Upgrading from xp home to xp pro

[Jay]

Currently i am using xp home however i wanted to upgrade
to xp pro but compaq warned me that some drivers may not
be available with xp pro and i have to download some of
them individually from their manufactures. I wanted to
know if there is something i can do to upgrade my os
without reformatting my HDD? is there a microsoft xp pro
upgrade kit for xp home? Pls. e-mail me a at

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Hi Jay,

Sorry, no support by email....

Unless Compaq offers a system-specific upgrade disk, you need a regular
WinXP Pro retail upgrade. This will upgrade without formatting. What Compaq
is trying to tell you is that the retail disk may not contain
system-specific drivers, and you should download them before doing the
upgrade (so they will be available for installation as soon as the upgrade
is finished).

Chances are you might need a few specific drivers from Compaq and any added
after-market peripherals, but the system *should* upgrade without any loss
of data (but it is still important to take precautions and copy everything
you cannot afford to lose to CD or floppy before you start).

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
Win98 Help - www.rickrogers.org

"Jay" > wrote in message
...
> Currently i am using xp home however i wanted to upgrade
> to xp pro but compaq warned me that some drivers may not
> be available with xp pro and i have to download some of
> them individually from their manufactures. I wanted to
> know if there is something i can do to upgrade my os
> without reformatting my HDD? is there a microsoft xp pro
> upgrade kit for xp home? Pls. e-mail me a at
>

[Ken Blake]

"Jay" > wrote in message
...

> Currently i am using xp home however i wanted to upgrade
> to xp pro but compaq warned me that some drivers may not
> be available with xp pro and i have to download some of
> them individually from their manufactures. I wanted to
> know if there is something i can do to upgrade my os
> without reformatting my HDD? is there a microsoft xp pro
> upgrade kit for xp home?


There is no special upgrade specifically for that purpose, but
the regular XP Professional upgrade works fine (although it
doesn't say so on the box).

Are you sure you need to do this? Are you aware that the two are
actually identical in all respects, except that Professional has
a few features (mostly related to networking and security)
missing from Home? For most (but not all) home users, these
features aren't needed, would never be used, and buying
Professional instead of Home is a waste of money.

Upgrade to Professional only if you need or want one or more of
these features.

For details go to

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_home_pro.asp

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/whichxp.asp

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/howtobuy/choosing2.asp



> Pls. e-mail me a at
>


Sorry, no. No E-mail support. Ask here, read answers here, where
all can benefit from the answers.

--
Ken Blake
Please reply to the newsgroup

[Spinner]

"Rick "Nutcase" Rogers" > wrote in message
...
> Hi Jay,
>
> Sorry, no support by email....
>
> Unless Compaq offers a system-specific upgrade disk, you need a regular
> WinXP Pro retail upgrade. This will upgrade without formatting. What
Compaq
> is trying to tell you is that the retail disk may not contain
> system-specific drivers, and you should download them before doing the
> upgrade (so they will be available for installation as soon as the upgrade
> is finished).
>
> Chances are you might need a few specific drivers from Compaq and any
added
> after-market peripherals, but the system *should* upgrade without any loss
> of data (but it is still important to take precautions and copy everything
> you cannot afford to lose to CD or floppy before you start).
>

I have actually done this with a Toshiba Laptop.
It worked just fine. I actually used a full (not upgrade)
version of XP pro. After the upgrade, I recieved a few errors
related to system restore, but re-installing SP1 fixed these. (documented in
the MS knowledge base)
Also the USB ports stopped working, but it was simply a matter of going to
device manager and telling it to update the drivers.



> --
> Best of Luck,
>
> Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
> http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
> Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
> www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
> Win98 Help - www.rickrogers.org
>
> "Jay" > wrote in message
> ...
> > Currently i am using xp home however i wanted to upgrade
> > to xp pro but compaq warned me that some drivers may not
> > be available with xp pro and i have to download some of
> > them individually from their manufactures. I wanted to
> > know if there is something i can do to upgrade my os
> > without reformatting my HDD? is there a microsoft xp pro
> > upgrade kit for xp home? Pls. e-mail me a at
> >
>
>

[rifleman]

In article >,
says...
> Hi Jay,
>
> Sorry, no support by email....
>
> Unless Compaq offers a system-specific upgrade disk, you need a regular
> WinXP Pro retail upgrade. This will upgrade without formatting. What Compaq
> is trying to tell you is that the retail disk may not contain
> system-specific drivers, and you should download them before doing the
> upgrade (so they will be available for installation as soon as the upgrade
> is finished).
>
> Chances are you might need a few specific drivers from Compaq and any added
> after-market peripherals, but the system *should* upgrade without any loss
> of data (but it is still important to take precautions and copy everything
> you cannot afford to lose to CD or floppy before you start).
>
>
But the OP already HAS Home - the drivers are not different in Pro!
--
(I may be wrong...I usually am....)
Google is your Friend
Email address deliberately false to avoid spam:
www.gbpcomputing.co.uk

[rifleman]

[This followup was posted to microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics and a
copy was sent to the cited author.]

