Vista or Bust? Moving to a New Machine

[wtw]

I'm reconstructing my present 5 year old machine after a c-drive failure.
I'm considering going to Vista rather than building a new machine with XP on
it. I have a few concerns about this. I've been told that if I go Vista with
a store bought machine, it is unlikely flushing the drive and installing XP
will work. The machine I'm looking at as a replacement is an HP quad core
with 6G of memory. I'm pretty sure that's a 64-bit machine. Should I be
concerned about some of my older programs that were running a 5 year old
ASUS MB? Office 97 and some non-MS apps.

 

[Malke]

I'm reconstructing my present 5 year old machine after a c-drive failure.
I'm considering going to Vista rather than building a new machine with XP
on it. I have a few concerns about this. I've been told that if I go Vista
with a store bought machine, it is unlikely flushing the drive and
installing XP will work. The machine I'm looking at as a replacement is an
HP quad core
with 6G of memory. I'm pretty sure that's a 64-bit machine. Should I be
concerned about some of my older programs that were running a 5 year old
ASUS MB? Office 97 and some non-MS apps.

Office 97 is not compatible with Vista. As for other applications, you need
to go to each program's website and see. In some cases, older programs will
run fine on Vista. In many cases, they won't. There is no "one size fits
all" rule so you need to do your homework *first*. Ditto for any hardware
peripherals - printers, scanners, webcams, etc.

Also note that if you want to use all 6GB of RAM, you will need to run a
64-bit operating system. XP has a 64-bit flavor as does Vista. Make sure
that 64-bit drivers are available from the OEM for whatever operating
system you want to use.

Personally, I think purchasing a new computer is the way to go. You need to
decide what operating system you want and that will help you decide what to
buy. Below is my standard "how to replace Vista w/XP" information which I
hope helps you.

A. On an OEM (HP, Sony, etc.) computer:

1. Go to the OEM's website and look for XP drivers for your specific model
computer. If there are no XP drivers, then you can't install XP. End of
story. If there are drivers, download them and store on a CD-R or USB
thumbdrive; you'll need them after you install XP.

2. Check with the OEM - either from their tech support website or by calling
them - to see if you will void your warranty if you do this. If you will
void the warranty, you make the decision.

3. If the OEM does support XP on the machine, call them and see if you can
have downgrade rights and have them send you an XP restore disk. This will
be far the easiest and best way of getting XP on the machine. Note: Dell
will sell you XP preinstalled on some models "designed for Vista" from the
business side of the store. HP probably will, too.

4. If XP is supported on the machine but the OEM doesn't have an XP restore
disk for you, understand that you'll need to purchase a retail copy of XP
from your favorite online or brick/mortar store.

5. Also understand that you will need to do a clean install of XP so if you
have any data you want, back it up first.

6. If none of the above is applicable to you because you can't run XP on
that machine (see Item #1 above), return the computer and purchase one
running XP instead.

B. On a generic/home-built computer (from non-OEM company) - You will need
drivers for all your hardware. See the second link below for more details:

http://michaelstevenstech.com/cleanxpinstall.html - Clean Install How-To
http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Reinstalling_Windows - What
you will need on-hand

Malke

 

[wtw]

Thanks.
While I was checking out new computers in the store yesterday, I decided to
play with Vista. I discovered some demo video that went through, at least,
file operations. Does it or others like it exist on the web?

 

[Bob I]

Small correction about Office 97. It's "not supported", as opposed to
"not compatible". My wife is running Office 97 without any particular
issues on her Vista Home Premium Dell.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

I'm reconstructing my present 5 year old machine after a c-drive failure.
I'm considering going to Vista rather than building a new machine with XP on
it. I have a few concerns about this. I've been told that if I go Vista with
a store bought machine, it is unlikely flushing the drive and installing XP
will work.

Why not? It has nothing to do with being store-bought, but only with
whether the hardware is adequate and whether needed drivers exist for
all your hardware. Many five year old machines do not have adequate
hardware; for example, I wouldn't run Vista without at least 2GB of
RAM.

