Do you Need Windows 7?

So you are thinking of getting Windows 7, but you are not sure, and you don;t know which version to buy or if you should have someone else install it. I can help.

First: Windows 7 is possibly the best operating system Microsoft has ever made. Windows 2000 was the most solid, Windows XP was easy to learn. Windows 98 just cannot do anything any more. Windows ME or Millennium was possibly the worst operating system Microsoft ever made. Windows Vista was a disaster, because Microsoft was trying to please everyone and wound up pleasing no-one.  Windows 7 is faster than any previous version, uses fewer resources than either XP or Vista, offers more functionality than any previous version and it has fewer compatibility problems than any previous version. So, no matter what you have you probably want it. BUT do you need it?

Whether or not you need Windows 7 depends upon three factors: the age and quality of your current system, what you do with that system and whether or not you are having problems doing what you want to do.  Let's look at that last one first. It is a caveat in many industries that you "don;t fix what ain't broke". That is, if your system does what you want it to do reasonably well, then you do not need to upgrade. Windows 7 is pretty and nice and fast, but there is a small learning curve, and if you upgrade your current machine, you may wish you had not the moment a really nice new spiffy machine comes out. Upgrading the entire machine these days is not a major expenditure. So if you are using a machine which is three or more years old, you should only upgrade to window 7 if you plan to keep ot a few more years. New machines come with Windows 7 installed.

If your machine is relatively new and is not behaving well with its current operating system, then you should probably look at upgrading. I bought a nice tablet PC from HP last year and it worked well for about 7 months, but then I had to start re-imaging it every six to eight weeks, because it crashed and nothing worked right. After using my restore disks three times I was really happy to get a release candidate copy of Windows 7. I installed it and everything has worked well since then. I did replace the RC version with a retail version last month, and the computer is very happy and so am I.

The last scenario is if you have a machine with Windows XP or Vista which cannot do what you want to do, but upgrading it will fix this. One example is running software that is incompatible with your current operating system, but which will run under windows 7. Make sure, though, that you check the other requirements, such as memory and processor speed.before you try to upgrade. Certain specialty programs, like voice input and video editors work better under the new OS also. This is good reason to upgrade.

So you have looked at all of these and decided to buy Windows 7. If you have XP or Vista installed you qualify for the upgrade price, However, while upgrading Vista is pretty easy, and it even leaves your programs installed, you may need to uninstall a few things or de-authorize subscriptions before upgrading. If you have XP you must do a custom install, which causes Windows 7 to take all your files and put them in a folder named Window.old, and then install itself. It will probably work even better if you uninstall most or all of your programs. Also, for both of these you should back up your data: documents, pictures, music and videos. You can move them to a backup external drive, back them up online or write them to DVDs. There are even special programs to make backup DVDs. The second thing you should do is uninstall your antivirus, in case it might interfere with the installation.

So this should help you decide what to do: keep your system as it is and buy a new one as soon as you can with Windows 7 installed, do nothing at all, or upgrade to Windows 7.