[Beverly Stacey]

I'm going to be upgrading my Toshiba Satellite (18 months old) from Vista to Windows 7 and have a couple of questions.

1. Am I correct in thinking I don't actually need to back up anything on my laptop before I do the install? I will back up just in case but just asking as I'm too geeky to not know the answer.

2. Can I transfer my Vista license to my husband's laptop (it's around 7 years old, Toshiba Satellite) it's running XP at the moment)? If so,I presume I'm going to need a key - where can I find this? My laptop didn't come with installation disks, I had to make up my own boot disks.

I'm aware I'll probably need to upgrade the memory on the older Toshiba, although I'm wondering whether it would be better to keep it running XP. He uses it for astronomy so runs quite a few programs on it, he rarely uses it online, only to download drivers etc.

Thank you!

The Linux is on my netbook by the way, not running anything other than Vista on my main laptop.

Edited by Beverly Stacey, 20 September 2010 - 06:03 AM.

[Advertisements]

I'm going to be upgrading my Toshiba Satellite (18 months old) from Vista to Windows 7 and have a couple of questions.

1. Am I correct in thinking I don't actually need to back up anything on my laptop before I do the install? I will back up just in case but just asking as I'm too geeky to not know the answer.

You should backup anyway, Also it is suggested if possible do a Clean install of Windows 7. It will take on average 20-40mins for a new install versus 1hr+ for an Inplace Windows upgrade which is prone to failures during the upgrade. For me the success rate is about 50-60% for Completing the upgrade. With most of the time issues end up arising during the final bit of the upgrade (first boot into the desktop screen)

2. Can I transfer my Vista license to my husband's laptop (it's around 7 years old, Toshiba Satellite) it's running XP at the moment)? If so,I presume I'm going to need a key - where can I find this? My laptop didn't come with installation disks, I had to make up my own boot disks.

Legally, No. The copy provided on your laptop is an OEM copy licensed for that computer hardware only. If it was the Retail Version then legally yes.

I'm aware I'll probably need to upgrade the memory on the older Toshiba, although I'm wondering whether it would be better to keep it running XP. He uses it for astronomy so runs quite a few programs on it, he rarely uses it online, only to download drivers etc.

Thank you!

The Linux is on my netbook by the way, not running anything other than Vista on my main laptop.

If the computer is 7 years old, it won't run vista well. As is vista is a huge resource hog compared to Windows XP. As such even computers at the time of release had issues running Vista smoothly out of the box.

HTH Jon

[amw_drizz]

I'm going to be upgrading my Toshiba Satellite (18 months old) from Vista to Windows 7 and have a couple of questions.

1. Am I correct in thinking I don't actually need to back up anything on my laptop before I do the install? I will back up just in case but just asking as I'm too geeky to not know the answer.

You should backup anyway, Also it is suggested if possible do a Clean install of Windows 7. It will take on average 20-40mins for a new install versus 1hr+ for an Inplace Windows upgrade which is prone to failures during the upgrade. For me the success rate is about 50-60% for Completing the upgrade. With most of the time issues end up arising during the final bit of the upgrade (first boot into the desktop screen)

2. Can I transfer my Vista license to my husband's laptop (it's around 7 years old, Toshiba Satellite) it's running XP at the moment)? If so,I presume I'm going to need a key - where can I find this? My laptop didn't come with installation disks, I had to make up my own boot disks.

Legally, No. The copy provided on your laptop is an OEM copy licensed for that computer hardware only. If it was the Retail Version then legally yes.

I'm aware I'll probably need to upgrade the memory on the older Toshiba, although I'm wondering whether it would be better to keep it running XP. He uses it for astronomy so runs quite a few programs on it, he rarely uses it online, only to download drivers etc.

Thank you!

The Linux is on my netbook by the way, not running anything other than Vista on my main laptop.

If the computer is 7 years old, it won't run vista well. As is vista is a huge resource hog compared to Windows XP. As such even computers at the time of release had issues running Vista smoothly out of the box.

HTH Jon

[Beverly Stacey]

Hi Jon

Thank you so much for your reply, yes - it does help a lot. You've confirmed everything I suspected in all cases. I wouldn't do any install without transferring everything to my external hard drive first, and I'd far rather opt for a clean install than just the conversion.

You're very right about Vista hogging the resources, I can't begin to work out how much time I've wasted waiting for firefox to respond, even after just typing the one character in some cases. I think that even if I had installed Vista on my husband's laptop I'd have been reverting to XP again before too long. My husband has no patience at the best of times, especially not for anything more technical than a kettle. I like a quiet life!

Thanks again and enjoy the rest of your day

Edited by Beverly Stacey, 20 September 2010 - 12:11 PM.

[amw_drizz]

Glad I was able to help