You can't expect to be able to upgrade from an 8 year old operating system to a brand new operating system. I am sure that people would love to go ahead and do it but they would find many if not all of their programs incompatible and it would somehow be Microsoft's fault.

Yes, I can definitely agree with Gartenberg's implication that the difficulty of upgrading a machine from Windows XP to Windows 7 will likely reduce their potential sales; XP gained a lot of ground due to coming out in a market with accelerating OEM PC sales, a market that had already stabilized well before the current recession hit, which assuredly hurt sales even more, and will wind up hurting the adoption rate of Windows 7 simply by cutting the number of new computers being purchased.

Hence, the upgrade market matters a fair amount; Vista failed a lot there due to very poor marketing as well as arguably a lot of design and feature choices made with it that turned out to be unpopular. I have the distinct impression that while perhaps not quite as severe, Windows 7 will also likely find a slower adoption rate than Microsoft hopes.

As someone who has worked in IT for years the term "in place upgrade" makes me cringe. I have seen so many of these go so horribly wrong over the last 15-20 years that I never recommend them. In this case providing it as an option might sound nice on paper or as a concept. However with a different kernel and all the other changes correctly migrating settings without breaking apps that are dependent on specific DLLs or registry keys would be impossible.

Woooooouuuuld not.
Obviously you don't work in "the IT" and you obviously don't know it's still the same base kernel,AKA "NT".

A clean install is not upgrading in any way. Epic fail.

i'm in no hurry to go form xp to windows 7, xp runs greats and windows 7 is nothing but lipstick on the vista pig

I work in IT as well it's going to be a clean install via scripting and imagining if it's done. This is not an issue for corporate users in least. It’s fast and reliable, just too much risk in upgrading an OS. They will have a challenge selling the upgrade itself though. Windows 7 may have better driver support day one but it will be no better with dated applications.
Even if all of our apps had no issues, the OS was free, and it installed itself I’m not sure I would bite. For most there is no meaningful advantage to upgrading.

This is from someone that likes Vista and is very impressed with Vista SE, I mean Windows 7. I do think this is ready for public consumption now. I also think that it will be the first Microsoft OS to sell more copies of the 64bit version. The upgrade route only makes sense for computer junkies that have Vista or weren’t satisfied with Vista. Upgrading the old family PC just wouldn’t make sense, hand it down to little Johnny and replace it.

@cablechewer

i.e. This is a CLEAN INSTALLATION. I hope I don't get you for tech support.

"There will be no software upgrade path."

Reading for you = epic fail.

If you have old hardware, it is probably a good idea to replace that old hard disk before it croaks anyways. (Hard drives and power supplies have the shortest life expectancies, IMHO.) So just install Windows 7 on your shiny new bigger/faster drive and keep the old one for data. No "backup" necessary. If you find you don't like Windows 7, you can go back to the old drive.

You know, I think that statistically hard drives and power supplies have the shortest life expectancy, but in my experience I've had ram die on me 4 times (and its kind of a bitch to diagnose) and twice has a motherboard died. I've never had a hard drive or a power supply die.

You are damn right it is a hassle to re-install your software. It's the digital equivalent of packing up and tackling the Oregon Trail.

Windows 7 is shaping up to be a huge giant warm blanket of fail. Vista redux, yuck. What's new in it again? Why am I supposed to want/need it? I thought so.

YOu got.. DISENTERY

XD

You're upgrading your license not your computer. That's still upgrading. When I upgraded my graphics card or processor, I took the old one out and put the new one in. Or are you implying that I didn't upgrade because I had to take the old one out?

How many people here don't do a clean install on their computer? Seriously now sometimes MS can't do anything to please the haters. I like MS products (they do make good products most of the time), and I don't try to hide that fact, but I'm far from a fanboy. I'm a very big critic of Vista (I don't need my OS to protect me from myself thanks) and the RROD and my 360 scratching my disks (no I didn't move my console, so apparently my came with the optional cat inside), so it's hardly like they can do no wrong, but don't hate a company for being successful.

