can I upgrade my system from Xp to Win 7 ultimate?

I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from
a friend and its still in the packaging as he never used it. Anyway,
I've been thinking of upgrading my system, but the thought of having to
manually reinstall everything has caused me to put off the upgrade so
far, plus my understanding is that, at least with the normal versions of
Win 7, I can't just do an upgrade from XP anyway... but I now understand
that Win 7 ultimate has something called XP mode that would allow me to
continue running the XP programs. If true, how would this be done?
Would I still have to reinstall everything? It would sure be nice to
just install '7 over top of everything else and then "insert" my XP OS
into Win 7.... sort of like a virtual machine. Could be dreaming, buy
maybe not.

Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Thank you!

Chef BRD

Bill Ravioli wrote:
I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate.

MS provides a tool Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor for the purpose of
evaluating your hardware's compatibility.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/down...ils.aspx?id=20

Read the instructions on the page, download the .exe and install, run
the .exe.

--
Mike Easter

Mike Easter wrote:
Bill Ravioli wrote:
I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate.

MS provides a tool Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor for the purpose of
evaluating your hardware's compatibility.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/down...ils.aspx?id=20

Read the instructions on the page, download the .exe and install, run
the .exe.


One problem with Upgrade Advisor programs, is they use .NET, and
the sneaky *******s at Microsoft make sure the version of .NET
needed, won't install on WinXP. Just so you have some
advance warning of what's going to happen :-)

It would have been oh-so-clever, if the advisor was written
in C# and "ran on anything", as then you could take your
Win98 machine and see if it was Win7 compatible. But tat
isn't an option right now.

If you need CPU info, as to what CPU features your box has
got, there is this.

(coreinfo)
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/...rnals/cc835722

*******

The OP also has the option of "just installing it" and
seeing what happens. Windows 7 supports "skip" at the
license key box, so you don't have to enter a license key.
You can install for 30 days and run it that way, without
doing a re-arm. This leaves plenty of time to determine
you don't have the drivers or whatever, to run the OS.

The XP CPU might support 32-bit or 64-bit OSes. The Win7
DVD I got (system builder purchase) was 64-bit only. I think
some of the retail boxed versions came with two DVDs. If
you needed the "other" DVD, you can easily download
it, because your license key would work with the Win7
download page.

Because this asks for a product key, it will work for
someone who purchased a System Builder disc, or work
for someone who bought Retail software. The license
key box will refuse to accept the license key from
a Dell OEM COA sticker. For those people, they can use
the Heidoc URL generator instead. But the following link
will work for non-OEM purposes. Microsoft "wants you
to suck it", if you were silly enough to buy a Dell,
HP, Acer, and so on.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/soft...nload/windows7

*******

If a person does a test install, make a complete backup of
the disk first. Do the install. Test it out. Restore from
backup is the easiest and sure-fire symptom free way to get
back to where you were. (Make your emergency boot CD
when the backup software tells you to.) Making a backup
also covers the intangibles, where an installer disc you
happened to use, deleted your other OS. This has happened
to me, so I can assure you I do the backup before I do
multi-boot installs. I lost three OSes once, and that's
my biggest accident to date - and for that one, NO BACKUP!

Paul

Paul wrote:
Mike Easter wrote:
Bill Ravioli wrote:
I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate.

MS provides a tool Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor for the purpose of
evaluating your hardware's compatibility.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/down...ils.aspx?id=20

One problem with Upgrade Advisor programs, is they use .NET, and
the sneaky *******s at Microsoft make sure the version of .NET
needed, won't install on WinXP. Just so you have some
advance warning of what's going to happen :-)

Oh. The page says .NET 2.0 or higher. I have an XP with 2.0 and 3.5.

But I haven't tried to install the advisor on it.

