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Upgrading my PC from XP to Windows 7,having already transferred my files to an external hard drive using windows easy share does anyone else have any tips or hints before I start the installation.
Run Belarc advisor on it, and get a print out of what all your hardware and installed software is.
Never used "easy share", but I like doing it "old school"... if you've space, backup your doc's [music/picture] & favorites again.. just to be doubly sure 😯
When installing Win7, choose to wipe the old drive.
Ohhh good choice ^^^^ alternatively go to device manager and open all the "+" so you can see the hardware names and take screen prints. So you can hunt specific drivers, if need be.
As above, note down key hardware from Device Manager such as Display Adapter, Network Adapters, Sound Card, etc... Windows 7 will usually find most of these or have a generic driver but it makes it easier to get the drivers if it doesn't. Belarc is a good shout as it will generate a report to print off.
Boot off the Windows 7 disk and choose Custom method, then delete the old partitions and select the unallocated space on the HDD and continue the installation.
Should be a simple process in all.
Boot off the Windows 7 disk and choose Custom method, then delete the old partitions and select the unallocated space on the HDD and continue the installation.
It might seem obvious, but before making changes to partitions, disconnect your external drive so that you don't accidentally delete any of its partitions.
All top advice above.
I would only add - if you start getting tired - STOP!!
I have tried to carry on rebuilding a computer when really I should have called it a night and ended up causing myself about a day's extra work!!
Cheers
Danny B
Unless its a real top spec xp machine personally I wouldnt bother wasting your time. I guessing its a 32 bit machine so the max ram it can access it 3.2gb which is the bare min for win 7.
Put the £150 oward a new pc just my opinion but I have been down this road more than once.
Good luck.
I'd disagree, found win 7 work well on reasonable old hardware
64 bit processors were around quite a long time before 64 bit Windows was mainstream.
Also, a lot of people have upgraded their PC's but not the OS.
Win 7 is much much better than Vista was on lower spec machines and 2GB is acceptable if not earth shattering.
Finally (and having just installed XP on a VM on my Win 8 machine) - XP is a dog compared to Win 7 / 8.
Not until you go back to it do you realise how cumbersome it is...
I always suggest making 2 partitions on your disc - one for OS and programs, one for user data. Makes doing maintenance and re-install simpler as you can just wipe the install partition without worrying about data. Rather old fashioned I know to use more than one partition, but I've been very glad of doing so on more than one occasion.
Unfortunately MS don't appear to share this view and don't make it at all easy to do so (it's easy enough to set up 2 partitions, not so easy to point user directories at the second one). Even worse I've not made a note of how I did it with Windows 7 - though I moved stuff post-install and if you're doing a fresh install it would make more sense to use an unattend script.