I decided to upgrade an Acer Aspire X1440 (Win 7 64bit) to Win 10, it just wouldn't work. Kept failing at 32%, which seems a common enough problem, tried all the fixes which didn't work so tried to install from USB. This also failed.

I was pretty convinced that it was a graphics driver that was the issue so I thought I'd format the HDD and try again. Win 10 still won't install, in fact nor will Mint, or Ubuntu (ACPI PCC Probe Failed), and of course I've lost the Win 7 recovery partition.

It was only after I did all this that I found that according to Acer you cannot upgrade this device to Win 10.

I now have a nice, hardly used Acer Aspire X1440 with 1TB HDD and 8gb RAM that doesn't boot into anything. Seems a shame to bin it but I can't think of anything else to try...

Very obvious answer (sorry about that ): maybe you can find a Windows 7 x64 installation CD somewhere and reinstall it? I suppose you've still got your license number (usually a sticker on the underside of the device). Windows 7 is still supported until 2020.

I'm very curious to know why you couldn't install Ubuntu on it. I could understand having driver issues once the install was finished, but for it to fail outright seems strange.

I wonder if there's a bad sector on that drive. To me, that's the only thing that could prevent all those OS installs from finishing. I can't recall if there's a free live CD out there with drive scanning tools, but that might be the culprit. You could also just try swapping out the hard drive and trying one of these installs again.

Yeah, I don't have a Win7 CD, I guess I could take a look at eBay

Sorry, forgot to say my initial though was HDD issue, I tried a new HDD (with Win 10 & Mint) still no joy.

Yeah, it's pretty rare for Linux not to be install-able on pretty much anything these days.

You could next try a low-level format of that 1TB drive, or at least query the S.M.A.R.T. data to see if it is reporting issues.

Weird... I'm trying to think of what would halt the installation of an OS. Isn't it pretty much just unpacking files for most of the process? I'm having a hard time thinking of what would stop that in its tracks.

Even with the Windows 10 upgrade, I get why Acer would tell you that the computer doesn't support Windows 10, but I would think that would usually be due to driver issues, and that the OS would still install.

How old is that computer? Looking at it online, I see PS/2 ports. Haven't seen those in a while...

That's what I thought, I think it's 2012

I'll try a low level format, how do I query the S.M.A.R.T. data with no OS?

Can you remove the disk and connect it to a different PC using a usb enclosure/interface?

I don't have a sata usb enclosure, this could all get very complex.

One other thing, is there likely to be anything in BIOS that is interfering? I can't see anything, the settings are very sparse, and there's not much you can change. I can't find a BIOS upgrade that works, there's a BIOS for LINUX on Acer's site but it won't load when I try to flash, it says it's not compatible with the ROM version.

I wondered if UEFI was required, but apparently that's just for new systems. I'm pretty sure that Acer doesn't have it but apparently that doesn't matter. Besides, I'd think that would make it fail quicker...

Well, got a Win 7 CD. Reinstall worked but there seems to be an issue with updates, they don't even work properly with WSUS. I can't see anything on the internet that says this is an issue, it's up and running now, but I can't get it to update the video drivers so I can actually set my screen res correctly.

I may just use it as a headless music server (LMS), or take a hammer to it.

I found that even with loading updates with wsus, the first few updates take, literally, days. I wasn't using my laptop for anything, so I let it run. The first update with wsus took more than a day before it started, and a couple of the online updates after the first also took more than a day each. Not it seems to update "normally". I couldn't install vid drivers until the second online update.

I smell a rat.

OK, so patience is the key? Hammer would be more fun though.

I've done several Win 7 rebuilds. With a reasonably high speed connection (and I don't think that's the issue), running through all the updates takes frickin' forever! It's a hot mess!

A couple times, I've had to start over. Pain in the arse.

-jk

Yes, patience is the key, and definitely a hammer would be more fun. But not taken to my blameless laptop, the hammer needs a more deserving target...

Oh god, don't get me started on those updates. I've had to do fresh Windows 7 installs waaay too often, and I usually have to leave the first batch going overnight.

For whatever reason (maybe you guys can explain) the worst of the worst are the .net framework updates. Sometimes there will be several of those and they each take about 10 times longer than any others.

I'll have to give it another go, although if I put a photo of Farage on it the hammer option would be even funner...

Looks like the trick is to install Windows 7 SP2, err, I mean the update rollup package to an SP1 box available here: https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/wind...dows-7-and-8-1/

And soon it will be better via Windows Update as the cumulative strategy for Windows 10 is being implemented for 7 and 8.1. http://arstechnica.com/business/2016/08/windows-7-8-1-moving-to-windows-10s-cumulative-update-model/

Eventually getting updates to work through wsusoffline. It's taken most of the day though.