how to upgrade to xp from win 95

[Greg Bean]

OK: a freind of mine has a compaq desktop from about 1996.
it has windows 95 and a 4 gig hard drive.
the friend wants to upgrade to xp. I have the win 98 and
the win melenium cd's. but I dont know the procedure. I
also have the win xp cd. do I need to reformat the hard
drive first? if so of if not please tell me the procedure.

greg

 

[Chris Lanier]

First, you need to make sure your system can handle XP.

Windows XP Home Edition System Requirements
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/howtobuy/upgrading/sysreqs.asp

Windows XP Professional System Requirements
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/howtobuy/upgrading/sysreqs.asp

4GB of storage will mean that you will be VERY limited on the number of
applications you can install.

After you check all that you need to be sure you have a second licence of
that copy of XP. if you said that's it's your's most likely you have it
installed, right? you can only install it on ONE computer.

Additional Licenses for Windows XP Home Edition
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/howtobuy/addlic.asp

Additional Licenses for Windows XP Pro Edition
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/howtobuy/addlic.asp

 

[greg]

thanks for the reply: but... what is meant by second copy
of the liscense. and how do I know if i have one.

also: how would I upgrade to win melenium if thats all I
can do? as of now the machine keeps saying it cannot do
it. cant remember the exact message.

greg

 

[Matthew Busselberg]

In addition to what's been said already, if you are
upgrading, especially on that small of a hard drive,
chances are that he does not have enough room left on the
hard drive to perform the upgrade. Keep in mind that
upgrades always need more space than they will ultimately
take up in order to perfomr the upgrade.

Matthew

 

[Matthew Busselberg]

You really ought to check how much hard drive space is
available. The same problem about hard drive space for an
upgrade can keep Me from installing as well. Go to my
computer, right click the c drive and click on
properties. If your free space is less than 700MB, don't
bother upgrading until you have a larger hard drive.
Also... with older computers, your bios may have trouble
reading hard drives larger than 8.4GB unless you have an
extra IDE controller card (such as one by Promise
Technology) that has an advanced BIOS or drive management
software (both of which may also cause problems with a
windows Me or XP installation).

 

[greg]

thanks again people but I alrezdy stated the size of the
hard drive. "find my friend a used win 98 machine"? they
already have a used win 95 machine! thats where this
conversation started. are you guys saying that if I
reformat the hard drive I cannnot install win 98n or
melenium? I know other people that are running xp on old
machines. can someone just tell me how to format the hard
drive. and install the stand alone copy of win 98?

greg

 

[Vern]

Sorry for the runaround. Not only is this an XP forum, but
our servers are down. The 98 or ME forum is where you
should go. But their servers are down too, so be patient
in waiting for an answer.

 

[Bob Knowlden]

It's unlikely that a machine that old meets the minimum requirements for XP:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/howtobuy/upgrading/sysreqs.asp

In brief, the minimum requirements are: 233 MHz CPU, 64 MB of RAM, 1.5 GB of
HD space. The *recommended* minimums are 300 MHz, and 128 MB of RAM. I can't
take that 1.5 GB minimum HD seriously; I have about 2 GB of stuff, *just in
my Windows folder*.

If you have broadband access, you can get the Download Advisor :

http://download.microsoft.com/download/whistler/Utility/1.0/WXP/EN-US/UpgAdv.exe

(32 MB), which will check for hardware and software issues. I don't know
whether it'll run under Win95, though.

If, by some miracle, the hardware meets the XP requirements, 95 is not
upgradeable to XP directly:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/howtobuy/upgrading/matrix.asp

You can always do a reformat/clean install. (I've also read that a Win95
install CD can be used as qualifying media for a clean installation from an
XP upgrade CD, but I've never tried it. I've only used a Win98 upgrade CD
for that.) In principle, you could try to preserve stuff by upgrading to 98
and then to XP, but that would be an unusual approach.

Are you aware that XP can only be activated on one machine at a time?
(That's not strictly true, but it's not worth working around that. Of
course, there's always software piracy, but I don't recommend that.) Don't
try to install XP on your friend's PC with your product key, even if it
squeaks by the minimum requirements.

The short version: probably not a good idea.

Sorry that I can't be more encouraging.

Bob Knowlden

Address may be altered to avoid spam. Replace nkbob with bobkn.

 

[Papa]

Greg, forget it. That old clunker will run at an extremely slow crawl, if it
runs at all, with XP. Face it, a Windows 95 machine of that vintage is good
for Windows 95 - period - as you will discover if you attempt it.

And in regard to your saying "find my friend a used win 98 machine? they
already have a used win 95 machine", the Windows 98 machines are usually
more powerful than the Windows 95 machines (faster CPUs, bigger HDs, more
RAM, etc.). Simply reformatting the HD doesn't buy you much, all that does
is clean up the HD, and if you take a closer look at some of your friend's
older PCs which are running XP, you will find that they upgraded either from
a Windows 98 machine or from a Windows 95 machine with lots of hardware
upgrades. A plain-jane Windows 95 machine just won't hack it.

 

[Alex Nichol]

OK: a freind of mine has a compaq desktop from about 1996.
it has windows 95 and a 4 gig hard drive.
the friend wants to upgrade to xp. I have the win 98 and
the win melenium cd's. but I dont know the procedure.

You could in principle upgrade to 98, and then from that run an XP
update CD - the 95 is sufficient support for the upgrade license, though
you cannot upgrade it direct. But with only a 4GB drive, and the
probable amount of RAM (anything under 192 MB RAM is really inadequate)
I would strongly advise getting to Win98 (rather than ME) and stopping
there

 

[Plato]

OK: a freind of mine has a compaq desktop from about 1996.
it has windows 95 and a 4 gig hard drive.
the friend wants to upgrade to xp. I have the win 98 and

Forget about it. Your buddy needs a new PC.

 

[Greg Kamer]

Greg,
The down and dirty method is pretty stright foward.....

1. Insert a Win98 Boot Disk floppy
2. Turn computer on. When it boots to a:/ type in "format c:" without quotes
3. You will get a warning message telling you everything on the hard drive
will be deleted. Are you sure you want to do it, select Yes
4. Once the hard drive is formated, re-boot with the floppy disk still in.
Select the option to re-boot with cd rom support.
5. Insert the Win98 cd and run Setup.

Make sure before you do this that the cd you have is the full install Win98
and not just an upgrade.