In search of ... a better way to list existing software

[barney]

Folk, I have a[nother] problem.

Have a [relatively] new Toshiba Satellite, P775, with Intel i7 CPU, 600GB RAM, 750GB HDD, Win7 Home Premium. 
The disk is partitioned thusly:

• 250GB OS (C:\) drive partition
• remainder partitioned as E:\ drive for data & some software that wants to write to the install directory.

I want to upgrade to Win7 Ultimate.  In light of that, I went to Amazon, purchased the appropriate Windows Anytime Upgrade.  I'm still working with that, but so far the results have been nil.  The upgrade cannot even create a restore point, so that kills it before any upgrade has been initiated.

I've checked that the drives are properly configured, insofar as I can tell, for restore creation.

In light of this, it's likely that I'll have to do a full install, rather than an upgrade.  I've been using this box for a month or so, and have installed a number of programs.  I'm trying to list all the installed software so as to create a checklist for installs subsequent to the upgrade.

I tried the late Karen Kenworthy's Directory Printer, but I don't know that it's listing everything.  I also tried Revo Uninstaller to export both a .txt and .html file.  Again, I'm not certain that everything is being listed.

I know I'm gonna have trouble replacing some of the utilities Toshiba put on the box, so I want to be certain everything is listed in order to research those utilities.  So, back to the question at hand, is there a better way to list everything that is currently installed  ?

(A better question might be, "How can I get past the restore point issue?"  However, I'm not certain that could be addressed by anyone who did not have physical access to the box  .)

Oh, yeah, I did shut down everything that did not have to load on boot (Chameleon Startup Manager Pro, v3.4.0.761), which did make the Windows boot process much faster.  However, this Toshiba takes 123-126 seconds for the physical boot, i.e., two (2) minutes before the OS even begins to load  .  That can be shortened in the BIOS, but then it will boot only from the HDD, not even from a LiveCD 

[x16wda]

Can you use your restore-to-factory-default to go back to whatever the base image was, and try the upgrade from there?  That would take care of the Toshiba utilities.  You'd still have to reinstall everything else...

[barney]

I'd love to do that ... but the restore disc won't install ... can't get Toshiba to boot from it.

OK, more on the situation.  I finally - after a dozen or so tries (Einstein was wrong  !) got the system to recognize the upgrade.  Seven (7) times, in fact.  Same result each time: 

• update installs
• system reboots into Ultimate
• system crashes on next reboot - no boot record.

Then I have to go through several tries to get system to boot from optical drive.  I'm typing this prior to my next [probably failed  ] reboot, 'cause I don't know what it'll take to get back online.  I had a crib sheet for EasyBCD, but that seems to be gone with the wind.  If reboot doesn't fail, I'll see if I can find it again online.  If worse comes to worst, I can get online with the Thrive tablet, but an OSK is not well suited to any kind of real communication - it barely suffices for search  .

I'm basically very unhappy  with Toshiba at this point  .

[MilesAhead]

http://www.lookinmypc.com/download.htm

Has kind of a non-professional sounding name. But I was impessed with it. Generate a nice html report for lots of categories. One is installed apps.

Plus it's free and has a portable version.

[barney]

Thanks  .

I have that on my to-do list, but hadn't looked at it yet.  Sounds promising  .

(Note:  that to-do list could keep me busy for well nigh a year, but life keeps getting in the way of the important stuff  .)

[anandcoral]

barney,

I use Free Belarc Advisor http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html to get html list of all installed programs. It gives much more information, but I use it for the program names and versions to compare between two machines, if both are having same set of program and versions.

See if it helps you,

Regards,

Anand

[barney]

Thanks.

I quit using Belarc some time ago.  Don't recall exactly why, but I think it was because it kept telling me I needed to upgrade PHP/MySQL/Apache, as well as a few commercial programs  .  However, in light of this recent set of events, it appears a revisit is in order, with a bit more attention to possible configuration(s).

Looks as though a [at least] weekly inventory would be beneficial, as well as the scheduled backups  .

Aside:  this is the first post I've made that had no corrections in spell check  .

[barney]

Status update.

After close to a dozen efforts (I lost track, of course), the Toshiba seems to be keeping the Ultimate upgrade.  At least, the upgrade has survived four (4) reboots, one (1) overnight.  The frustrating part is that there is no clear indication as to what finally - if it is final! - worked.  Very frustrating  .  As they say in military dialogue, "Confidence is low."

On the positive side, several programs have become evident that should at least alleviate some of the stress in case of similar future events.

Oh, one (1) other question, anent this topic:  how do I mark it as resolved?  I really should take care of housekeeping  .

[tslim]

600GB RAM?

[barney]

Typo (brain typo, that is) ... was gonna say HDD, then went to check actual HDD size to be certain, lost track of what I was doing when I came back  .  Shoulda been 6GB RAM, of course  .