Questions To Be Consider When Going for Windows 7 upgrade

Whether you’re keen to upgrade to Windows 7 or you just wish to know what to expect if and when you do, there are lots of things to keep in mind.
Can I upgrade directly from XP?
Many users who are still running Windows XP want to know whether they can upgrade to Windows 7 without losing all their data and settings. The answer is, well, sort of. Microsoft doesn’t provide a direct upgrade path from Windows XP to Windows 7. An in-place upgrade is available only if you’re running Vista SP1 or later. If you have Windows XP, even if your hardware is compatible, you’ll have to perform a clean installation of Windows 7. However, you can use the Microsoft Deployment Tool, which includes the User State Migration Tool, to transfer your user settings for the desktop and applications to the new Windows 7 installation.

Can I do a Vista in-place upgrade?
If you have Windows Vista, remember that you must install SP1 or SP2 before you can perform an in-place upgrade to Windows 7. If you try to upgrade a Vista computer that doesn’t have a service pack installed, you will get a message informing you that to upgrade to Windows 7, the computer needs to be running Vista with Service Pack 1.

Will there be driver compatibility issues?
A big problem in Windows Vista was driver incompatibility. Too many users upgraded their Windows from XP to Vista only to find that a favorite peripheral, such as a printer or scanner, would no longer work. Vista also introduced a new display driver model, WDDM, which required video card vendors to write completely different display and video miniport drivers. And security enhancements in Vista affected how the OS handles drivers. Even though Vista was in development for few years, many hardware vendors did not have Vista drivers ready for all of their products when the OS was released.

Now that Vista has been out for more than two years, most hardware vendors have updated their drivers to work with it. Because Windows 7 uses the same driver models as Vista, the vast majority of hardware devices that work with Vista will work with Windows 7. For Vista drivers that won’t install on Windows 7, you can usually solve the problem by installing in Compatibility Mode. To do this, right-click the driver’s setup file, select Properties, click the Compatibility tab, enable compatibility mode, and select the appropriate operating system from the drop-down box.

Which Windows 7 version shall I choose?
Windows 7 is also comes both Home Basic and Home Premium editions. There is also a Starter edition, which comes with low-powered netbooks.

What if I have applications that won’t run on Windows 7, even in Compatibility Mode?
There may be some XP programs that you can’t get to run on Windows 7, even using Compatibility Mode. However, you may still be able to enjoy all the benefits of Windows 7 without giving up your favorite applications, thanks to a new compatibility tool called XP Mode. XPM is a host-based virtualization solution that will reportedly be made available at no cost to users of Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate editions.