how can i restore windows.old (windows10) from windows 7

[OrJust_ISO]

ill try my best to describe my issue so,
my computer froze yesterday (nothing new happens all the time) so i restarted it and it said it was applying an update then got stuck on a black loading screen with the spinning circle on the bottom after what seem like 30-45 mins of it being on that screen i restarted again (again nothing new iv had to do this before) but this time when it restarted it would post but not boot windows so i when threw all the trouble shooting and identified it was the windows 10 program itself so i got my windows 7 install disk and re installed windows 7 computer boots windows 7 now but
i am wondering how i can get back all my programs/files/drivers that are in the windows.old folder theyre still there i can see them, and if i could get windows 10 back as well

Update: all right so i went ahead and updated 2 windows 10 in the hopes that the windows.old folder would stay there if i chose to keep all files and programs. the windows.old folder is there but all the programs/files are gone and my hard drive says its practically empty. any way i can get those back, cause technically there still on hdd since they haven't been over written by anything right ??

 

[Colif]

I don't think you can access it from 7 but MAYBE if you copy the folder onto a USB/another hdd and then download the Windows 10 media creation tool and use it to make a win 10 installer on USB, and install win 10 back on the PC, and then move the windows.old folder back onto c, MAYBE you can access the files in it...

https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/1950-windows-10-clean-install.html << really handy guide to installing win 10

when you reach screen asking for key, click "I don't have a key" and win 10 should auto activate on install.

If windows won't let you copy folder, you can try http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/use-ubuntu-live-cd-to-backup-files-from-your-dead-windows-computer/ as it doesn't care about windows permissions

 

[OrJust_ISO]

I don't think you can access it from 7 but MAYBE if you copy the folder onto a USB/another hdd and then download the Windows 10 media creation tool and use it to make a win 10 installer on USB, and install win 10 back on the PC, and then move the windows.old folder back onto c, MAYBE you can access the files in it...

https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/1950-windows-10-clean-install.html << really handy guide to installing win 10

when you reach screen asking for key, click "I don't have a key" and win 10 should auto activate on install.

If windows won't let you copy folder, you can try http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vista/use-ubuntu-live-cd-to-backup-files-from-your-dead-windows-computer/ as it doesn't care about windows permissions

what if i dont have anything large enough to copy my windows.old file too its almost 800Gb

 

[Colif]

Oo I wasn't expecting it to be that big. MY brain isn't working today, only got 4 hours sleep... i will look at this later and see what I can find

 

[OrJust_ISO]

Oo I wasn't expecting it to be that big. MY brain isn't working today, only got 4 hours sleep... i will look at this later and see what I can find

all right so i went ahead and updated 2 windows 10 in the hopes that the windows.old folder would stay there if i chose to keep all files and programs. the windows.old folder is there but all the programs/files are gone and my hard drive says its practically empty. any way i can get those back, cause technically there still on hdd since they haven't been over written by anything right ??

 

[Colif]

I hate telling people bad news.. when you upgraded over win 7 it would have created a windows.old folder and put the win 7 install into it. Is the windows.old folder still 800gb?

I should have warned you, I didn't think you would try an upgrade, i thought you would clean install (its why I said to move the folder).

What was in the folders? I hope you didn't lose too much you can't get back

 

[OrJust_ISO]

I hate telling people bad news.. when you upgraded over win 7 it would have created a windows.old folder and put the win 7 install into it. Is the windows.old folder still 800gb?

I should have warned you, I didn't think you would try an upgrade, i thought you would clean install (its why I said to move the folder).

What was in the folders? I hope you didn't lose too much you can't get back

the thing im most bumbed about is my fallout saves still havent finished fallout 4 some old ass photos and programs that i torrented and no longer have the means of torrenting other than that nothing i cant just re download

however i am trying to recover some of it using the Recuva program found most of it some however it says cant be recovered

 

[Colif]

The free recovery programs are better than nothing but not as good as the services that cost about 3x times the cost of a hdd. Paid services are that price to stop everyone using them, only people who have data that is super critical use them

I would use 2 drives and put everything you cannot afford to lose on the 2nd one. Its how I worked for as long as I remember. You should put game saves on One drive as well, or some other service like google drive. I have backups of backups. I had a run of bad hdd and never wanted to start from scratch again.
I have a 64gb USB stick just with my music on it. For about 10 years I was paranoid of losing music collection as I didn't want to waste time getting it all back again.

 

[OrJust_ISO]

The free recovery programs are better than nothing but not as good as the services that cost about 3x times the cost of a hdd. Paid services are that price to stop everyone using them, only people who have data that is super critical use them

I would use 2 drives and put everything you cannot afford to lose on the 2nd one. Its how I worked for as long as I remember. You should put game saves on One drive as well, or some other service like google drive. I have backups of backups. I had a run of bad hdd and never wanted to start from scratch again.
I have a 64gb USB stick just with my music on it. For about 10 years I was paranoid of losing music collection as I didn't want to waste time getting it all back again.

yeah im gana ask for an external hard drive for Christmas now and backing everything up every other week
thank you for your help though greatly appreciate it