How to Uninstall Vista

If you upgrade to Vista from Windows XP, you may be finding it difficult to revert back to XP. There are several factors involved in uninstalling Vista and some of these make it difficult to successfully go back to XP. Whenever you do a new Operating System upgrade, you need to face the fact that reverting back to a previous version may not be an option and even if it were an option, the process of going backward is complicated and may not even work.

With that said, be sure you have made the necessary backups before upgrading to Vista or before attempting to downgrade your Windows Vista installation to XP. You can try to downgrade without losing data via the Microsoft Knowledge Base article at http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/933168.

But the best way is to use a fresh XP CD with a fresh license key. While you can try to use a previous license of XP from that computer, it may not work, as there have been issues with Vista rendering previous XP licenses useless after a Vista upgrade. This makes sense, as Microsoft does not want you to sell the upgraded XP after you are no longer using it. So be sure to get your hands on a boxed copy of XP before attempting an upgrade.

Boot to the fresh copy of XP. To do this, you may need to go into the system BIOS to change the first boot device to the CD ROM drive. When asked where you want to install XP, look for the current partition where Vista is installed and remove it. This will wipe out the Vista installation and all data will be lost. You can now install XP by choosing the free space on the hard drive.

You will also need to install drivers for all of your hardware. If you do not have a driver disk, be sure to go to the manufacturer of the hardware (motherboard manufacturer, video card manufacturer, sound card manufacturer, etc...) and have those disks ready. You should at the very least have the driver for the network card so you can get online and download the other drivers later.

If you have a major brand name computer and have purchased it with XP and then later installed Vista, call or Email their technical support to see if there is a way to successfully revert back using the recovery disks that came with your computer.

If you have any other questions about downgrading Vista, please be sure to join our free message boards today.