single c: drive for dual boot operating systems.
For downloading windows 8 consumer preview you have to download self-guided software as mentioned in my previous post. After downloading this software double click to run this software. Now this will take some time to examine your existing windows OS and hardware (whether 32bit or 64bit, and existing hardware and programs compatibility) after that your downloading will start. You can pause and restart the downloading as per your requirement; your downloaded data will be safe.
After finishing of downloading you can install windows 8 consumer preview directly from here, it will upgrade your existing OS (windows XP/Vista/Windows 7). You can keep your existing files, programs, settings as per your existing OS; (see my previous post for this).
But I will not suggest you to use upgrade option as this windows 8 consumer preview is a beta version. So you have to again install windows 7 if this OS crashes or time period expire of this windows 8 consumer preview (one year).
Now come on second option that is install on other partition; you can do it by two methods, either you can make a bootable USB drive or save an ISO image that can be burnt on a DVD media later to install windows 8. You can do both the things as this has already been downloaded in your PC. You can save an ISO image to burn on a DVD media and if you have a USB drive of 4BG or more you can also make a bootable usb drive for easy installation, as usb installation is faster than DVD installation. After finishing a key will be displayed by the setup , note down this key it will require at the time of installation.
Now restart your PC and go to BIOS setup of your PC, select first booting device as USB drive. Now save and exit, inserts your usb drive and restart your PC, your installation will start. Now choose as custom setup , enter your key as note down earlier, click next and check for agree for licence , now click next and select your partition as you have earlier created ( be careful here you will see only drive 0,1,2,3 type numbering and not will see C,D,E drive, you can select by disk capacity).
Setup will start now and take approx. 15 minutes (depends on your hardware) to finish, after finishing your PC will reboot automatically, It will reboot again once more to finalising setup.
Now setup will ask you to set you PC name, user name, password etc., and you are done.
see the pictures below –
Press up arrow or esc key to see the login screen-
you can not uninstall windows 8 , you have to remove windows 8 consumer preview entry from your boot loader file then you can delete windows 8 partition to remove windows 8 consumer preview. See my previous post regarding this how to uninstall windows 8 from your dual boot PC.