[lbhocky19]

ok so i have a quad core vista machine with 3 gigs of ram and a 8800gt card that over the past year had both 500 gig hard drives die on me.
what i want to do is buy another hard drive and then upgrade to 7 with a student copy i can get cheap through school, the only issue i am anticipating is that you must have vista installed already.
Since my main hard drive is dead with the operating system when i buy a new one I wont have an OS installed.

Any ideas? could i have gateway send me a restore disc to use on a new hard drive or am i kind of stuck buying 7 out right

[Advertisements]

Any ideas? could i have gateway send me a restore disc to use on a new hard drive or am i kind of stuck buying 7 out right

Gateway should be able to sell you the recovery disk for your system which will put Vista back on it. Then the Win 7 upgrade you mentioned should install with no problem

[rshaffer61]

Any ideas? could i have gateway send me a restore disc to use on a new hard drive or am i kind of stuck buying 7 out right

Gateway should be able to sell you the recovery disk for your system which will put Vista back on it. Then the Win 7 upgrade you mentioned should install with no problem

[lbhocky19]

and the recovery disc could install on a clean hard drive bought retail?

[rshaffer61]

Yes, it will set the system up just as it was brand new. After everything is up and running correctly then you can install the upgrade of Win 7.
If there is a problem just let us know and we can assist you with that if need be.

[lbhocky19]

ok just found out the offer ended to get the premium 7 update.
now they offer windows 7 professional and it looks like standard OS and not an update version.
can i install that straight to the hard drive or do i still have to get the recovery disc from gateway since thats 20 bucks id rather not spend

[rshaffer61]

If it is a full copy then thats all you will need. Just install it to the new hd and you should be good.

[lbhocky19]

ok im just having a big fail day here.
looked at checkout and it says Microsoft Windows 7 Professional Upgrade - 32 bit
soo i guess it is indeed just an upgrade.

so hopefully last question.

can i upgrade from 32 bit vista to 64 7? or have to stay with 32

[rshaffer61]

Nope you would have to do a 32 bit OS upgrade.