The home desktop (used by all the family) has been inadvertently upgraded to Windows 10, and too many things don't work properly any more (printer, youtube, sound, start button, new IE, etc.) in fact it seems like we only have half an install (we have the new login screen, bottom button bar ribbon thing, but no tiles and no Windows 10 dialog boxes) and so we'd like to downgrade to Win 7 that was there before.

Plenty of guides online, but none seem applicable. First of all Start button does nothing, but I can manage to get to a "Restore" dialog box via Control Panel but it's in the old Win 7 format and doesn't offer the option to go back, even though the upgrade appears to have been done on 23-May (judging by the date of the Windows.Old directory) and so within the 1 month that Miscrosoft kindly allow users to downgrade...

Am I stuck with having to do a fresh install of Win 7, for which I may have an ISO I downloaded to fix a laptop, but otherwise will have to see if it's in the hidden startup disc area, or search around for a place to download it.

And who in Microsoft can I complain to and send an invoice to for all the time I'm going to have to spend fixing something that was not broken before?

I'd do a fresh install of windows 10 from a USB. I had sismilar issues on my Surface 3 and bit the bullet an did a fresh install. Mine was previusly an upgrade from Windows 8.

Windows 10 was a far better product after the fresh install.

Also take the opportunity to do the install onto a new SSD if you are still using a HDD. Spent days, and £££s faffing around with PC overclocking etc only to see the biggest improvement provided by a 500Gb SSD

You may recall that this (inevitably) happened to me a few months back. I rolled back to W7, but then the bloody PC did it again. Nothing worked, etc, as you describe.

However, as bockers says, once it is working properly, W10 is no worse than W7 and at least you don't have to keep fighting Microsoft's evil attempts to force you into it.

Join the dark side.

Use this great little program to stop Windows 10 installing until you want to.

Never 10

Well I'd rather stick with Windows 7 on that PC (if it ain't broke...) but I'm unable to roll back, and if I have to do a fresh install anyway, I guess I could upgrade, but it's just the faff of having to find updated drivers or put up with malfunctioning old drivers (that worked OK under Win 7)...

Haven't tried this but might help?
https://neosmart.net/Win10Rollback/

Like you, I prefer 7 but as Bockers says it might be worth trying a fresh install (plus gritting teeth to get along with Windows 10). The opportunity to upgrade for free is almost over. Windows 7 is/was excellent but is getting old now (released 2009) and MS is determined to kill it off.

All common issues seen upgrading Home editions of Win 7/8.1 to 10.

Clean install of 10 is the way forward - superior OS to 7

Assuming you have the product key for your Windows 7 then Microsoft's download link is here.

However, as mentioned above by others, if you're going to have to do a clean install anyway then I'd try 10. I'd also been a fan (if that's the proper term) of Win7 for ages (especially given that it isn't Vista or 8) but have moved to 10 on our 3 machines over the last 6 months and wouldn't go back. Of course I had the advantage of being able to play with it gradually (I ran it as a VM for a while then bought miniWishy a Win10 laptop for Christmas and just let him be a guinea pig for me) as oppose to having a broken version forced upon me. Even MrsWishy migrated to it painlessly and she has the least interest in playing with stuff like this in our household. It just needs to work for her and it did so without IT tech support required.

Friday is the last day to upgrade to Windows 10 for free. Just a reminder in case you missed the ones on your PC

Done the deed, but a good reminder for people

Easily fixed and very common of an upgrade... which is why its always better to build as fresh. Microsoft can only mitigate against certain circumstances and depending on the state of your machine pre upgrade and the applications that are on it, it doesnt always go to plan. Or a particular application could cause your profile to become corrupt which is whats happend here. its not really microsofts fault to be honest but anyway lets get you working.

Your profile has become corrupted which explains why things like the start menu etc dont work. Create a new user account (make sure its a full admin). Log into that account and everything will be working. Then you need to transfer you data across, things like My Document, Desktop, Favourites. Do not copy anything else like AppData or any windows files that are in your profile. You will find your old profile in c:\users\

If it doesnt let you access the folder then you will need to right click and go to properties and give yourself permissions to the folder.

Once everything is copied to the new profile you can delete the old account

Hope this helps....

Also regressing back to windows 7 now is not really an option unless you want even more issues...

Don't worry: you can still get a *professional* operating system for free.

What MS has done to it's customers this last year simply takes the biscuit.

Cheers Mario but it seems to have fixed itself, or at least I have a proper working Start button. Better (grudgingly) upgrade the other PCs too, oh wait, I'm not there, so I can't

Like?

The page is not long enough. I'll just point out that you know what you're doing with a computer, and I know what I'm doing with a computer, and a few others know what they're doing... but the majority just push the buttons and end up with an unfinished chunk of beta software dumped on them.

My hardware, my decision as to what software runs, and in particular my decision as to *when* any changes happen, and when any huge downloads occur. Disguising system updates as 'critical security' updates, breaking their own rules regarding what happens when the delete tag on a window is hit (no, MS, it *doesn't* mean 'go right ahead'), and continuous phoning back to the base camp... not acceptable.

But hey, it's FREE! and SHINY! and NEW! So it must be good, right?

Pah.