Uninstalling Windows 8 Developer Preview

Question

How to uninstall Windows 8 Developer Preview

What you need:

* Windows 7 Installation DVD or USB drive

The Steps:

Boot your computer to the Windows 7 DVD and click on Install now as shown below:



2. Select your language and click next:



3. Click the button for "Use recovery tools" and choose the Windows 7 installation, note the Location (C) or (D), etc.

4. Select "Command Prompt".

5. Prepare your keyboard to write the below :P

6. Let's Activate the primary partition, let’s start with the following commands:

    Diskpart
    Enter

    Select disk 0
    * (In-case your preferred windows is on the primary disk)
    Enter

    List partition
    Enter

    Select partition 1
    * (In-case your preferred windows is on partition 1)
    Enter

    Active
    * (That will make the selected partiation active)
    Enter

Okay, we are done making the required partition active using... Let’s quite:

    Exit
    Enter

7. Using the bootrec command, we have to fix the MBR:

    bootrec.exe /FixMbr
    Enter

8. And now we going to use bcdedit command to restore the system's boot list but first let's backup the old bcdlist:

    bcdedit /export C:\BCDBackup
    Enter

    c:\
    Enter

    cd boot
    Enter

    attrib bcd -s -h –r
    Enter

    ren c:\boot\bcd bcd.bck
    Enter

9. Now we have to rebuild the Boot Configuration Data (BCD) list on the primary drive:

    bootrec /RebuildBcd
    Enter

    *** Scanning all disks for Windows installation.
    *** Please wait, since this may take a while...
    *** Successfully scanned Windows installation.
    *** Total identified WIndows Installation: 2
    *** [1] d:\Windows
    *** Add installation to boot list? Yes<Y>/No<N>/All<A>:

    Note that is the Windows 8 installation, so note the drive letter in-case you have installed Windows 8 on the local disk (D) and just write:

    N
    Enter

    Now, Bootrec will display the Windows 7 installation which will be c:\Windows

    *** [2] c:\Windows
    *** Add installation to boot list? Yes<Y>/No<N>/All<A>:

    Select this installation:

    Y
    Enter

10. Finally, using bootrec, we shall fix the booting record to the primary disc:

    bootrec.exe /FixBoot
    Enter

PS: As always, you're on your own & Windows support in-case there is any damage occured to your MBR!

Goodluck :)

Answer 1

On Fri, 16 Sep 2011 11:17:20 +0000, ras-7 wrote:

How to uninstall Windows 8 Developer Preview

Note

This procedure does not uninstall the DP and most certainly won't work for
those who have overwritten their Windows 7 install with a Windows 8
install. All this procedure does is replace the Windows 8 bootloader with
the Windows 7 bootloader.

In addition, if you'd originally installed Windows 7 to a clean,
unpartioned disk, the bootloader would normally be on the System Reserved
partition that gets created automatically. This procedure will change that
default such that the bootloader is now going to be on a different
partition.

---

Paul Adare
MVP - Identity Lifecycle Manager
http://www.identit.ca
You have a tendency to feel you are superior to most computers.

Answer 2

Overwritten windows 7 install = Dumb which mean -> Format the partition!

Installing to clean partition doesn't reserve the original bootloader = Erased the master bcd -> revert to bcdBuild!

Thanks for posting into the thread :)

Answer 3

On Fri, 16 Sep 2011 11:57:29 +0000, Amro Raslan wrote:

Overwritten windows 7 install = Dumb which mean -> Format the partition!

Dumb or not, if you'd take some time to look through the existing posts on
this forum, a ton of people have done this, and the subject of your post is
technically inaccurate and misleading. This is not meant personally but it
is what it is.

Installing to clean partition doesn't reserve the original bootloader = Erased the master bcd -> revert to bcdBuild!

Actually, again, you're wrong from a technical perspective. The Windows 8
and Windows 7 bootload processes are very different. You may not have
noticed, but if you choose to boot Windows 7 from the Windows 8 boot menu,
your computer takes a while and then completely reboots before booting
into Windows 7. My best guess, until I get a little more time to
investigate fully is that during this process, the Windows 7 bootloader is
put back into place, otherwise there'd be no reason for the reboot.

All your process does is to get rid of the Windows 8 bootloader and
replaces it with the Windows 7 bootloader, and as I said in my original
response, it really doesn't do it correctly since you're also making the
partition that Windows 7 was installed to the active partition, which for a
default Windows install is not correct. In a default Windows 7 install, the
active partition, the one that contains the bootloader files is the System
Reserved partition, not the one with the Windows install files on it.

You may ask why the above matters, well, consider someone who is triple
booting between say Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows Server 2008 R2. Your
process will let them boot to Windows 7, however, it will not allow them to
boot to their Server R2 install.
Finally, your process is overly complex and involved. For those with a
working system who simply want to remove Windows 8, the easiest process is:

1. Boot to either Windows 7 or Windows 8 and in Advanced System Settings,
change the default OS to Windows 7 and set the time out to 0.

This changes the bootloader back to the Windows 7 bootloader.

Depending on the speed of your system, you may notice a quick flash of the
screen that allows you to choose which OS to boot. If this bothers you,
then you can:

1. Allow your box to boot to Windows 7.
2. Log in and open an elevated command prompt.
3. Type bcdedit.
4. Identify your Windows 8 install and then select and copy the
corresponding Identifier.
5. Type bcdedit /delete <paste_the_Win8_identifier> /cleanup

Format or delete the partition that Windows 8 is on.

Done.

---

Paul Adare
MVP - Identity Lifecycle Manager
http://www.identit.ca
Remember the good old days, when CPU was singular?