The driver problem is much more likely lf it's a laptop,

The machine I'm looking at as a replacement is an HP quad core
with 6G of memory. I'm pretty sure that's a 64-bit machine.

With 6GB, I hope so. All 32-bit client versions of Windows (not just
Vista/XP) have a 4GB address space. That's the theoretical upper limit
beyond which you can not go.

But you can't use the entire 4GB of address space. Even though you
have a 4GB address space, you can only use *around* 3.1GB of RAM.
That's because some of that space is used by hardware and is not
available to the operating system and applications. The amount you can
use varies, depending on what hardware you have installed, but can
range from as little as 2GB to as much as 3.5GB. It's usually around
3.1GB.

Note that the hardware is using the address *space*, not the actual
RAM itself. The rest of the RAM goes unused because there is no
address space to map it too.

So note that you will need a 64-bit version of Vista to take advantage
of the 6GB.

Should I be
concerned about some of my older programs that were running a 5 year old
ASUS MB? Office 97 and some non-MS apps.

The fact that it's a 5 year old ASUS MB is largely irrelevant. Most
programs, even non-MS, that ran under XP will also run under Vista.
However Microsoft Office 97 will not. But you should check each
program on its manufacturer's web site.

 

[wtw]

That's a relief. I think I may have the pro version. However, it may be just
time to go with the student version. I've gotten Office versions very
inexpensively over the years, but in fact have not used some the facilities
like sql. I think the student version has PP, but maybe not. I use primarily
Excel, Word and PP. I think I might even get a good discount on it through
the local community college. I take something like "adult ed" classes that
get me discounts.

 

[Malke]

Small correction about Office 97. It's "not supported", as opposed to
"not compatible". My wife is running Office 97 without any particular
issues on her Vista Home Premium Dell.

Thank you.

Malke

 

[wtw]

I hope the HP people provide a 64-bit Vista, but it's worth looking into.
I'm told that if I start with Vista and don't like it, which probably won't
happen, wiping the drive clean and installing XP will lead to trouble. My
wife, who is big on Linux, did this on a HP Vista , but has experienced no
trouble for over a year.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Thank you.

Thank you from me too, Bob. I thought the same thing as Malke
apparently did.

 

[Bob I]

Bob I wrote:




Thank you.

Malke

You're welcome.

 

[Bob I]

Thank you from me too, Bob. I thought the same thing as Malke
apparently did.

You're welcome.

 

[Patrick Keenan]

I'm reconstructing my present 5 year old machine after a c-drive failure.
I'm considering going to Vista rather than building a new machine with XP
on it. I have a few concerns about this. I've been told that if I go Vista
with a store bought machine, it is unlikely flushing the drive and
installing XP will work. The machine I'm looking at as a replacement is an
HP quad core with 6G of memory. I'm pretty sure that's a 64-bit machine.
Should I be concerned about some of my older programs that were running a
5 year old ASUS MB? Office 97 and some non-MS apps.

There is no point in installing more than 3.5 gig RAM on a non-64 bit
system; the system will not let you use more than just less than that. So
if that system has 6 gig RAM, yes, it's going to be running a 64-bit OS.

The bigger problem you are facing is that your hardware may be inadequate or
incompatible for Vista. You must check first.

HTH
-pk

 

[Larry]

There is no point in installing more than 3.5 gig RAM on a non-64 bit
system; the system will not let you use more than just less than that. So
if that system has 6 gig RAM, yes, it's going to be running a 64-bit OS.

The bigger problem you are facing is that your hardware may be inadequate or
incompatible for Vista. You must check first.

HTH
-pk

There are some software issues as well. Since you only mention Office
97 I won't go into an exhaustive list of what they might be. Check
the vendor's website to inform your final decision. Most driver
issues have been resolved, but as Pat pointed out, you might want to
run Microsoft's compatibility wizzard.

Once you have done your homework ... you are really going to like
Vista! Yes, I have kept my old XP Pro machine, but I also have a
Vista Ultimate machine. It rocks!