How to uninstall windows vista?

You can't 'un-install it'.  Blow an XP image backup in or reformat. I'll save the 'RTFM' lecture for another time.....

Nakor: "Nothing on earth is forcing you to install the beta versions. It can get rough on the bleeding edge. "

Blow an XP image backup in or reformat. I'll save the 'RTFM' lecture for another time.....

how do i do that?

I couldn't resist.

did you make a backup?

do you have your XP disk?

Bash, ...Vista [beta!!] was never recommended to be an upgrade from XP. This is something you should have read before you installed it. [Hence the 'rtfm' quoted above]

Suggestion: Backup/copy every document/file you want to keep ~to CD/DVD or another drive if you have one ...and format the drive you screwed up, then re-install XP on that clean drive.

I hope you learn an important lesson from this   

Hopefully, Bash, you'll look before you leap in future.....meaning, have patience grasshopper. You weren't the only one wanting to try out Vista....I too was fairly anxious to as well, but no way would I have made it my primary OS or had it dual booting on the same physical drive. It would've had to wait if I couldn't have clean installed as a secondary OS on another HD, being that its still in beta and experiencing stability and driver issues, etc.

Having said that, however, if you could reinstall XP on your primary HD and Vista on another, you could continue to test it without those issues and upgrade to the Release Candidate - which is promised to resolve many of the stability/performance/compatability issues - later in the year. Like I said to Musical Mayhem earlier, if you don't have a spare drive, a relatively inexpensive 40gig yould do the trick for the time being, and you'd be able to continue playing with it...Vista, that is.

Also, Vista has more and different sound settings, and then it depends on whether your sound card is supported..if so, you have to select the correct default settings, not only for which device but also whether its analogue or digital output, stereo or 5.1, etc. My SoundBlaster Live card wasn't supported at first, but I put in a report to MS and a few days later I received an update to get it running, but even then I had to do the aforementioned settings to get the best from it.....now the "1812 Overture" can be heard thundering throughout my suburb.

And finally, but not least, try the EzTrust AntiVirus suite free for 12 months on Vista.....I do and it works like a charm. http://consumerdownloads.ca.com/pub/myeTrust/apps/pptrialr8.exe

And BTW, regarding those 'rtfm' comments....some of the ol' farts around here fergits 'they was once boys themselves, so don't pay too much heed to it

how do i do that?

1 - If you have a backup image, simply overwrite the current "Vista" operating system with the backup (this is done with backup software such as Ghost, TrueImage, etc.)

Note - if you did not make a backup image of the XP installation, then you can't use this option.

2 - Here are some instructions I had in another thread for a clean install:

Assuming you have the XP installation disc, you would first obtain the following drivers:

1 - Chipset drivers for your motherboard chipset.

2 - Video drivers for your video adapter (graphics card).

3 - Audio drivers for your audio chip or card.

4 - Networking drivers (i.e., NIC card, Wireless adapter, Modem).

5 - USB drivers only if you are not installing either XP with Service Pack 2, or Service Pack 2 after installing a previous version of XP.

6 - Drivers for any devices such as printers, special input mouse, tablet, etc.

Once you have the drivers (which you may already have on disc, or download via the computer or hardware manufacturer's web site) make sure they are available on external storage of some sort (CD, external drive, etc.).

Power on computer and press the appropriate key to boot into the BIOS settings display (usually Esc, Del, F1, or F2) and then set the boot sequence so that the CD (or DVD) drive you use is the first boot device. Place the XP installation disc in the CD (or DVD) drive > save settings in BIOS and exit > wait for the text prompt "Hit any key to boot from CD" to display, and then hit "Enter" to start boot sequence.

This will place you in the XP Set-Up screens.

To do a clean install, you would do the following:

1 - Press "Enter" when promted to start set-up.

2 - Press "F8" to accept the EULA.

3 - Press "Esc" to start XP installation process.

4 - Press "D" key to delete anything on the partition you are intending to install XP on (note - make sure to review the highlighted partition to verify that you are working with the correct partition).

5 - Press "Enter" to continue.

6 - Press "L" to verify that you indeed want to proceed with deleting the selected partition data.

7 - Review the type of format highlighted (Raw Format is the default, and is recommended for a true clean install).

8 - Press "Enter" to start the formatting process.

Once formatting is completed, Set-Up will copy the files to the Windows directory, reboot, and proceed with installing the XP operating system.

Note - this is the procedure for a true "clean install". If you want to do a repair, you could try that, but I do not know what the results would be.

FINE!!!!! i will find a way to un-update windows Vista.....if i don't......i'm stupid..but if I DO....(which i will)....then all of you guys will say sorry.

except for those who tried helping me out of course..

Corky: Thanks for the info but i already knew that. i would have done what you have said but there are two problems.