It's so very true. However, we do that because we all had bad experiences from upgrading from Win95 to Win98, Win98 to (shrug) WinME and so on. What is this time, Microsoft had a true upgrade process? One that will swap your users and programs folder on a temp partition, wipe your Windows partition, wipe your registry, Install 7, re-transfer your users and programs, scan the programs and add the proper links to the registry? A man can dream...

Seems like the biggest reason companies have for not upgrading from XP is they think their users are too stupid to comprehend the new OS.

All the PCs in my house are Vista, and I find no reason to be using XP. When you have quad core 3.2GHz with 6GB RAM, it doesn't matter what OS you're on the speed is going to be incredible. You can argue about this thing is faster or that is faster, the end of the day either OS is going to be faster than the user.

yea i get a chill down my spine everytime i hear stories of people trying to install a new version of windows over there existing windows install that has been on there computer for the last 10 years without a format or cleanup.

Seriously guys you know the drill you cannot upgrade from a 10 year old OS to a current one. might as well try to upgrade from windows 7 from windows 2k or even better windows 95. the files have changed too much sense then so an upgrade path from XP or 2k would not go smoothly and would be too much of a mess

thats the #1 reason MS isn't going to do it because it would be too much of a mess

Yes Jaragon13 you are right. It is the next step in the evolution of the NT Kernel. I overstated by calling it new. However on the other hand the migration non-essential functions out of the Kernel along with the usual tweaks and updates has continued. The change from NT to XP to Windows 7 is not insignificant (just look at the driver model changes in the last few versions for one major difference). It is probably not enough I should have called it new, but there are a lot of differences.

@gm0n3y I am well aware that a software upgrade isn't being offered from XP to Win7. I was responding to the idea of such an upgrade raised by Gartenberg.

not every one is laoded with money to spare

my pc 3 gigs ram
athy 5000+ black ed
gf 9600gt


gettign picture here most this can be bougth for 100 bucks or less per part

vista will eat near an entire gig of ram if not more
as is for mysystem XP DOES run a LOT faster
as is with the exception fo halo 2 i can run every game out ther with no OS errors (game/os errors are the case with vista 64 bit which is requried if you actually want to use more than 3 gigs ram)


i got nothgin agaisnt vista other than the only version worth the upgrade is the 64 bit and then i'm certain about 1/2 to 2/3rds of my some 100+ older games wont work on it , yeah i mgiht eventually get vista , but most liekly i will still keep a dual boot if not a whole pc for win xp.

To joex444 All the PCs in my house are Vista, and I find no reason to be using XP...Well how many and what do you use them for.I'm a Gamer and all 11 of mine run XP. We play online (WoW) and FPS games. I have no need for High Cost Vista. I've tested win 7 and it manages memory very nice the look and feel is also good but is it worth the $319. hmm I wonder.
snakepitt Out. 20 + Years Experience

While you can't upgrade XP to 7 directly, keep in mind that you can still upgrade XP to Vista and Vista to 7. I had to do exactly that in order to get 7 on an XP laptop I have (and I wanted to avoid a fresh install).

Vista (like 7) will install/upgrade and run fine without a PID for 30 days.

Well, up to 120 days if you really want, but since you're just going to turn around and upgrade to 7, this probably isn't that useful.

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/win [...] -120-days/

Can anyone confirm you'll be able to keep your existing install of XP *and* install the "upgrade" version of Windows 7 to a different partition? I wouldn't mind saving a few bucks by getting the discounted upgrade vs oem, but don't want to find out it'll only install on the same partition as XP, or that it deactivates your old XP license. They've done weirder things. Thanks.

I just have a question about this. I have xp and i preordered the upgrade cd for windows 7 (the deal was good for 50 dollars). from what i understand the upgrade cd is different from the regular cd. would i have to..
1/ wipe out my hard drive and then install windows 7?
2/ wipe out my hard drive, install windows xp and then windows 7 after?

Thanks

I just have a question about this. I have xp and i preordered the upgrade cd for windows 7 (the deal was good for 50 dollars). from what i understand the upgrade cd is different from the regular cd. would i have to..
1/ wipe out my hard drive and then install windows 7?
2/ wipe out my hard drive, install windows xp and then windows 7 after?

Thanks