Will I be able to upgrade my copy of Windows 7 (OEM) to 8 on Friday?

Cromulent · 22 Oct 2012 at 18:18

I have Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit but it is the OEM version. Will I still be able to upgrade to Windows 8 on Friday or is there some restriction on upgrading from an OEM version of Windows 7?

Craig321 · 22 Oct 2012 at 18:22

As far as I know you can upgrade any version of Windows for £25? (£15 if you only just bought the PC).

jamjar · 22 Oct 2012 at 19:11

Craig321 said:
As far as I know you can upgrade any version of Windows for £25? (£15 if you only just bought the PC).

this is correct

PhilGQ · 22 Oct 2012 at 19:18

with a hundred million people downloading at once, I reckon it will be more like Sunday before the download finishes

By the way I made up the hundred million, but its going to be a lot of people however you look at it.

jas72 · 22 Oct 2012 at 20:36

Craig321 said:
As far as I know you can upgrade any version of Windows for £25? (£15 if you only just bought the PC).

great looking to upgrade my nc10 form xp to 8 25 quid is about all i want to pay.

pity you cant pre-order

thecremeegg · 22 Oct 2012 at 20:48

So if I have say a copy of XP installed and upgrade, what happens if I need to reformat for example, do I need to install XP each time?

Sorry if this is a bit on the noobish side, never bought an upgrade version before!

Cromulent · 22 Oct 2012 at 20:50

thecremeegg said:
So if I have say a copy of XP installed and upgrade, what happens if I need to reformat for example, do I need to install XP each time?

Sorry if this is a bit on the noobish side, never bought an upgrade version before!

Good question. I'd like to know the answer to this too.

I would hope that the upgrade is just an ISO image with a serial number.

Craig321 · 22 Oct 2012 at 22:12

PhilGQ said:
with a hundred million people downloading at once, I reckon it will be more like Sunday before the download finishes

By the way I made up the hundred million, but its going to be a lot of people however you look at it.

I'm hoping to get it at work on Friday on the fibre, so hopefully it won't be too busy/overloaded! Can't be doing with waiting for it to download on my 1Mbps connection :/

gareth170 · 22 Oct 2012 at 22:52

thecremeegg said:
So if I have say a copy of XP installed and upgrade, what happens if I need to reformat for example, do I need to install XP each time?

Sorry if this is a bit on the noobish side, never bought an upgrade version before!

no

u can do a clean install still. in fact win 8 as a feature that u can restore windows to a clean state.

Glaucus · 22 Oct 2012 at 22:59

Download manager, purchase at midnight and leave. I can't see it taking to long, few hours.
On the RP the only problem was getting to the downlaod link, once you got the link, it downloaded fine.

bledd · 22 Oct 2012 at 23:14

jas72 said:
great looking to upgrade my nc10 form xp to 8 25 quid is about all i want to pay.

pity you cant pre-order

Metro has a minimum resolution requirement, doesn't work on 1024x600 (many netbooks have this as the max res)

Worth checking before buying!

PhilGQ · 23 Oct 2012 at 11:53

Craig321 said:
I'm hoping to get it at work on Friday on the fibre, so hopefully it won't be too busy/overloaded! Can't be doing with waiting for it to download on my 1Mbps connection :/

I am more concerned about the other end of the wire. I have got a 30Mb connection but downloads from PSN take ages. I know MS have more/better capcity than Sony but still...

Glaucus said:
Download manager, purchase at midnight and leave. I can't see it taking to long, few hours.
On the RP the only problem was getting to the downlaod link, once you got the link, it downloaded fine.

Hopefully it will be similar tp RP then, but I guess knowbody know what launch demand will be like until it launches.

ChocolateStarfishRammer · 23 Oct 2012 at 12:02

The more appropriate question is,

Why would you want to?

PhilGQ · 23 Oct 2012 at 12:47

ChocolateStarfishRammer said:
The more appropriate question is,

Why would you want to?

Because its where the party is at.

stoofa · 23 Oct 2012 at 13:06

ChocolateStarfishRammer said:
The more appropriate question is,

Why would you want to?

Because he's taken a proper look at the new OS and decided he actually wants to upgrade. Finds the "negatives" very small compared to the advantages. And has decided upon it's own merit that an upgrade is a good idea rather than:
A. Taking one look, seeing "something different" and running away.
or
B. Listening to other people who are jumping on the usual "MS suxxor" bandwagen (a la Vista).

Glaucus · 23 Oct 2012 at 13:14

stoofa said:
B. Listening to other people who are jumping on the usual "MS suxxor" bandwagen (a la Vista).

Don't forget xp. Same rubbish articles back then. So much so there was a petition by some to save it.
Every single windows release gets these articles.

ChocolateStarfishRammer · 23 Oct 2012 at 14:32

stoofa said:
Because he's taken a proper look at the new OS and decided he actually wants to upgrade. Finds the "negatives" very small compared to the advantages. And has decided upon it's own merit that an upgrade is a good idea rather than:
A. Taking one look, seeing "something different" and running away.
or
B. Listening to other people who are jumping on the usual "MS suxxor" bandwagen (a la Vista).

A.

Took me 10minutes to figure out how to uninstall a program.

Crud.

jas72 · 23 Oct 2012 at 14:42

bledd. said:
Metro has a minimum resolution requirement, doesn't work on 1024x600 (many netbooks have this as the max res)

Worth checking before buying!

thanks bledd for the advice.

Just checked so windows 8 built for tablets is NOT built for netbooks oh well....

Surprised that netbooks make up to less than 1.2% of the windows market......

windows boffin said:
Looking at the data about devices in the marketplace today, we see that only 1.2% of active Windows 7 users have screens with a resolution of less than 1024x768. When designing a new platform that supports the devices of today and tomorrow (with undoubtedly higher resolutions) we optimized for the majority of today’s screens (i.e. 98.8%) without sacrificing the experience and complicating the developer story for legacy screens.

Ah well 25quid less for MS I doubt they'll be worried

the NC10 can go to higher resolutions but it means a left and right scroll just wonder what the effect of that would be on my netbook? I think it would be too much of a PITA.

Glaucus · 23 Oct 2012 at 14:54

It is built for netbooks, just not old netbooks that don't support it.
Need equipment will support it, doesnt help you or others with old equipment though

And actually to make full use of it you need 1366x768

Which is why all w8 tablets have the higher res.

champ222 · 23 Oct 2012 at 20:13

so could i buy an upgrade now at 25 quid whilst its cheap, but not actually use the update yet? in a year or so when the issues are all ironed out and win 7 is starting to feel old?

I have 3 pcs with windows on could i buy 3 copies and put them aside until i'm ready for 8?