1. i have a lot of important htings in there that i do not what to erase.

2. i have a windows professional cd but my old windows was home ed.

FINE!!!!! i will find a way to un-update windows Vista.....if i don't......i'm stupid..but if I DO....(which i will)....then all of you guys will say sorry.

Bash, no one is being unkind, only realistic. I think everyone here is hopeful you can revert to XP without losing data.

The theme of the replies illustrates an oppertunity to learn for yourself or others reading this.

Before one beta tests, they should know how to revert.
Before one beta tests they should know the risks.
Befroe one beta tests one should back up their existing system.

Did you learn these lessons for next time?

I started to install Vista yesterday on a Virtual PC (MS 2004) and it hung up. I will pursue it later when I know more about that method of installation. But I KNEW for certain that it would be less responsive and that it could not affect my existing system.

And for the record, we have nothing to apologize for.

1. i have a lot of important htings in there that i do not what to erase.

Is there a folder named "windows.old" on your drive? I know that installing Vista via booting from DVD and overwriting the existing XP installation, the Vista set-up program creates this directory before installing Vista.

If so, this directory is where your files from your old settings are, including all saved files. This was done so you can access them while running Vista, but does not allow you to run the executable program files.

I do not know of, nor have I heard of, a way to run the set-up from that folder to reinstall Windows XP. You may be able to run a repair in some way to restore the OS - not sure on that one. I would trust yraq on any PC issue though.

2. i have a windows professional cd but my old windows was home ed.

This is not a problem assuming you have the space on the drive, the legally owned product key, and are able to pull all your important files from the "windows.old" directory (if it exists).

except for those who tried helping me out of course..

I think everyone was trying to help, some differently to others, but nobody was being unkind or calling you stupid, just suggesting for you to go about things differently.

And for the record, I too got swept up in things to jump in boots 'n all and stuff 'em up when I was your age, as probably most of us did, and it's just offering advice based on personal experiences of years gone by.

Still think clean installing XP on a separate drive and making it your primary OS is your best bet and the easiest way to keep Vista to test/play with, all your data stored on it...then all you'd have to do is copy everything you want to access easily back over to XP

Best of luck, whatever you decide

I hope you learn an important lesson from this

You won't be getting an apology from me, because: 

All I meant by the above comment, Bash, was that if you do not learn from this mistake, somewhere down the road you'll do something similarly bad, and find yourself in hot water again.

It was meant in a kind way, as I certainly wish no ill will upon you, or anybody for that matter.

There should be some way you can save your important data and start over, and I'm sure you'll find it. A couple of things I have learned of you in the time you've been here, is that you're persistent and that you try hard at what you do....

Good luck

I too have learned about the dangers of beta software. Remember when the beta SP2 packs were out. Well about a couple of times during the beta I had to restore the computer back because of incompatitbility with drivers. So I told myself that no major beta software was going to get installed. As soon as Vista came out, I planned out everything and that if installing on another drive was not possible then I was not going to install it. I have 3 hds, but only one of them are connected at a time. One is my main drive which has my main OS and files, the 2nd one used to be the backup but now has Vista on it, and the third is the backup. Anyway, I would recommend that you attempt to store some of your small files on the internet for backup using services like yahoo, or gmail and try putting the rest of your files on another harddrive if possible, or burning them to a least 2 CDs or DVDs (I've had the case where they were corrupted on one disk and I lost EVERYTHING except my music).

gO TO A DECENT WAREZ SITE

gO TO A DECENT WAREZ SITE

Huh?

hold up....man i got to be more clearer in my comments.

what i wrote before wasn't actually suppost to be taken as granted..it was supported to be like a challenge....almost...kind of.

anyway..i got back windows xp by using the recovery disk that came with my computer...it restored everything but left major damage.

1. there was still windows vista files everywhere which affected windows xp.

2. can't access my documents because it says that i'm not allowed to open it.

3. many programs didn't work again.

this all happened because i told the computer to restore everything but not to erase any documents.

i kept searching for a way to get to my documents and i did. there was a file in drive c:/ called users. i clicked on owner and got everything i had. also there was a public folder which had wallpapers form windows vista. i took those and put them in the owners folder. now i have all my things....except my skins...but that was easy to get.

my plan now is to get two dvd's and put all of my things in it. the reason i need two is because all my things take up 6.07GB. once i do that...i will use the recovery disk to format everything to the way i bought it. then arrange my files to the way they were before.....then things become fine!!

is that a good plan?

oh and by the way...nobody is saying sorry but i'm also not stupid (ok maybe) so everyone wins? (NOT FOR GRANTED; JUST FOR STUPIDITY)

also got cool wallpapers to add to windows xp from vista.....so i got a gift for trying out the BETA.