In article >,
says...
> Currently i am using xp home however i wanted to upgrade
> to xp pro but compaq warned me that some drivers may not
> be available with xp pro and i have to download some of
> them individually from their manufactures. I wanted to
> know if there is something i can do to upgrade my os
> without reformatting my HDD? is there a microsoft xp pro
> upgrade kit for xp home? Pls. e-mail me a at
>
>
Pro is EXACTLY the same as Home apart from some security enhancements -
if Home is working Ok on your machine then there will be no problems
upgrading to Pro. And Compaq are talking out of their arses.
--
(I may be wrong...I usually am....)
Google is your Friend
Email address deliberately false to avoid spam:
www.gbpcomputing.co.uk

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

> But the OP already HAS Home - the drivers are not different in Pro!

In the retail versions, no, they are not different, but the user has
Compaq's OEM version of WinXP Home. Drivers in major OEM distributions are
often modified to match the proprietary (read: crappy) hardware the systems
come with.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers aka "Nutcase" MS-MVP - Win9x
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Associate Expert - WinXP - Expert Zone
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone
Win98 Help - www.rickrogers.org

"rifleman" > wrote in message
om...
> In article >,
> says...
> > Hi Jay,
> >
> > Sorry, no support by email....
> >
> > Unless Compaq offers a system-specific upgrade disk, you need a regular
> > WinXP Pro retail upgrade. This will upgrade without formatting. What
Compaq
> > is trying to tell you is that the retail disk may not contain
> > system-specific drivers, and you should download them before doing the
> > upgrade (so they will be available for installation as soon as the
upgrade
> > is finished).
> >
> > Chances are you might need a few specific drivers from Compaq and any
added
> > after-market peripherals, but the system *should* upgrade without any
loss
> > of data (but it is still important to take precautions and copy
everything
> > you cannot afford to lose to CD or floppy before you start).
> >
> >
> But the OP already HAS Home - the drivers are not different in Pro!
> --
> (I may be wrong...I usually am....)
> Google is your Friend
> Email address deliberately false to avoid spam:
> www.gbpcomputing.co.uk
>

[Spinner]

"rifleman" > wrote in message
om...
> [This followup was posted to microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics and a
> copy was sent to the cited author.]
>
> In article >,
> says...
> > Currently i am using xp home however i wanted to upgrade
> > to xp pro but compaq warned me that some drivers may not
> > be available with xp pro and i have to download some of
> > them individually from their manufactures. I wanted to
> > know if there is something i can do to upgrade my os
> > without reformatting my HDD? is there a microsoft xp pro
> > upgrade kit for xp home? Pls. e-mail me a at
> >
> >
> Pro is EXACTLY the same as Home apart from some security enhancements -

As far as drivers are concerned, yes.
As far as your statement is concerned, wrong.

> if Home is working Ok on your machine then there will be no problems
> upgrading to Pro. And Compaq are talking out of their arses.

Wrong again. Compaq was being perfectly honest.
If you upgrade an OEM Xp machine, either Home or Pro,
many times you have to go back to the manufactures website
and download thier drivers. XP sometimes replaces the OEM drivers with
what it "thinks" are the correct drivers, rendering the hardware
unuseable. Home my be working fine with the OEM drivers installed, but if
Pro replaces those
drivers during the upgrade, the OP will need the original OEM drivers to
re-install them.
I recently upgraded a Home laptop to Pro. After the upgrade the USB ports
would not work.
I had to install SP1 and then re-install the drivers to get them to work.
Pro had replaced the OEM drivers with it's own, which did not work.

All the OP has to do is download the OEM XP drivers (that's XP, not Home,
Pro or otherwise)
and save them on his machine so when/if Pro needs them, it has them handy.
Not much fun having no access to the net to get NIC drivers, because you
have no drivers for your NIC to get to the net. ;-)



> --
> (I may be wrong...I usually am....)
> Google is your Friend
> Email address deliberately false to avoid spam:
> www.gbpcomputing.co.uk
>