Solved Made a huge mistake!

My aunt purchased a windows 8 laptop, hated windows 8 and asked me to put windows 7 on it.

Having installed windows 8 on my laptop and then reverting to windows 7 and going back to windows 8, I thought that this would be easy.

I had trouble booting to the windows 7 cd, so I ran it from the logged-in desktop. Then the stupid thing just wouldn't do anything at all, so I plugged it's hard drive into my windows 7 desktop and deleted all of the partitions (the big mistake). I thought surely now it will boot from the windows 7 CD. But all it does is say secure boot failed.

I cannot for the life of me figure out how to get into this computer's BIOS settings to turn secure boot off and legacy boot on. I had no idea what either of these things were before I deleted windows 8 and couldn't do anything else with the computer.

I tried a bootable MS DOS but it didn't work, and then when I tried it on my desktop I realized that I have no idea how to use MS DOS.

The computer is a Sony Vaio SVE15126CXS

I was a master at windows 7, but the new windows 8 sharades have got me all confused and stuck.


Any help would be hugely appreciated!!!!!

-Derek

I was a master at windows 7, but the new windows 8 sharades have got me all confused and stuck.

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You're not the only one coming across annoyances.

VAIO User Guide | Why does a message appear and Windows fail to start when I turn on my VAIO computer?

I had trouble booting to the windows 7 cd, so I ran it from the logged-in desktop. Then the stupid thing just wouldn't do anything at all, so I plugged it's hard drive into my windows 7 desktop and deleted all of the partitions (the big mistake). I thought surely now it will boot from the windows 7 CD. But all it does is say secure boot failed.

Click to expand...

Welcome to EightForums

1) Downgrade to Windows 7.
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/13326-downgrade-windows-8-windows-7-a.html
Warning you must have the uEFI/BIOS firmware setting in Step Three set.


2) If Using a USB Pendrive on a PC with a uEFI BIOS.
USB Pendrive need to be formated to FAT32 as in
http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/15458-uefi-bootable-usb-flash-drive-create-windows.html
Take note of Step 11 for Windows 7.
Also you will need to use a USB 2.0 port, as there are no USB 3.0 drivers in Windows 7.

How do I downgrade my OEM Windows 8 to Windows 7 P... - Sony Community

PeterT said:

Currently we do not have any support for Windows 8 downgrade to Windows 7 at this moment. We are investigating this area and drivers to see if this is possible. We should have some kind of an update by Jan or Feb 2013 in terms of what model is eligible or not.


Sony Community Manager
Sr. Software Engineer
Peter Tat

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Sony eSupport - Windows® 7 Clean Install Instructions for Windows® 8 PCs

Sony said:

1.With the computer powered off, press the Assist button to enter the VAOCare Rescue Mode Boot screen.
2.Select the ‘Start BIOS setup [F2]’ option to proceed to the system BIOS.
3.Once inside the InsydeH2O Setup Utility, use the arrow keys to select the ‘Boot’ list.
4.With the ‘Boot Mode’ option selected, press enter to change the setting from UEFI to Legacy. or (UEFI/Legacy if a option)
5.Use the arrow keys to proceed to the ‘Exit’ menu.
6.Select the ‘Save Changes’ option and press Enter.
7.After saving the changes, select Shutdown.

Click to expand...

SIW2 said:

I was a master at windows 7, but the new windows 8 sharades have got me all confused and stuck.

Click to expand...

You're not the only one coming across annoyances.

VAIO User Guide | Why does a message appear and Windows fail to start when I turn on my VAIO computer?

Click to expand...

WOW that was so easy!!!!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!! All I had to do was press the assist button while the computer was off and run bios and disable secure boot and then switch it to legacy boot!!!!!!! you saved my friggin life!!!!!!!!!! thank god I didn't tell my aunt that I ruined her brand new $1000 computer yet!!!!!!

theog said:

How do I downgrade my OEM Windows 8 to Windows 7 P... - Sony Community

PeterT said:

Currently we do not have any support for Windows 8 downgrade to Windows 7 at this moment. We are investigating this area and drivers to see if this is possible. We should have some kind of an update by Jan or Feb 2013 in terms of what model is eligible or not.

Click to expand...

PeterT said:

Sony Community Manager
Sr. Software Engineer
Peter Tat

Click to expand...

Sony eSupport - Windows® 7 Clean Install Instructions for Windows® 8 PCs

Sony said:

1.With the computer powered off, press the Assist button to enter the VAOCare Rescue Mode Boot screen.

Click to expand...

Sony said:

2.Select the ‘Start BIOS setup [F2]’ option to proceed to the system BIOS.
3.Once inside the InsydeH2O Setup Utility, use the arrow keys to select the ‘Boot’ list.
4.With the ‘Boot Mode’ option selected, press enter to change the setting from UEFI to Legacy. or (UEFI/Legacy if a option)
5.Use the arrow keys to proceed to the ‘Exit’ menu.
6.Select the ‘Save Changes’ option and press Enter.
7.After saving the changes, select Shutdown.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Thank you, I already got drivers for it, I got them before I tried to re-install. I am tech-savvy enough to know to check for windows 7 drivers haha.

LOL. Glad it was useful.