--
Mike Easter

Bill Ravioli wrote:
I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I recently acquired a
brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from a friend and its still in the
packaging as he never used it. Anyway, I've been thinking of upgrading my system, but the
thought of having to manually reinstall everything has caused me to put off the upgrade so
far, plus my understanding is that, at least with the normal versions of Win 7, I can't
just do an upgrade from XP anyway... but I now understand that Win 7 ultimate has
something called XP mode that would allow me to continue running the XP programs. If
true, how would this be done? Would I still have to reinstall everything? It would sure
be nice to just install '7 over top of everything else and then "insert" my XP OS into Win
7.... sort of like a virtual machine. Could be dreaming, buy maybe not.

Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Thank you!

Chef BRD

Please describe the hardware.
7/64 will require formatting the disk.
7/32 may install over top your XP but why bother. It will run about the same
as XP and will still have the ~3.8 gig ram limit. Waste of time.
With 7/64 you can install a virtual XP but that means reinstalling all
the XP programs in the virtual box.
I would consider installing 7/64 on a separate hdd and dual boot.

On Tue, 13 Dec 2016 17:39:05 -0500, Bill Ravioli wrote:

but I now understand
that Win 7 ultimate has something called XP mode that would allow me to
continue running the XP programs. If true, how would this be done?
Would I still have to reinstall everything? It would sure be nice to
just install '7 over top of everything else and then "insert" my XP OS
into Win 7.... sort of like a virtual machine. Could be dreaming, buy
maybe not.


Once you are running Win 7 Ultimate/Enterprise/Pro, you can download
and install 'XP Mode' from he
https://www.microsoft.com/en-nz/down...s.aspx?id=8002

XP Mode creates virtual machine running a copy of Windows XP. You
can then manually install any XP programs in the XP virtual machine.

XP mode is mainly intended for programs that will run in XP but
not in Windows 7.


FYI XP Mode does not run in Windows 8-10. If you upgrade again
beyond Win 7, you will lose XP Mode.


--
Kind regards
Ralph
🦊

In message , Paul
writes:
[]
If you need CPU info, as to what CPU features your box has
got, there is this.

(coreinfo)
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/...rnals/cc835722

Thanks for that. Although that page says Vista or higher, it seemed to
run fine on this XP (though if I understood it right it says my
processor _is_ 64-bit capable, which is odd as it wouldn't boot from my
Macrium 5 64 CD when I'd lost my M5 32 bit one).
[]
Because this asks for a product key, it will work for
someone who purchased a System Builder disc, or work
for someone who bought Retail software. The license
key box will refuse to accept the license key from
a Dell OEM COA sticker. For those people, they can use
the Heidoc URL generator instead. But the following link
will work for non-OEM purposes. Microsoft "wants you
to suck it", if you were silly enough to buy a Dell,
HP, Acer, and so on.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-ca/soft...nload/windows7
[]
Thanks for that link; useful!

Will the CD it makes have the "repair" option, rather than reinstall, if
we want to try that first?

It requires a product key. It says "Your product key is located inside
the box that the Windows DVD came in, on the DVD or in a confirmation
email that shows that you purchased Windows." Would the one extracted by
e. g. Belarc work? We have neither a box nor an email. I don't _think_
it's an OEM: it was installed before my eyes when the system was built,
and legally activated. Do OEM keys still have "OEM" as one of the
character groups, or did that go out with XP or '98? If they don't, and
ours is an OEM after all, will that page tell us as soon as we enter the
(from-Belarc) key, or will it put us through a useless download?
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"The people here are more educated and intelligent. Even stupid people in
Britain are smarter than Americans." Madonna, in RT 30 June-6July 2001 (page
32)

In message , Paul in Houston TX
writes:
[]
Please describe the hardware.
7/64 will require formatting the disk.
7/32 may install over top your XP but why bother. It will run about the same
as XP and will still have the ~3.8 gig ram limit. Waste of time.

Not necessarily waste of time: if you only have 4G or less, 7 may still
give _some_ advantages over XP (and _some_ software won't work, or won't
install, on 64 bit). [Though if _I_ had a working XP-32 system, I
wouldn't bother changing to 7-32, as I don't think the advantages of
7-32 over XP-32 are worth the hassle _for me_. But everyone's mileage is
different.]

