Windows XP ModeRun many existing productivity and business programs designed for Windows XP – additional necessary software is available for download, free-of-charge from Microsoft.
Save Time and Money Resolving IT IssuesTake advantage of the powerful diagnostics and troubleshooters built into Action Center to resolve many computer problems on your own.
Interact with any Compatible Device Connected to Your ComputerDevice Stage makes connecting and working with devices easier than ever with a single interface to manage devices and run common tasks. Plus, the new Devices and Printers folder shows you everything connected to your PC, making it a handy way to check on a printer, music player, camera, mouse, or digital picture frame (just to name a few).
Connect Multiple PCs, with or without a ServerUse Domain Join to connect PCs quickly and more securely to your wired or wireless domain network.
Automatically Back up Your FilesProtect your data from user error, hardware failure, and other problems. You can back up your files to an external hard drive, secondary hard drive, writable CD or DVD, or to a network location.
Share Files across the Various PCs in Your HomeWith HomeGroup, it’s simple to share music, documents, printers, and everything else with the other PCs running Windows 7 throughout your house.
Learn more about the Windows 7 Professional Upgrade
Model
Brand
Microsoft
Model
FQC-00130
Details
Name
Windows 7 Professional Upgrade
Version
Upgrade
System Requirements
If you want to run Windows 7 on your PC, here's what it takes: 1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
1 gigabyte (GB) RAM (32-bit) or 2 GB RAM (64-bit)
16 GB available hard disk space (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)
DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver
Additional requirements to use certain features: Internet access (fees may apply)
Depending on resolution, video playback may require additional memory and advanced graphics hardware
For some Windows Media Center functionality a TV tuner and additional hardware may be required
Windows Touch and Tablet PCs require specific hardware
HomeGroup requires a network and PCs running Windows 7
DVD/CD authoring requires a compatible optical drive
Windows XP Mode requires an additional 1 GB of RAM, an additional 15 GB of available hard disk space, and a processor capable of hardware virtualization with Intel VT or AMD-V turned on
Music and sound require audio output
Product functionality and graphics may vary based on your system configuration. Some features may require advanced or additional hardware.
Packaging
Retail
Features
Feature
Easier to use Simplify your PC with new navigation features like Aero Shake, Jump Lists, and Snap.
Customize Windows to look and feel the way you like by changing themes and taskbar programs.
Easy to network (with or without a server).
Back up your complete system over a network.
Faster and more flexible Designed to make your PC sleep and resume quicker.
Takes full advantage of 64-bit PC hardware and memory.
Windows XP Mode gives you the business flexibility you need.
Best PC entertainment experience Watch, pause, rewind, and record TV with Windows Media Center.
Pros: Although most people consider Windows 7 to be the same thing as Vista (so did I until I installed it), there are some very nice advantages to 7 that most people do not realize.
Here are the most notable:
Backup and Restore - this feature allows you to easily and quickly make a backup image of your current system configuration over the network, onto a hard drive, or on a DVD. You can also make a system repair disk. Vista had nothing like this.
You can set what you want to be displayed on the start menu - I don't know why Microsoft doesn't do this by default, but the Downloads folder is not displayed on the start menu. You can easily add it by right clicking on the start button, selecting Properties -> Customize.
Multicore support - If you have a quad core, definitely get 7.
Better power modes - You can actually use wake timers without having to manually add them.
Desktop changer - Although this was included with Vista, it was only on Ulti
Cons: Overall, I don't see many cons. There are only two major ones in my opinion.
UAC mode is still rather annoying. Even at the lowest setting it still pops up quite often. At lowest setting it claims to only notify you if a program wants to make "changes to my computer," but programs that would seem to not make any changes at all will request permission.
However, this is really the fault of the programmers who made the software (although obviously it's not their fault if the software was made before Windows 7 came out).
This is the biggest issue for me: it costs $199.99 just for the upgrade. Let's be honest. Windows 7 is a lot better than Vista, but it is still, in technical terms, an incremental change. In my opinion the retail version should sell for $199.99 and the upgrade should sell for $100. Come on, most of the people upgrading will probably be Vista users, and they paid good money for a flawed product. I think it's only fair to charge an incremental upgrade
Overall Review: This is what Vista should have been. It's a solid operating system that has very good driver support, features, and aesthetics. I am rating it 5 eggs because I never rate the actual product on price or previous versions; it is a very good operating system that lives up to its claims...it's too bad that the computer world had to suffer through (and waste who knows how much money) to get to this point.
Pros: Lots of small improvements from Vista.
The new task bar is very nice
The new aero interface.
Free copy of XP pro (virtual PC) included for enhanced compatability
Works great with games (L4D, CoD(4 & WaW), Fallout 3, FarCry2)
Easy multimonitor support via the windows key + p
Homegroup
Cons: Had issues with wireless drivers dropping the connection
Had to install some programs/drivers in either compatibility mode or at Admin level
Overall Review: Great OS, got 2 copies from MSDNAA, 1 from academic discount and 2 preorders from Newegg, shipped today(10/21)
I have been using Windows 7 since beta to RC to RTM
Product key invalid but was false.10/25/2009 6:19:48 PM
Pros: So far its working great now that I got it installed.
Cons: With the upgrade version going from winxp Pro with no raid, to Windows 7 Pro upgrade version with raid 0 was a pain.
The upgrade version won't validate the product key because you have to have a previous version of winxp installed, but when you set your raid it clears the MBR of the drive and win7PU thinks your trying use the upgrade version for a clean install.
