cf7 to cf8 - uninstall cf7?

So now I have my software and getting ready to do the upgrade.

I would like to uninstall the previous versions first, but what about all my settings in CF Administrator and what about all my Data Sources and their settings? Are they stored in CFIDE? I hate to lose these.

Thanks,
Richard

If you know that you want to uninstall all previous versions of CF with
your upgrade, it is usually simpler and cleaner to uninstall them before
the upgrade. AS ksmith said, doing so afterwards can make the CFIDE
folder disappear. You just need your license key of the previous
version to enter into a form box when the upgrade installer asks for it.

Some people like to keep the previous version running in parallel to the
new version for validation purposes. But if you are not going to do
this, you might as well go with the clean install.

You do not need to and probably do not want to leave old copys of ColdFusion installed. You should be able to safely uninstall unused old versions of ColdFusion. The main gotcha is make sure to zip up or copy your current CFIDE directory. The uninstaller will remove CFIDE. It will not know if it is from cfmx6x or cfmx7, or care. So, if it is deleted by an uninstall restore it from your backup.

The only reason to leave old versions around is to be able to quickly restore the older version if you have migration problems as you update.