Windows 7...Anyone rushing to switch?

Experience has taught me to avoid any new MS product until they get to Version 3 or more, so I'm not touching this puppy for a while. We got this computer just before the switch to Vista, so we're still on XP & I've already seen a lot of chatter of problems with your programs & drivers not working once you install 7. Has anyone upgraded?

I've been sticking with XP

I'm sticking with my Mac.

With the price of computers dropping today, I feel it is no longer worth it to upgrade operating systems. Just buy a whole new computer when someting you need will not run anymore on your old one. You also have to check the hardware in your old XP machine. It may not be sufficient to run the new operating system. Frankly, after Vista, "Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me."

Davydd


I'm sticking with my Mac.

windows 7 seems to correspond to about 10.3 or so. I saw some silly commercial actually touting the fact you can bring up two screens at once, like that was a big deal?
Spaces in SL is far beyond in concept.

David_NYC


With the price of computers dropping today, I feel it is no longer worth it to upgrade operating systems. Just buy a whole new computer when someting you need will not run anymore on your old one.

That works, unless you don't use pre-built computers.  I've been building my own for almost ten years, so it's far easier (and cheaper) to upgrade bits and pieces (as well as the OS) than to buy a new prefab computer which has 847 things I don't need or want and to which I need to add 847 things I do need and want.

That said, I'm still using Win2K Pro on my desktop.   I may upgrade it to XP soon, but maybe not.

Staying with 10.6.

I suffered through ME.  They can keep their Vista and 7 because my XP works at the moment.

I heard that they were no longer going to support XP.  Why isn't that illegal?  They are forcing us to give up something that isn't broke!

mar52


I suffered through ME.  They can keep their Vista and 7 because my XP works at the moment.

I heard that they were no longer going to support XP.  Why isn't that illegal?  They are forcing us to give up something that isn't broke!

It'll be OK. I have an old travel laptop that still runs W98, just fine. All it means is that there won't be any new security patches or service packs. But XP is fully mature. Keep your antivirus software up to date and you'll be fine.

THX!

My new HP came with a free upgrade to Win-7 sometime soon. I haven't decided if I will load the disc when it arrives. This machine has the 64 bit Vista which seems to be MUCH more stable than the 32 bit that was in my previous computer.

  It is tough to tell what is affecting the improvement in speed and stability...I went from 2 gigs of Ram to 8 Gigs in the new HP. Verizon upgraded their cell-modem USB plug-in for my Internet service at about the same time, and I took on the new Vista 64 (and soon the Win-7)...all within a short period of time.   Now I will say I am pretty happy with the increased speed and quality of stuff...but I am not sure what had the most influence on the change???
 
My Laptop still runs fine on XP and since I use Photoshop 6 on it and that won't run on Vista (and especially Vista 64) I use the Laptop for photo-editing.

I'm a Computer Science professor, so let me chime in here.

One of my students was trying to install "more happy" (if you've seen the MS commercial with the little girl and the cute little bunnies and kitties powerpoint)  on Thursday and all he kept getting was problems.  He definitely wasn't "more happy" with win7.

XP is going to be supported with security updates until 2014, contrary to what someone else has said here.  There isn't supposed to be any major SP's. 

One thing to remember is there is no direct path to Win7 from XP.  The only way I've seen it documented is to first upgrade to Vista, then upgrade to Win7 (meaning you have to purchase a copy of Vista to do this if you don't already have it).  One vendor is advertising they have a product to help you port up to it, but you have to do a backup of everything first.  I wouldn't advise most people to try this alone. 

Me, I'm sticking to XP for the moment too... and Centos Linux for my server work.  I have too many people who I support on Windows to go fully to Linux.

Hey another guy from WVa!

jimcfs1
 
One thing to remember is there is no direct path to Win7 from XP.  The only way I've seen it documented is to first upgrade to Vista, then upgrade to Win7 (meaning you have to purchase a copy of Vista to do this if you don't already have it). 

If that's the case, I'm running XP until this machine dies & will seriously consider making the next computer a Mac. MS greed sickens me!

If you are still running XP on an older machine, run the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=1b544e90-7659-4bd9-9e51-2497c146af15

I did. It basically said I was nuts to try to upgrade to Windows 7.

