Can I upgrade from 32-Bit WinXP Pro to 64-Bit Win7 Home Premium ?

Hello everyone,

I have been thinking to buy the Windows 7 Home Premium Family Pack. Which I read is just an upgrade not a clean install. I am running Windows XP Professional 32-Bit Edition. I am curious if I can upgrade from my current 32-bit OS to the 64-bit Windows 7 using the upgrade pack?

Thank you.

No You need to do a full install. Make sure the box DOES NOT say Upgrade.

I'm not sure if the family pack comes in 64 bit, you will need to check further.
You can't do an inplace upgrade from XP to W7, it must be a clean install.
You can do this using the upgrade version.

Go to the link provided to get full instructions.
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US [...] -windows-7

OK. Let's start. jonmor is mostly correct. The Family Pack includes disks for both 32 and 64 bit versions.

To upgrade from any version of WinXP to Win7 requires a clean install.

Of course you cannot install a 64 bit OS on a 32 bit system, but virtually every system sold in the last 3 or 4 years has a 64 bit CPU.

I would say even if it were possible don't bother. If it's a major update like that then I would say clean install all the way no matter what your options are. Heck whenever I update any computer (even my macs were it would just install the new system files over the old) I ALWAYS clean install. With that said W7HP is my FAVORITE OS of all time. So no matter what you do you really can't lose it's stable and rock solid as the day it was made over a year in. I've only had one BSOD and that was because my boot hard drive suffered physical failure other than that nothing but smooth sailing.

Bottom line get whatever pack you need to do update all your computers and clean install and JUST DO IT you won't regret it.

And just to add to this correct information supplied by jsc, you cannot do an in-place upgrade from any 32 bit OS to a 64 bit OS. This too, requires a clean install no matter what version of Windows you have, or what version you are upgrading to. If you had Win 7 32 bit for instance and decided you wanted to go 64 bit Win 7, it would require a complete full fresh install. So do your self a big favor, if you are going to go the trouble of a new install anyway by going from XP to 7, be SURE to go ahead and go with the 64 bit version, which is I believe was your intention anyway.

Some people will say they have problems running their old programs under the 64 bit OS, this almost always is something to do with Win 7 (or Vista....Win 7 is built on the Vista kernel) but not because it is 64 bit. The Vista / Win 7 kernel is quite a bit different than XP was. (hence the reason you cannot do a direct upgrade from XP to Vista or Win 7) and some older programs simply don't like to run under it. There is XP compatibility mode that will work for most problems you have with these older programs. I have been running Vista 64 for now for a couple of years and have not found any issues at all myself.

Most processors made since about 2003 in standard consumer desktop PC's are 64 bit.

I am quite sure my PC can handle 64 bit OS

System Config:

Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q9300
Motherboard: ASUS Rampage Extreme
RAM: Corsair XMS 3 DDR3 1600
Audio: Creative SupremeFX X-Fi
Video: Gigabyte Radeon HD 6850
SSD: Intel X25
HDD: Segate Baracuda

But to make things certain I just want to test drive Win 7 64 Bit. Is there any evaluation version available ?

Thank you for your help

Read my original post and follow the link to Microsoft.
As stated you can upgrade, but only by doing a clean install. That means save your files and reinstall all programs. This is not negotiable.
You can't do an inplace upgrade (retain installed programs and files) from any 32 bit system to a 64 bit one.

Sorry for getting to the party so late shiningdream.

While it is true that with Microsoft, the only way to upgrade to 7 from XP is through Vista. Likewise, Microsoft doesn't have a way to get from XP 32-bit to 7 64-bit. But don't despair. There is hope!

There IS a way to upgrade in-place from XP Pro 32-bit to Windows 7 (any version) 64-bit. To accomplish this feat you must use a 3rd party program by Laplink called PCMover. The Pro version is what I use at work to migrate users programs, settings, user files, the whole ball of wax to a new system. I've used it to migrate users from an XP Pro 32-bit box to a Windows 7 Pro 64-bit box with NO issues.

PCMover will also allow for an in-place upgrade to 7 64-bit. Although I have never experienced any problems using PCMover (and that's after migrating several PCs with it), I DO RECOMMEND making a full image of your existing HDD before the in-place upgrade just in case you have any issues. Acronis True Image works well for this although there are free ones out there you can try.

Enjoy!!

~Slaught3r