Upgrade to Windows Vista

Upgrading to Windows Vista can be a good cost effective way to run Windows Vista without having to buy a whole new pc with the full operating system. If you have XP or 2000, you may wish to use this option, but you should note that the upgrade editions of Windows Vista will only keep your files and settings in place if you have certain versions of Windows. You can perform an upgrade to Vista otherwise by replacing the current operating system which will override it, however this is counted as an upgrade and you can use the Windows Vista upgrade for this. Below you can find a table with the operating systems that are able to upgrade, and the particular versions that can upgrade without having to over ride the old one (keeping in tact the files and settings).

The next thing to consider is whether an upgrade is in fact better than buying a new pc with Vista pre installed or to build your own one specifically for running Vista,. This can be done in 2 ways. Firstly run the upgrade advisor available from Microsoft's web site. Once you run the advisor you should be able to determine whether the pc is fast enough to run your preferred version of Vista. You ma also wish to consider whether you are going to be using many graphic intensive tasks such as playing games and therefore go for a powerful graphics card or not.

Hardware Recommendations:

RAM: at least 1GB of RAM, you will be able to run Vista with 512mb however your system will be too slow to run the Aero interface smoothly and the more applications you run, will slow the system down immensely. 2GB would be a decent amount if you usually have many browser windows open and other applications and if you like to play high graphic games. Make sure if you are buying/building a system that you get the newer DDR2 RAM as this is much faster and will allow for upgrades in the future if you wish to buy faster RAM,

Hard drive: At least 20GB would be needed for installation. You will need much more if you are going to be installation various applications and download a lot of media from the Internet. 160GB is a more likely size to get nowadays for a desktop and around 40GB minimum for a laptop, better to go for around 80GB. If you are building a system, opt for a SATA drive as it will improve performance for around the same price as IDE drives.

Processor: A dual core processor is recommended. Intel and AMD both offer dual core processors ranging from the low to high end with prices accordingly. You may be able to run Vista on a 3.0GHz pentium 4 or 2800+ AMD processor, however its best to go for dual core or similar processors as this will ensure the speed does not decrease as you run more demanding applications.

Graphics Cards: Aim for a graphics card with at least 256mb RAM. You can run Vista on fairly low end graphics cards, however many 256mb cards are available at low end prices so to run Vista smoothly it is recommended to go for 256MB ones.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Motherboards: Make sure they support the processor you are going to buy whether its AMD or Intel as there are many sockets in use for processors nowadays. Also the graphics card will need to be supported by the motherboard - SLI and crossfire are the latest for graphics so go for these if you are getting a fairly up to date card even though it may not be the best one. For ram just make sure you have the right amount of pins. Best to go for DDR2 supported motherboards.

Monitor: LCD is the preferred monitor so you will most probably want to go for one of these. Most graphics cards no support 2 monitors so if you would like a dual screen set up this can be done easily.

Power supply: If you are building your own system, make sure you get a decent supply that can support your hardware and is compatible with your processor/graphics card configuration

Case: Make sure the case is suitable for all your hardware, you may wish to get one that has good airflow and room for expansion.

 

Other considerations would be to always back up your data if you are about to upgrade the operating system.