NEWS : XP to Windows 7 'upgrade' scheme announced

XP to Windows 7 'upgrade' scheme announced

But XP users must do a clean install

Gregg Keizer

Microsoft will help users upgrade from Windows XP to Windows 7 by selling upgrade media, but warned XP users they must do a "clean" installation of Windows 7. That means all data on the XP machine will be lost.

"Regarding XP, customers can purchase upgrade media and an upgrade licence to move from Windows XP to Windows 7," a Microsoft spokeswoman told Computerworld US. "However, they will need to do a clean installation of Windows 7."

In a follow-up reply to questions, the spokeswoman fleshed out what Microsoft means by upgrade. "The 'upgrade' part is referring to the licence," she said. "You will be able to get the discounted 'upgrade' licence, but it will include full bits."

That's how David Smith, an analyst with Gartner, interpreted 'upgrade' in Microsoft's description of what it would offer XP owners. "They're talking about the upgrade price," he said, pointing out that most software vendors use the term to designate a lower-priced version aimed at existing customers.

Although Microsoft Tuesday spelled the six planned versions of Windows 7, it declined to provide pricing for them, or for the XP upgrade licences.

http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/index.cfm?newsid=110406

 

So what's the cheap price of this 'upgrade'?

 

Which leaves an interesting question - just what, in particular, was _Vista?

 

A clus... er... Marketing mishap?

 

Well, i've attempted to use the upgrade "in-place" functionality of XP when I got around to putting it on my HP desktop previously running Windows 98 SE a few years ago, and while it worked it left a lot to be desired performance wise. There were also some oddity's in the UI as well. (opening Add-Remove Programs for example would result in the list of programs having a huge white space placed seemingly randomly in the list)

I recently decided to attempt a clean install (the reason why I didn't do one initially was due to the fact that I didn't have a Windows 98 disk only a HP recovery image cd and I was afraid that I would have to insert the Win 98 disk for validation) and it worked brilliantly, nothing compares to a clean install.

I just figure that this is a way to ensure that users have the best experience possible. They also get to use upgrade pricing so that's pretty good.

 

Well, this is interesting.

I've always wondered how these upgrades work. Aren't they just files that you download? If that's the case, then that means that every time you want to format your system you must make sure that you have a backup of the upgrade file AND you have to install your original OS before you run the upgrade each time?

 

Your confusing Windows Anytime Upgrade for jumping between Vista versions with upgrading from one complete version of Windows to another.

When you upgrade from one version of Windows to another (say from XP to Vista) you have the choice of either doing a clean install or upgrading "in-place"

If you upgrade in place, Windows will retain your user accounts and settings, programs, (the ones that are compatible with that version of windows anyway) and documents (music, photos, etc.)

Windows Anytime Upgrade allows you to jump up from one Vista version (say Home Basic) to another (like Home Premium) without performing a total reinstall of Windows. Oddly enough, this feature has changed significantly since Vista's introduction.

At first you could use Windows Anytime Upgrade by simply purchasing a new license key from the Windows Anytime Upgrade site, and inserting the "Windows Anytime Upgrade" disk that you either picked up at a retailer, was preloaded on to the computer's hard drive by the PC maker, or was shipped with many PC's in the months after Vista's consumer launch, allowing you to activate and install the added features right away. However, people were confused by the whole "downloading" thing, and still others didn't have an Anytime Upgrade disk, so Microsoft now makes WAU customers purchase physical media which contains a physical license key which is mailed to their home, making the process far less convenient than before.

 

Thank you, that was really helpful. So say you decide to use the WAU, you would have to purchase it online and a disk would be sent to you but that's an upgrade disk and not the full retail disc of the OS right? So either way, every time you have to format, you would have to install your original OS and then use your WAU disc to get your upgrade?

 

Nope, the "WAU" disc is the full Vista disc. The key is the most valuable part of the software, you could get the Anytime Upgrade discs at CompUSA for like 6 bucks when they still supported doing the upgrade electronically.

Now if that key is restricted in anyway, I honestly don't know, and searching is coming up with nothing.

 

Ah I see. I'm hoping that the upgrade to 7 will be quick and easy without me having to think of stuff like this.