With 7/64 you can install a virtual XP but that means reinstalling all
the XP programs in the virtual box.
I would consider installing 7/64 on a separate hdd and dual boot.

Agreed - if possible (e. g., probably not in most laptops).
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"The people here are more educated and intelligent. Even stupid people in
Britain are smarter than Americans." Madonna, in RT 30 June-6July 2001 (page
32)

On Tue, 13 Dec 2016 17:39:05 -0500, Bill Ravioli wrote:

I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from
a friend and its still in the packaging as he never used it. Anyway,
I've been thinking of upgrading my system, but the thought of having to
manually reinstall everything has caused me to put off the upgrade so
far, plus my understanding is that, at least with the normal versions of
Win 7, I can't just do an upgrade from XP anyway... but I now understand
that Win 7 ultimate has something called XP mode that would allow me to
continue running the XP programs. If true, how would this be done?
Would I still have to reinstall everything? It would sure be nice to
just install '7 over top of everything else and then "insert" my XP OS
into Win 7.... sort of like a virtual machine. Could be dreaming, buy
maybe not.

Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Thank you!

Chef BRD

For this and any other major change you need to get an image of the
existing system so you can undo everything if things don't work out.
Problem is I'm not sure if Macrium free version will work in xp and I
don't know of any others that will do the job.

On Tue, 13 Dec 2016 17:39:05 -0500, Bill Ravioli wrote:

I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from
a friend and its still in the packaging as he never used it. Anyway,
I've been thinking of upgrading my system, but the thought of having to
snip
Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Just curious: what improvement do you think you will get by upgrading
to W7?
--
Web based forums are like subscribing to 10 different newspapers
and having to visit 10 different news stands to pickup each one.
Email list-server groups and USENET are like having all of those
newspapers delivered to your door every morning.

CRNG wrote:
On Tue, 13 Dec 2016 17:39:05 -0500, Bill Ravioli wrote:

I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from
a friend and its still in the packaging as he never used it. Anyway,
I've been thinking of upgrading my system, but the thought of having to
snip
Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Just curious: what improvement do you think you will get by upgrading
to W7?

Box will be marginally harder to tip over.

But as a computer, not likely to be any sort of improvement.

WinXP didn't have ASLR. WinXP had DEP.
Vista had ASLR, but it was a bit broken.
Win7 has ASLR.

It's not much, but it's "a difference".

Paul

In message , dave
writes:
[]
For this and any other major change you need to get an image of the
existing system so you can undo everything if things don't work out.
Problem is I'm not sure if Macrium free version will work in xp and I
don't know of any others that will do the job.

I have used Macrium 5 to both image and restore XP. That's booting from
the Macrium CD, so I'd have _thought_ it's independent of the OS you're
imaging anyway - I certainly feel happier doing it, rather than trying
to do the image from inside a running Windows; however, I think Macrium
(5, anyway - and I doubt 6 is any different) _can_ be called from inside
a running XP. I can't think of any reason to do so, though, unless
you're blind and need the speech/Braille interface to be running.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

Lewis: ... d'you think there's a god?
Morse: ... There are times when I wish to god there was one. (Inspector Morse.)

On 12/13/2016 10:19 PM, Paul in Houston TX wrote:
Bill Ravioli wrote:
I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a
brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from a friend and its
still in the
packaging as he never used it. Anyway, I've been thinking of
upgrading my system, but the
thought of having to manually reinstall everything has caused me to
put off the upgrade so
far, plus my understanding is that, at least with the normal versions
of Win 7, I can't
just do an upgrade from XP anyway... but I now understand that Win 7
ultimate has
something called XP mode that would allow me to continue running the
XP programs. If
true, how would this be done? Would I still have to reinstall
everything? It would sure
be nice to just install '7 over top of everything else and then
"insert" my XP OS into Win
7.... sort of like a virtual machine. Could be dreaming, buy maybe not.

Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Thank you!

Chef BRD

Please describe the hardware.
7/64 will require formatting the disk.
7/32 may install over top your XP but why bother. It will run about the
same
as XP and will still have the ~3.8 gig ram limit. Waste of time.
With 7/64 you can install a virtual XP but that means reinstalling all
the XP programs in the virtual box.
I would consider installing 7/64 on a separate hdd and dual boot.


Well, I do have just that configuration and have had it for quite some
time. On a separate HD, I do have Win 7, 64 bit and I can select either
XP or 7 at bootup. I basically set up the small 80 GB drive as a test
to see if my PC would run Win 7 and it seems to have no trouble.
Problem is the small drive; my other XP drive is 1 TB and has a
gazillion programs on it, many with custom configurations I doubt I'd
ever be able to set up correctly again manually, which is why I was sort
of looking at an upgrade solution versus a complete reinstall.

My system was a kit I bought from Tigerdirect several years ago. The
motherboard is MSI G31M3 V2 with Intel Core 2 Quad, Q9400 2.66 Ghz
processor. 2 GB Ram. XP is the OS, but I also use Virtualbox with a
Ubuntu VM installed within it. The low RAM on this machine is such that
Ubuntu barely runs and is always quite slow. I have tried an upgrade to
4 GB Ram on this machine twice, but at least one of the sticks ends up
going bad within weeks. It was Kingston RAM and they sent me new sticks
twice and I have an uninstalled pair sitting here, but I am reluctant to
try yet another installation, so I have just stuck with the single
original 2 GB stick.

On the Win 7 80 GB drive, the machine seems to run well but as I said it
is bare bones with programs compared to the XP HD. I suppose I could
always use True Image to take the image from that small drive and expand
it out onto a blank 1 GB drive and go from there, but I'd still have to
reinstall everything from scratch that way I think.

Bill Ravioli wrote:
On 12/13/2016 10:19 PM, Paul in Houston TX wrote:
Bill Ravioli wrote:
I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a
brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from a friend and its
still in the
packaging as he never used it. Anyway, I've been thinking of
upgrading my system, but the
thought of having to manually reinstall everything has caused me to
put off the upgrade so
far, plus my understanding is that, at least with the normal versions
of Win 7, I can't
just do an upgrade from XP anyway... but I now understand that Win 7
ultimate has
something called XP mode that would allow me to continue running the
XP programs. If
true, how would this be done? Would I still have to reinstall
everything? It would sure
be nice to just install '7 over top of everything else and then
"insert" my XP OS into Win
7.... sort of like a virtual machine. Could be dreaming, buy maybe not.

Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Thank you!

Chef BRD

Please describe the hardware.
7/64 will require formatting the disk.
7/32 may install over top your XP but why bother. It will run about the
same
as XP and will still have the ~3.8 gig ram limit. Waste of time.
With 7/64 you can install a virtual XP but that means reinstalling all
the XP programs in the virtual box.
I would consider installing 7/64 on a separate hdd and dual boot.


Well, I do have just that configuration and have had it for quite some time. On a
separate HD, I do have Win 7, 64 bit and I can select either XP or 7 at bootup. I
basically set up the small 80 GB drive as a test to see if my PC would run Win 7 and it
seems to have no trouble. Problem is the small drive; my other XP drive is 1 TB and has a
gazillion programs on it, many with custom configurations I doubt I'd ever be able to set
up correctly again manually, which is why I was sort of looking at an upgrade solution
versus a complete reinstall.

My system was a kit I bought from Tigerdirect several years ago. The motherboard is MSI
G31M3 V2 with Intel Core 2 Quad, Q9400 2.66 Ghz processor. 2 GB Ram. XP is the OS, but I
also use Virtualbox with a Ubuntu VM installed within it. The low RAM on this machine is
such that Ubuntu barely runs and is always quite slow. I have tried an upgrade to 4 GB
Ram on this machine twice, but at least one of the sticks ends up going bad within weeks.
It was Kingston RAM and they sent me new sticks twice and I have an uninstalled pair
sitting here, but I am reluctant to try yet another installation, so I have just stuck
with the single original 2 GB stick.

