When word came out that Windows 7 RC was available for the taking, I had to jump on it. I want to install Windows 7 on the Viliv S5, and I’ve read that some owners have already had success doing so. I downloaded Win 7 and set off this morning to install it on the S5, but unfortunately, I haven’t gotten very far.
I set up a USB stick (8 GB) as a Windows 7 install and plugged it into the S5 and fired it off. It started no problem, and it didn’t take me long to realize how goofy I was being. You see the S5 has no keyboard nor mouse, so I wasn’t going to be able to guide the install process very well. No problem, I stopped it and connected a USB keyboard and mouse using a little hub I found laying around.
I plugged the USB stick into the hub along with the mouse and keyboard, but this time the Viliv wouldn’t recognize the USB stick at boot time. I fired Windows XP up and tried to access the stick from there, but it errored out. I figured that maybe the three USB peripherals plugged into the unpowered hub were too much for the little S5, so I scrounged up a powered hub and sure enough, that was the problem.
The rest of the basic install went without a hitch, but I have some glaring problems that doom this to failure. Primarily, the system does not see the Wi-Fi adapter at all, so I can’t connect to Windows Update to fix other components that Windows 7 didn’t install. I have a bunch of WinXP drivers I downloaded from Viliv that other users claim to have used successfully, but I can’t get any of them to install. They all tell me that they are for another OS, and even running in compatibility mode doesn’t work. Oh well, the life of a geek on the edge. I’ll be fiddling with this the rest of the day since my S5 is now not very usable, so you might not see me for a while.
UPDATE: It’s all working now including touch. I’m going to play tonight and see how it all works now. 
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