Questions about upgrading Windows 7 Home Premium to Professional

Hello guys,

I bought my HP laptop that have Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit installed in it with a Recovery Partition ( I didn't order the windows disc ) , then I recently bought Windows 7 Professional 64-bit and I would like to replace it with Home Premium, but I have three questions:

1. Should I upgrade the Home Premium version to Professional or it's better to replace it ( clean install I mean )

2. If I do a clean install I will lose my Recovery Partition of Home Premium version ??

3. I'm afraid that HP Product Support wouldn't support some missing drivers I may lose ( http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareList?os=4063&lc=en&dlc=en&cc=us&product=4043711&lang=en)

thanks...

 

1.) You should be able to use Windows Anytime Upgrade to migrate from Home Premium to Professional using your purchased key. The WAU process takes about ten minutes and keeps all your data, programs & data intact.

http://www.winsupersite.com/win7/ff_wau.asp

2.) Not unless you delete/merge the hidden recovery partition during a clean install or install into that partition.

3.) Not sure which drivers you think you may lose, but because you are staying with Windows 7 on the same platform (x64), driver support doesn't change.

--L.

 

My university (Cairo University) made an agreement with Microsoft, to distribute Windows 7 Professional 64-bit and 86-bit and Office 2007 for the students and teachers, it is sold for 3$ and it activates itself through the internet. I don't have any keys for it only the disc, I'm not sure how it work !!

 

I'm not familiar with the particulars of your University Agreement, but if don't have a key then you should be fine with an in-place upgrade over your existing installation. Since you are not changing OS or platform, but merely moving to a different edition, you should have no worries about an in-place upgrade.

If the disc forces a clean install (the upgrade option would not be available), be sure to cancel, back up your data then restart the installation process.

(It's always a good idea to back up your data, even when doing an in-place upgrade.)

--L.

 

You'll probably have to download ISO files from which you can make a bootable disk. I'd personnally perform a clean install after backing up all the important files.

 

I'm not familiar to Universities agreements too so well I bought 2 discs, the other one is Windows 7 Professional 32-bit, I'll do a clean install on my old TOSHIBA laptop to test it since it have vista.

 

What ISO files to a make bootable disk and why ?? I prefer a clean install too since I got my laptop with HP's bloatware and 32GB USAGE in the C: Drive

 

If you are going to upgrade to Windows 7 Professional 32-bit, then your ONLY option is a clean install upgrade. You cannot go from one platform (64-bit) to another (32-bit) without performing a clean install.

If the copy of Windows 7 Professional you purchased came with two disks, one 32-bit and 64-bit, it is a retail package. Note that you cannot install and runs these concurrently. You can move back-and-forth between 32-bit and 64-bit as much as you'd like, but you cannot run the 32-bit version simultaneously with the 64-bit version on another machine.

If you purchased two licenses, one 32-bit and one 64-bit, obviously you can install and run them at the same time.

The retail versions of the full and upgrade products are sold with both 32-bit and 64-bit disks but only one license. The license provides for installation and reinstallation of either platform as much as you'd like. You may transfer that copy to a new machine, provided you uninstall it from the old laptop first.

OEM versions, however, are sold as either 32-bit or 64-bit only, and with a single license. Typically these licenses are also single machine licenses. If you install the 32-bit version on your Toshiba laptop, later uninstall it and attempt to install on a different laptop, the license activation will fail. You can reinstall it as much as you'd like on the Toshiba, but only the Toshiba and only in 32-bit.

--L.

 

thanks for the elaboration, you made me understand what is going on, they are 2 different license by the way (OEM versions) because they said it will connect to the internet right after the install finish then activates itself and run on this computer only( 1 computer only).

 

Technically it is possible to use x86 key in x64 and vice versa, since the keys are universal. The actual reason for "cannot do that" is more complex.

OEM versions are not meant to be sold for end users, they are meant to be sold for System Builders and OEM manufacturers who sell complete systems: the combination of hardware and software is one product. It is up to the system builder to decide between x86 or x64 OS.

Microsoft had (somewhere) stated that using x64 instead of preinstalled x86 is okay, but it is up to the system builder to provide support, drivers and install media for their product. Not all OEM/System Builders provide both sets of drivers, instead they will say that their product is meant to be only x86 and it's their right to do so. End users may disagree

 

My advice is to back up all your data and do a clean install, if you cant find all the drivers on the HP website check out this link

about those university licences, they are volume licences, we have them at our school too, they all use the same key (which is embeded in the installation disc already, you don't need to enter it) and probably the licence agreement is the same as in my school, and it states that you are allowed to legally use the software for the duration of your course, but afterwards you should uninstall it and replace it with a personal licence (which you can get cheap thru school as well, at our school it's $65 for a lifetime licence to win7 ultimate), now there's no way MS can check if you are still using the software or not, its just not legal anymore ... so it's up to you to do the right thing or not ...