In reference to jimcfs1's comment about having to buy Vista, I've seen scuttlebutt that since you don't have to register Vista right away, if you can get a "hot" copy of the XP-to-Vista upgrade, immediately upgrade to Windows 7 from there.

MIKE S-
  Not only is he from West-By God-Virginia, But he has a last name different from yours, and (unless his computers are battery powered) he has E-L-E-C-T-R-I-C-I-T-Y  !!!

You need to come down the mountain and find this guy !!
 
Jim, Keep your eye out for a big guy who looks like Jeb Clampett with a full beard and a long extension cord dragging from the computer under his arm !!!

David_NYC



In reference to jimcfs1's comment about having to buy Vista, I've seen scuttlebutt that since you don't have to register Vista right away, if you can get a "hot" copy of the XP-to-Vista upgrade, immediately upgrade to Windows 7 from there.

From what I've read that's right. If you don't use the upgrade to vista from XP to log onto the net it won't be able to validate it ( and I think there is still a grace period to register it once its installed). So once vista is installed and you continue to Windows 7 that will be the Windows version that will validate itself. So find someone with a Vista dvd and use that. It the kind of thing that Microsoft can't say to do, but if it works it will save a lot of time and headaches. 

 Kind of reminds me of the hint on the Walt Mossberg blog that a Mac Tiger user could use the 29 dollar upgrade to Snow Leopard without spending the  extra hundred dollars on the Tiger to Snow Leopard upgrade set. Not the kind of news that Apple would want to spread around. 

The other thing is that if you stay with XP you should receive support from Microsoft for another couple of years and security patches for another few after that. So there is not need to rush to Windows 7 from XP or Vista . But if you upgrade from XP to 7 it could be a hassle no matter when you do it, now or in 2015. Microsoft has a bunch of help programs on its web site to help you through it. On the whole Windows 7 is supposed to be a much better organized and safer program than either XP or Vista, especially when used with the new Microsoft anti-virus program and better firewall. They just don't make it easy to get there from XP. 

Myself, I use a Mac. 

 I'm still working with Windows XP 2000. It's familiar!
David O.

I just upgraded a 6 year old PC from Windows XP to Windows 7 with no problems!  It even worked with the drivers that they said were "incompatible."

I had to reinstall all my programs, but that only took about 90 minutes.  Otherwise, it kept all my files in tact.

You're a brave soul, Stephen.

And lucky!

David_NYC


If you are still running XP on an older machine, run the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=1b544e90-7659-4bd9-9e51-2497c146af15 

I ran this diagnostic tool & MS said that I'd have to do a custom install, my graphics system needs to upgraded to get the full "Aero" effect & that I will have to reinstall all my software (no indication if all the software will work, not to mention having to go back to the various software makers for "updates").
 
I think I'll pass & I think my next machine might be a MAC.

Sticking to Vista with my laptop (no problems, pop-ups are caught, & avoiding suspicious websites).

Netbook running well on XP.

...and why shell out $119 right now to upgrade???

Heard a rumor that some folks at MS thought that naming this Windows 7 might be promising users something it couldn't really deliver. They wanted to lower everyone's expectations by naming it Windows 6.66!

Since I have had my Apple (2 years) my Dell laptop is just a horrible memory.

I've been Apple Mac for over a quarter century now. I stick with the innovators not the followers.

I only wish I started with a Mac when I began my computer life.

Have a friend that got 7 last week, upgrading from Vista which she hated.

She's having a lot of problems getting her existing programs to work with it.

She's also a game player and there aren't any patches yet to make her games work with 7.

She's not happy.  Says XP is better

I'm going to stay with Vista for a few more years. I like it well enough.

I stick with what works for me. I also don't relish being an unpaid product tester for Steve Ballmer. Hence, I stuck with Win2k until 2005, and plan on sticking with my extremely stable version of XP for quite awhile longer.

Gonna stick with my Vista.  It's actually stable, I have it tweaked to my needs, and why fix something that isn't broken.

WarToad


Gonna stick with my Vista.  It's actually stable, I have it tweaked to my needs, and why fix something that isn't broken.

That goes against everything MS stands for!

