Problems Solved

QI upgraded to Windows 10 just before the cut-off date and am very happy with it so far. However, before Windows 10 loads I now get a screen telling me I have five seconds to load either Windows 10 or Windows 7. I leave it, and the PC automatically starts up in Windows 10. I used the Disk Cleanup tool to delete the old copy of Windows, so why do I get this screen? It’s only a minor inconvenience, but is there an easy way I can delete this reference to Windows 7. Do you know why this is happening, or how I can fix it? Or do I just have to live with it? Mike Smith

AWe’re not entirely sure what happened here but we have some theories, so let’s go through them.

You used Disk Cleanup to remove the old copy of Windows, but did you actually upgrade to Windows 10 from Windows 7 or from Windows 8.1? We ask because Disk Cleanup removes a folder called Windows.old, and it’s possible that this folder related to Windows 8.1 — not Windows 7.

How could that be? Well, we think that your PC might at some point in the past have been set up as a dualboot system, meaning it had both Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 installed. Whether or not you or some previous owner did that we can’t say but it could’ve been the case even if the computer booted straight into Windows 8.1 (or 7 for that matter), because the dual-boot menu might have been disabled. Regardless, if our theory is correct your computer had two different versions of Windows installed, each with its own product key.

Then, in one of these versions of Windows you upgraded to Windows 10, so that the Windows installation was duly changed to the new operating system. This process would have created a Windows.old folder for Disk Cleanup to find and remove (as you did), but it would not have deleted the other operating system on the dual-boot arrangement. Our guess is that you began the upgrade to Windows 10 from within Windows 8.1. However, we suppose you could have begun in Windows 7, but Windows 10 actually ‘saw’ and upgraded the Windows 8.1 installation.

Have you actually chosen the Windows 7 option? If your PC duly boots into Windows 7 then our theory is correct and you have nothing to worry about — plus the benefit of having a choice of operating systems.

However, if doing this shows an error message, then we think Windows 10 must have somehow glitched during the upgrade, and the dual-boot menu shouldn’t be there. To fix it, launch Control Panel (via Windows key+x), then click ‘System and Security’ followed by System, and then ‘Advanced system settings’, followed by the Settings button in the ‘Start-up and Recovery’ section. Now click to remove the tick from ‘Time to display list of operating systems’ (see screenshot), click OK followed by OK and you’re done.