Win 7 to 8/8.1 upgrade or clean install?

[Pumo]

So, how bad is to make an upgrade of win 7 to 8 compared to a clean install?

I feel almost ready to upgrade, but I really don't want to install again ALL that huge bunch of apps, that BTW I use very constantly, as it would take too many hours and or maybe even a few days to re-install everything.
I know it's always better to make a clean install, but I would like to know if it's not that bad to make an upgrade.

Also, I got a couple of HDDs, both on BIOS mode. There's a way to convert both diks to UEFI without losing data, before making the Win 8 upgrade? (as I would like to have Win 8 on UEFI mode).

Or definitely I should make a clean install, whether I like it or not?

Another note: Can I convert my main OS HDD to UEFI to install Win 8 there (be it upgrade or clean) without affecting the other HDD that has my files and data and no system files?
I mean, can I have the OS on an UEFI HDD and my data on a BIOS HDD, at least for the time being, or I MUST convert both HDDs to UEFI?

[sdfgeoff]

The hard drive isn't the bit that does UEFI, it's the motherboard that does that.

Pther than that, I know nothing about the upgrade process.

[Pumo]

Oh yeah, you're right, I should be more clear about that. I meant GPT vs MBR.

My motherboard features both BIOS and UEFI, so that won't be an issue.

[Sirius]

When I tried the upgrade from Win7 to 8 on one of my machines (didn't go straight to 8.1) I ran into issues where certain links wouldn't work - including many tech support related links hosted by MS (generally, anything from go.microsoft.com), and also any links in some of the "Metro" apps. It was mainly just an annoyance, and didn't totally prevent me from using the system, but things like that are why people usually recommend clean installs... it's tested better.

[sigma]

I see no reason to change W7 to W8.

[CDN_Merlin]

I'm with Sigma, stay with 7 and wait for 10.

[Krom]

Oh yeah, you're right, I should be more clear about that. I meant GPT vs MBR.

My motherboard features both BIOS and UEFI, so that won't be an issue.

There is no reason to change a MBR disk to GPT if it is already partitioned to its full capacity. GPT is only necessary/different in that it supports drives larger than 2 TB formatted capacity.

Also I second waiting for Windows 10, I have a windows 8.1 system (a surface pro 2) and while 8.1 mostly works on a tablet, it is a terrible choice for a desktop or laptop. (And I ended up installing and using classic shell on it anyway.) Basically Windows 8.1 makes a lot of compromises in order to bring a "mobile friendly" interface to Windows and as a result brought together all the worst parts of the desktop along with all the worst parts of mobile computing while losing all the benefits of either platform. Windows 10 promises to be a little smarter by only doing mobile stuff on actual mobile devices where it makes sense and behaving more like Windows 7 did on a proper desktop or laptop computer where that also makes sense.

But if you do decide to go through with it, then definitely clean install. The benefits from a clean install far outweigh the time it requires to reinstall/recover all your old applications and settings (also if you know what you are doing you can restore 80% of your programs settings by selectively compressing and saving stuff in %programdata% and %appdata% and then overwriting the new ones once your program is installed in the new OS (and 15 of the other 20% can be accomplished by backing up the programs relevant registry settings).

[Pumo]

Hey, thanks for the %programdata%/%appdata% tip, it will be very handy in the future!

Well, I have my Windows 8 disk since about a year, and already installed it (clean) and used it on another partition, then uninstalled, but TBH I did somehow liked it, although indeed Windows 10 looks more promising.

So I thought about this: for the time being I may install Win8 in upgrade mode. If something goes wrong and I don't like it I try the clean install, it will be almost the same, just sooner or later.

Anyways, thanks for the help!

[Sirius]

That also brings up another point: while it remains to be seen what final form Windows 10 will take, I'd still advise not getting too attached to any particular details from Windows 8. The majority of the new UI features are going away, with the notable exceptions of store apps and their live tiles - but they probably won't look exactly the same either.

[sigma]

If you want diversity, for Win7 there is a huge amount of the interface design. Not from Windows.