 I have Vista Home Prem in my old laptop, XP in the Netbook, and VHP in the new laptop, with free Win7 Home Prem upgrade arriving in my mailbox any day. So yes, i'll install, but would like to do a "clean install", not just an upgrade, so i've been doing some research on this. I've read it's very cool.

i liked xp just fine (actually liked me, too - never had a problem with it) and had absolutely no interest in  vista at all.  and even less once i saw it in action when a friend got a new computer and had problems and asked me to help.

my computer started having issues last spring and i've been fixing it as i go along - keeping it up/running 1) because i just didn't really have the extra funds to spend on a new one and 2) because i definitely didn't want vista nor did i want to pay an exhorbitent fee to 'downgrade' to xp.

know quite a few people that were testing 7 and all have nothing but good feedback about it...and many of them tested vista, too, and most had nothing but negative things to say about that one.

my own  limited experience with vista - and the known issues with getting certain games to run on it, kept me fiddling with my computer.  which is over 7 years old, so, definitely outdated in a lot of ways.

it died, for good, thursday. i tried to get it up and going again.  resorted to getting a new one yesterday.  7 is better than vista in  some ways.  there were quite a few changes in vista from xp and there are more changes now in 7 when compared to vista. it's hard to find some settings...i really don't like the way things are so hidden - not all that user friendly.  especially for those that aren't too savvy with computers, it's hard to manuver around.  for those that are savvy, it's frustrating to not be able to find what you're looking for - the new locations for some things just don't make sense (to me, anyhoo).

haven't done much other than  start the  thing up - and really, the intial setup was an absolute breeze - even the internet settings.  from everything being in-the-box to when i was on the internet literally took all of 30 minutes.  fastest set up of a computer i've ever done!

haven't loaded  my uru (and other myst games) on  it yet - from what i understand from others, they all run fine, with very little fiddling, on 7.  on vista that wasn't the case.

oh, depending on which version of 7 you have, there's a utility to run things in other o/s mode (similar to what you could do in xp with 'compatibility mode' for older win95 stuff).  mar52, if your sis has a basic version of 7, she will have to wait for fixes to be issued.  or maybe she can download one of the programs that do 'virtual' o/s and run the games through that.

http://xkcd.com/528/

Greetings!

Me sees NO Reason to "upgrade" from Win Vista up to Win 7. My IBM/Lenovo Notebook works and runs perfect with Win Vista for almost 2 Years now.

Backups of my important Files up to a external Harddisk of 500GB (Portable), on Tape, or on CD Media, what I uploaded in the Internet, is comprehensible, in german Language "nachvollziehbar", Photos, etc.


Michael

And to be somewhat "serious", besides my Alcohol Addiction, and my former Life as a so called "Biker", nothing is important about myself.

Michael

I'm going to do a fresh install of 7 on my desktop pc, leaving Vista HP on my laptop. I've had the W7 RC for some time, but never installed it.

I'm an IT manager, and have no plans to migrate to 7 at the plant, just too many unknowns right now. I won't even install IE8, as it conflicts with my main business apps.

Seamus, there is so very many paronia with all of us..., all I wrote in the 1980s, the 1990s, since the Year 2000, who gives a ****.

Our big "giant" Internet, with all, I can not handle, is really related to very few contacts, like in former times per telephone.

Even our Telephone Talks is not a single Secret anymore, but I still like to tell "her", that She is still a "Secret".

I see her, meet her, and I am still busted, no Internet!



Michael

I got Windows 7 from a local PC Repair Shop when I took my computer in to get the hard drive replaced.  I'm sure it was a perfectly legal installation (since then I've begun to theorize that it is a massive conspiracy centered out of Redmond).  So far I'm very disappointed.  I have shifting icons on my desktop that wink in and out of existence to some unknowable and unfathomable pattern.

 I just recieved the free upgrade by mail. It's an upgrade from Vista so i understand doing a clean install isn't possible. For now, i'll hold off.

My laptop came with W-7 installed. I had an unusual problem with a Brother Laser printer in that it would work fine until I used Mail Merge, then it would not print. Works fine with other printers.

jeepguy


 I have Vista Home Prem in my old laptop, XP in the Netbook, and VHP in the new laptop, with free Win7 Home Prem upgrade arriving in my mailbox any day. So yes, i'll install, but would like to do a "clean install", not just an upgrade, so i've been doing some research on this. I've read it's very cool.

 The problem is doing a clean install from an "upgrade" disc will be virtually impossible, for me anyway. So for now it just sits.

 My friend keeps screaming at me to install IE8! He says that fixes everything!