I tried calling in the key to Microsoft automated help line to do offline validation, but they told me the key I had was invalid and need to be return to the retailer. How ever the key is not invalid.
The solution I came up with was install win7PU 32bit on raid 0, Skip the product key validation, and the install Win7PU 64bit as upgraded to the Win7PU32bit. Then I was able to validate my key online.
Overall Review: They need a better way to check for winxp/vista, and MS support needs to validate these keys in this situation instead of having you send them back to retailer for a new copy that will do the same thing.
Anonymous
Ownership: more than 1 year
Verified Owner
A Good One!1/2/2011 6:48:18 PM
Pros: 64-bit and very, very fast on every machine I've installed it on. I have actually had more luck running older software and games under Windows 7 than under Windows Vista. So far, Windows 7 has been very stable and reliable on all the machines I've setup with this OS. Of course, all the systems that I maintain are setup and then locked down so average users cannot mess up the OS.
Cons: NONE.
Overall Review: It's funny how so many people blame Windows and / or Microsoft for their own inadequacies at using a computer. I had a guy drop off a system the other day, and he said he hated Internet Explorer because it never worked right for him ... he wanted me to install Firefox. (Which I did.) I opened IE8, and he must have had every toolbar that was ever made installed. All the toolbars literally took up half of his IE browser window. Uninstalling them all "magically" made IE start working again. I've run all of Microsoft's OSes, and I have to say, they've all run fine for me - provided I didn't go A-Wall with off-hand software, cheap hardware with lousy drivers, and as long as I never went in and tuned it up so "good" that it wouldn't even boot up anymore. C'mon people, give me a break.
Pros: what can I say? Win7 Pro...perfect. I did a clean install on a dell optiplex 755 which had Vista Biz on it. Luckily, it was completely infected and hosed. I popped the Win7 CD in there, booted up to it, did a clean install as I didn't need anything from before, installed in 12 minutes, SP1 took almost 30 minutes to install, also installed IE9 and all updates...all in under an hour. Anyone remember how a Windows 2000 install would take half a day?
Cons: none.
Overall Review: came with 32 and 64 bit bit dvd's in box.
Pros: Stable, great performance, improved UAC, a much better defined and organized GUI over Vista, great new Taskbar features, excellent new little AERO Peek, Snap, and Shake features for organization on the screen, Jump Lists for files quickly at hand, Libraries for better organization, XP Mode for compatability issues with programs and last but not least - the retail package includes both 32bit and 64bit if you aren't ready for 64bit yet but might be in the near future.
Cons: There still will be some compatibility issues out there with older hardware and software and also newer hardware until manufactures get ALL of their drivers and applications updated - however it won't be anywhere close to the amount of issues that were seen with Vista.
Overall Review: Other than on a secondary laptop I skipped Vista all together because of many older games that I still played along with other incompatabilies and general disliking of it. I can without a doubt now say that I am happy to be off of XP; not that I didn't like it but because of the robust performance and overall great look that Windows 7 offers.
Running great with an Intel DP45SG, Core 2 Duo P8400, 4GB of Crucial RAM, EVGA GTX260 SSC and WD5001AALS RAID 0.
Overall Review: If you didn't like Vista or avoided it and stayed with XP then you will not be disappointed with Win7. I myself liked Vista and never had one issue with it and it only got better with SP1. Win7 has alot of nice features and really simplifies alot of tasks.
Cons: I bought two copies of Windows 7 to upgrade two RAID 1 equipped XP computers. These MBs were bought in 2006 and 2007. I found that neither MB (both from ASUS) had Windows 7 compatible drivers available. Microsoft Tech Support was no help. The result is either a) buy a new MB for each computer to be able to upgrade these RAID equipped systems to Windows 7 or b) don't upgrade.
The moral of the story.. Make sure YOUR MB has Windows 7 drivers available for all functions BEFORE you buy Windows 7!
Pros: Although most people consider Windows 7 to be the same thing as Vista (so did I until I installed it), there are some very nice advantages to 7 that most people do not realize. Here are the most notable: Backup and Restore - this feature allows you to easily and quickly make a backup image of your current system configuration over the network, onto a hard drive, or on a DVD. You can also make a system repair disk. Vista had nothing like this. You can set what you want to be displayed on the start menu - I don't know why Microsoft doesn't do this by default, but the Downloads folder is not displayed on the start menu. You can easily add it by right clicking on the start button, selecting Properties -> Customize. Multicore support - If you have a quad core, definitely get 7. Better power modes - You can actually use wake timers without having to manually add them. Desktop changer - Although this was included with Vista, it was only on Ulti
Cons: Overall, I don't see many cons. There are only two major ones in my opinion. UAC mode is still rather annoying. Even at the lowest setting it still pops up quite often. At lowest setting it claims to only notify you if a program wants to make "changes to my computer," but programs that would seem to not make any changes at all will request permission. However, this is really the fault of the programmers who made the software (although obviously it's not their fault if the software was made before Windows 7 came out). This is the biggest issue for me: it costs $199.99 just for the upgrade. Let's be honest. Windows 7 is a lot better than Vista, but it is still, in technical terms, an incremental change. In my opinion the retail version should sell for $199.99 and the upgrade should sell for $100. Come on, most of the people upgrading will probably be Vista users, and they paid good money for a flawed product. I think it's only fair to charge an incremental upgrade
Overall Review: This is what Vista should have been. It's a solid operating system that has very good driver support, features, and aesthetics. I am rating it 5 eggs because I never rate the actual product on price or previous versions; it is a very good operating system that lives up to its claims...it's too bad that the computer world had to suffer through (and waste who knows how much money) to get to this point.