I have a 5 year old HP laptop sitting doing nothing as the hard drive went south. I have scavenged a replacement hard drive, I have a legitimate product key for Win 7 pro but no actual recovery disc or USB (the laptop has no optical drive). What are my options to get it up and running again without spending a lot? I don’t fancy a dodgy install of Windows as it will be linked to my home network. Cheers

What do you want to use it for ?

I will be running traktor from it, nothing else

download an iso of win 7 pro, make a bootable USB and stick it on. or go 10 preview or full version which will be released imminently.

If you’ve got a legit produce key, then you can download W7 installation media direct from MS – see http://www.howtogeek.com/186775/how-to-download-windows-7-8-and-8.1-installation-media-legally/ – it also explains there how to install from USB.

You should be able to download any necessary drivers from HP.

Stick an SSD in it.

or go 10 preview or full version which will be released imminently.

MS have clarified that that won’t quality, needs to be W7 or W8.1.

I getting the runaround trying to obtain the ISO . Microsoft site, with product keep entered tells me to go to HP to obtain a recovery disc, HP site send me back to the Microsoft site. Maybe I need to get an optical drive and reinstall that way…

Ah, I get a message saying my key is for software pre-installed and contact the manufacturer. Last time I did it you could still get the files on Digital River – I do have a W7 install USB, but not all that easy to share.

Have you tried contacting HP for recovery SW?

MS have clarified that that won’t quality, needs to be W7 or W8.1.
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What won’t qualify? He says he has a valid W7 key.

I was hoping to be able to get it to try* from this W7 OEM install (I have a “Get Windows 10” icon on my taskbar). If not they have said that all versions of W7, whether legit or not will be eligible for upgrade 😉

*well I have already tried the beta, but hoping for greater things from the release version.

What won’t qualify? He says he has a valid W7 key.

The W10 preview.

Last time I did it you could still get the files on Digital River

Yeah, they pulled that I think. I might be able to get you a legitimate ISO from work on Monday if you’re stuck. Is it an OEM CoA you have?

Either you’re missing the point or I am – he says he has a valid W7 key.

I was replying to Del who seemed to be suggesting you can upgrade for free from the preview; you can’t. (I may have misunderstood the suggestion, ofc.)

I have a legit ISO I could make up for you, I own the upgrade disc and using the known exploit could turn that into a full blown multi install if you wanted (were it not for copyright law). Can’t either post or do it as a personal torrent so you’d better not tell me if you don’t want me to do that.

I’d install Ubuntu.
(free Linux install).

I’ve just taken Windows 8.1 off my laptop and replaced it with Ubuntu – way faster!

Will Traktor run on Linux? Maybe with WINE?

Cougar, that’s a very kind offer of help, thanks. If it’s not too much trouble that would be great but no worries if time doesn’t allow for you.

I get the same message as aracer, so from a legitimate perspective it would seem this software is no longer available from a download perspective.

The laptop is probably worth £50-60 at best so the idea of spending the same buying a fresh copy kind of puts me off especially as I already have a software key.

Thanks again

You can find Windows 7 HP OEM disc on one of the torrent sites – there are some on the Pirate Bay.
I’ve used this method when I couldn’t find a Vista disc for an IBM laptop I had.

Would this help ?
http://getintopc.com/softwares/operating-systems/windows-7-ultimate-free-download-iso-32-64-bit/

Well, I thought I was getting somewhere. I’ve hacked boot camp on my mac so that I can create a USB boot. Subsequently downloaded per jesmonddingo’s link (thanks!) and created the boot USB. I changed the BIOS to boot from USB first but unfortunately no joy – the pc continues to boot from the hard drive. Not sure if a problem with the boot USB that I created on the mac or alternatively the software downloaded. Grrrrr.

MS have an official tool for this. http://wudt.codeplex.com/

Windows 10 preview won’t qualify for the release version of W10, but you can still run the preview and it will continue to get preview updates, and is free.

Windows 10 is the last major version release of Windows. From then on everything will be released as incremental updates, and the preview will be to preview those updates. Think of it like Fedora which is a bleeding edge version of Red Hat where new features are tried out on users.

Does the mac create a windows bootable USB or a Mac one,as they are different afaik.

Cougar, I have a mac so can’t use that tool unfortunately. The PC is no use until it has an OS.

Oh, I thought you said you had Boot Camp?

mac version of bootcamp 🙂

All sorted now, thanks for the many words of wisdom