Upgrade Home to Pro

[Alex]

Just bought a new Dell preconfigured with XP Home on it.
I already have a full copy of XP Pro (SP1) I want to use
instead. Options seem to be:
1 - Use the "Upgrade" option provided in the XP Pro
install menu. MSFT website suggests this approach is
doable from Home, but I have heard and read that
the "Upgrade" is not the way to go as many have found the
result to have some bugs.
2 - Use the "New Installation" option provided in the XP
Pro install menu. This seems to be the way to go, but
cannot find confirmation that others have had success
with this approach.
3 - Change BIOS to look to CD Drive for boot disk, boot
up off the XP Pro install CD, reformat, and do a clean
install. My concern with this method is that my computer
skills with the BIOS and deeply technical areas are
nonexistent. There appear to be several key steps here
to make this work right (e.g., ACPI recognition with F5
button when prompted for F6 RAID controller, etc.), and I
am concerned about getting all the right drivers back on
the computer (for the sound card, video card, DVD RW,
etc.)

If option 2 renders a stable result, then that seems the
best path. If not, I could use some help for where to
find resources to guide me through, key stroke by key
stroke, option 3.

Thanks, Alex.

 

[purplehaz]

You missed one option:
If you upgrade your new Dell from xp home to xp pro you will void your
support and warranty from Dell.
Options 2 and 3 are/can be the same thing, clean installs. One is started in
windows, one is started at boot up, both goto the same place and do the same
thing.
Options 1 and 3 are/can be the same thing, upgrade installs. One is started
in windows, one is started at boot up, both goto the same place and do the
same thing.
Start the install any way your comfortable with.
Upgrade installs from home to pro, in general, go very smoothly. If it
doesn't work right, then format and clean install.

 

[Steve C. Ray]

Alex, the upgrade should work fine for you. If you had a system that was
having lots of problems then a upgrade may not be the way to go, but with a
new system it should be OK. The upgrade will leave all the installed
applications intact. Try the upgrade first, you can always go back and do a
clean install if necessary, but I think you won't have problems.
There is something else to consider, however. Changing the OS from what was
delivered in your new Dell may void the warranty. You need to look at this,
maybe contact Dell and see what they say.