Microsoft Windows XP Pro SP2 DSP CD

[Ian D Samson]

This isn't really a Windows 2000 Pro support call, so the engineers
can't charge me R249+VAT just to ask a question about Windows XP
Professional DSP - whatever DSP means.

At the end of March 2008, I will be needing to purchase 2 Windows XP
Professional CDs to upgrade firstly my Windows 2000 Professional SP4
computer, and secondly my Windows XP Home computer, so that we are all
on the same page.

What I need to know is what my software supplier cannot tell me. That
is, if I purchase two Windows XP Professional CDs, will I have to
reformat the hard drives in both machines? Since Windows 2000 Pro SP4
is already NTFS and Windows XP Home is also NTFS, surely installing XP
Professional over 2KProSP4 and XP Home will only update the system
files? Since the main drive in my W2K Pro SP4 machine is a 300GB disk,
I am very hesitant to have to reformat it just to accommodate some
quirk of XP Pro.

If not, from where can I purchase proper XP Professional packages
since no one in South Africa appears to be selling XP - EVERYONE is
going mad selling VISTA - and I am not interested in VISTA until next
year at the earliest.

Advice please.

 

[Shenan Stanley]

This isn't really a Windows 2000 Pro support call, so the engineers
can't charge me R249+VAT just to ask a question about Windows XP
Professional DSP - whatever DSP means.

At the end of March 2008, I will be needing to purchase 2 Windows XP
Professional CDs to upgrade firstly my Windows 2000 Professional SP4
computer, and secondly my Windows XP Home computer, so that we are
all on the same page.

What I need to know is what my software supplier cannot tell me.
That is, if I purchase two Windows XP Professional CDs, will I have
to reformat the hard drives in both machines? Since Windows 2000
Pro SP4 is already NTFS and Windows XP Home is also NTFS, surely
installing XP Professional over 2KProSP4 and XP Home will only
update the system files? Since the main drive in my W2K Pro SP4
machine is a 300GB disk, I am very hesitant to have to reformat it
just to accommodate some quirk of XP Pro.

If not, from where can I purchase proper XP Professional packages
since no one in South Africa appears to be selling XP - EVERYONE is
going mad selling VISTA - and I am not interested in VISTA until
next year at the earliest.

My first suggestion: Get a new software vendor. The one your have has no
knowledge (simplistic knowledge even) of what they sell. I would not trust
someone who could not answer simple questions about a software they sell to
indeed sell me said software. You can find many vendors selling Windows XP
online. Choose one with a good rating - read carefully what you will be
buying and even call them before ordering if necessary. Sorry - I do not
have any suggestions directly for South Africa - most of my purchasing
knowledge would center around places like pricewatch.com and vendors like
newegg, buy.com, amazon.com, tigerdirect.com, etc.

If your 'software vendor' is selling you the OEM licensed copy of Windows XP
Professional - then you cannot *upgrade* the system without formatting it.
If your software vendor is selling you the Retail Upgrade or Retail Full
versions of Windows XP Professional (or the Volume license - which I doubt
if you are only purchasing two) - then you can perform an in-place upgrade.

However - there is NEVER any guarantee that everything will work out of the
box. There are millions upon millions of possible hardware and software
combinations - and since each vendor of each product provides their own
support for each operating system - you may have a piece of hardware or a
piece of software that is unsupported in Windows XP SP2. Only you can
discover that through research.

My first suggestion:
Windows XP Supported Upgrade Paths
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=292607
and:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/upgrading/default.mspx

The first link gives you the supported upgrade paths that your 'software
vendor' was unable to and the second does that and leads you to the upgrade
advisor application that "checks your system hardware and software to see if
it is ready for upgrade to Windows XP..."

Also - Windows XP and Windows 2000 do have 'different' versions of the file
system (albeit slight). Windows 2000 uses v3.0 of NTFS and Windows XP uses
v3.1 of NTFS. Although - in this case, it won't make much difference in as
far as the upgrade for you goes.

In ANY case - you should perform a full backup of your system before
attempting the upgrade. This is not a simplistic process - you are
replacing a lot of major stuff and should treat it with such respect. I
would suggest using an external hard disk drive and some imaging application
like Ghost, TrueImage or BootItNG (to name three) to make a full image
backup of the system. That way - if things go horribly wrong - you simply
apply the image you saved and everything is as it was before you attempted
the upgrade.