On the Win 7 80 GB drive, the machine seems to run well but as I said it is bare bones
with programs compared to the XP HD. I suppose I could always use True Image to take the
image from that small drive and expand it out onto a blank 1 GB drive and go from there,
but I'd still have to reinstall everything from scratch that way I think.

Max mem is 4 gb.
https://us.msi.com/Motherboard/G31M3...-specification
One of the main reasons for installing a 64 bit o/s is to take advantage of
mem over 4 gb but it sounds like there may be something wrong with the motherboard.
Going from xp32 to 7/64 will require a format.
Might want to consider a newer motherboard someday but that will likely mean
a format due to drivers.

On Wed, 14 Dec 2016 17:28:34 -0500, Bill Ravioli
wrote:

On 12/13/2016 10:19 PM, Paul in Houston TX wrote:
Bill Ravioli wrote:
I have an older, XP system that I have been running for years. I
recently acquired a
brand new CD that has Win 7 ultimate. I got it from a friend and its
still in the
packaging as he never used it. Anyway, I've been thinking of
upgrading my system, but the
thought of having to manually reinstall everything has caused me to
put off the upgrade so
far, plus my understanding is that, at least with the normal versions
of Win 7, I can't
just do an upgrade from XP anyway... but I now understand that Win 7
ultimate has
something called XP mode that would allow me to continue running the
XP programs. If
true, how would this be done? Would I still have to reinstall
everything? It would sure
be nice to just install '7 over top of everything else and then
"insert" my XP OS into Win
7.... sort of like a virtual machine. Could be dreaming, buy maybe not.

Suggestions and commentary welcome!

Thank you!

Chef BRD

Please describe the hardware.
7/64 will require formatting the disk.
7/32 may install over top your XP but why bother. It will run about the
same
as XP and will still have the ~3.8 gig ram limit. Waste of time.
With 7/64 you can install a virtual XP but that means reinstalling all
the XP programs in the virtual box.
I would consider installing 7/64 on a separate hdd and dual boot.


Well, I do have just that configuration and have had it for quite some
time. On a separate HD, I do have Win 7, 64 bit and I can select either
XP or 7 at bootup. I basically set up the small 80 GB drive as a test
to see if my PC would run Win 7 and it seems to have no trouble.
Problem is the small drive; my other XP drive is 1 TB and has a
gazillion programs on it, many with custom configurations I doubt I'd
ever be able to set up correctly again manually, which is why I was sort
of looking at an upgrade solution versus a complete reinstall.

My system was a kit I bought from Tigerdirect several years ago. The
motherboard is MSI G31M3 V2 with Intel Core 2 Quad, Q9400 2.66 Ghz
processor. 2 GB Ram. XP is the OS, but I also use Virtualbox with a
Ubuntu VM installed within it. The low RAM on this machine is such that
Ubuntu barely runs and is always quite slow. I have tried an upgrade to
4 GB Ram on this machine twice, but at least one of the sticks ends up
going bad within weeks. It was Kingston RAM and they sent me new sticks
twice and I have an uninstalled pair sitting here, but I am reluctant to
try yet another installation, so I have just stuck with the single
original 2 GB stick.

On the Win 7 80 GB drive, the machine seems to run well but as I said it
is bare bones with programs compared to the XP HD. I suppose I could
always use True Image to take the image from that small drive and expand
it out onto a blank 1 GB drive and go from there, but I'd still have to
reinstall everything from scratch that way I think.

Hi Bill,

you may try Zinstall XP7, but it's not free... (169$)

http://www.zinstall.com/products/zinstall-xp7

Zinstall XP7 migrates the old XP system using virtualization.
All legacy XP applications, which are inherently incompatible, are
still kept working within Windows 10, 8 or 7 or - exactly as they
worked before.

HTH
--
Gianni