Helping a computer idiot buy an OS

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Rezereifer

New Member
I am buying a computer without an OS, and buying and installing the OS seperatally. I want to buy windows vista (due to its compatibility with certain games i have). On Amazon i found the following item for purchase: "Windows Vista, Ultimate Edition with Service Pack 1, Upgrade Version (32-bit CD and 64-bit DVD) (PC)". This item infers it is the UPGRADE VERSION, will this item include a full version of windows vista ultimate for my use or is it only for the sole purpose of upgrading previous versions of vista and therefore useless to me as i do not currently have any version of vista?

Thank you in advance for your patience and your assistance!
 
You need to have XP installed first before you can upgrade to Vista using your Vista Upgrade disc. You want to buy Ultimate (Retail) like this one. This retail copy of Vista will allow you to install Vista from scratch without having the need to have XP installed before-hand. An OEM copy of Vista will do as well. Once you've installed the OS, you need to use Windows Update to firstly update it to Vista SP1 (if the disc doesn't have SP1), and then update to SP2.

That being said, I don't have anything against Vista, but why don't you just get Windows 7? Most things that work on Windows Vista will work just fine on Windows 7 too you know? I believe Microsoft is dropping support this year for Vista too, meaning you will no longer get updates. So I don't think now is a good time to buy Vista. Also, Windows 7 is faster than Vista in most cases, it doesn't consume as many system resources. Vista likes to eat RAM!
 
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Rezereifer said:
I am buying a computer without an OS, and buying and installing the OS seperatally. I want to buy windows vista (due to its compatibility with certain games i have). On Amazon i found the following item for purchase: "Windows Vista, Ultimate Edition with Service Pack 1, Upgrade Version (32-bit CD and 64-bit DVD) (PC)". This item infers it is the UPGRADE VERSION, will this item include a full version of windows vista ultimate for my use or is it only for the sole purpose of upgrading previous versions of vista and therefore useless to me as i do not currently have any version of vista?

Thank you in advance for your patience and your assistance!
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Will not include retail version of Vista.

I recommend getting 7. Even if a game/program says it's highest compatibility is Vista, doesn't mean it won't run on 7. That just means when it was made, 7 wasn't commercial.

I've only ever seen 1 program not work on 7, but on Vista, and that's VirtualDJ.
 
I would wait and download windows 8 public preview at the end of the month. then pre order it and you will get a full retail copy dirt cheap.

I pre ordered windows 7 and only paid £35 for it, then recently sold it for £75 :)
 
Just stick with Windows 7 for the time being, it's a full product and will work just fine. So forget Vista, move onto 7, only try Windows 8 if you want to, but I wouldn't recommend running a beta OS on your main machine, you get hardware and driver incompatibles with the beta OS.
 
Don't get an upgrade because it is useless on empty hard disk drives.
Get the full retail edition of let's say Windows 7.
Even though my favorite is still XP and always will be :D




Cheers!
 
S.T.A.R.S. said:
Even though my favorite is still XP and always will be
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Off topic I know but I find XP to be slow with all the latest updates, and it's not great for modern hardware. I'm running XP on a decent-spec PC from 2005 here right now and it's quite slow even without any updates installed since SP3. Definitely would recommend getting 7 and forgetting about XP and Vista, both of these products will be obsolete in a year or two's time.
 
Windows 8 should never be a recommendation unless we are talking about Beta OS to use.

Windows 8 will only be a bets for a month? I do not understand this being that I used windows 7 Beta for I think like six months.
 
That was my understanding, i thought the windows 8 release at the end of this month was the final before public sale at end of year.

I used the final beta of windows 7 until the retail version came out, and there was hardly any difference between the final beta and retail version, i had no problems with any of my hardware or software.
 
he don't know what he is talking about either. Windows 8 will run as long as you have it installed. It is a DP, not a beta, and even the betas are full OS's not limited time OSs.
 
i get my information from microsoft, the pre beta win 8 does have a time limit on it,i never said any time limit on the beta version , if the beta version has no time limit then i would use that forever,that is if i wasnt using win xp.
 
vistakid10 said:
Off topic I know but I find XP to be slow with all the latest updates, and it's not great for modern hardware. I'm running XP on a decent-spec PC from 2005 here right now and it's quite slow even without any updates installed since SP3. Definitely would recommend getting 7 and forgetting about XP and Vista, both of these products will be obsolete in a year or two's time.
Click to expand...

LoL of course XP will work slow if you install all the upadtes WHEN NOT NECCESSARY.
I have XP installed on my system since 2004. and it still works perfectly.
 
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