Better to wait before buying new PC?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Brett
  • Start date Start date
The upgrade will be a clean install of the operating system, unlike upgrades
in previous editions of Windows, so if your concern is performance of
"clean" versus "upgraded" systems forget about it. It will only be an
upgrade in the sense of retaining your apps (but they are moved to another
part of the hard drive during the OS installation and then reinstalled at
the end). All installations of Vista are "clean" regardless of the
"upgrade" and "custom" options in Setup.
 
Do all versions of Vista ship with that? I think not.

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Richard G. Harper [MVP Shell/User] (e-mail address removed)
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Lang Murphy said:
Vista has Complete PC Backup Restore which -is- a disk image tool.

Lang

Richard G. Harper said:
Not to worry about a Vista "upgrade" as it's not an upgrade in the same
vein as other, prior Microsoft OSes have worked. The Vista upgrade
process is really more like a migration - settings and programs are
gathered, Vista is installed, then the migrated settings and programs are
put back again.

I would recommend that if you're worried about failure/reinstall that you
look into an imaging product that can create a perfect offline image of
your computer and store it for those rainy day problems.

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Richard G. Harper [MVP Shell/User] (e-mail address removed)
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Brett said:
I need a new desktop but am not sure if I should wait until Vista is
released in January or buy an XP box and upgrade via a free Vista coupon
(HP). I imagine the hardware (4GB RAM, 250GB HD, dual core Intel) I buy
now on an XP box will be just fine for a Vista upgrade. The question
mark for me is what may be the differences in the long run between
working on an upgraded Vista box verses a full install of Vista. Maybe
hardware that doesn't doesn't brand itself with Vista or something and
ends up causing problems when I upgrade.

I also wonder what a restore will be like with a Vista upgrade. I'll
have to restore the original XP then upgrade to Vista everytime. Any
comments are welcome.
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
Any of them will work - I use both Norton Ghost and Image from TeraByte
Unlimited on a regular basis, personally. As for storage, get a cheap
external USB drive and store the image file on that.

--
Richard G. Harper [MVP Shell/User] (e-mail address removed)
* NEW! Catch my blog ... http://msmvps.com/blogs/rgharper/
* PLEASE post all messages and replies in the newsgroups
* The Website - http://rgharper.mvps.org/
* HELP us help YOU ... http://www.dts-l.org/goodpost.htm
 
It isn't great at letting you know the space. It will warn but then says
that using compression it may work. Quite frankly you are going to end up
with an out of space if you push the envelope, but it does allow several
levels of compression (just uses more cpu to accomplish). As to how it
makes an image with so many files loaded, it has a great deal of I/O when it
starts and my guess is it makes some kind of shadow copy, but I don't know
the internals.
 
Maybe in theory, but that doesn't mean they install properly or work. Too
many have bad results for it to be considered a fait accompli IMHO
 
I have tried telling folks this, no one listens.
That previous mentality of "upgrade install" is
bad or "unclean", permeates profusely in
these quarters... but Vista's install *is*
different. Old habits and old (justified)
assumptions die hard.

How have you been, Colin? Haven't seen
you post often.


Take care,

Michael
 
After numerous upgrades of various Vista builds on
two different machines, I have only had *one* upgrade
install fail. Yes, they take much longer to complete.
But, I have been absolutely pleased with the results
of "upgrade installs".

The one thing I do suggest for anyone doing an upgrade,
uninstall any AV software, even if the compatibility advisor
doesn't say so, and do some disk cleanup ahead of time.


-Michael
 
All well and good for your machine and software mix. Posts on the various
Vista groups indicate lots have problems. I didn't have one that worked
personally. I did uninstall the AV and everything that had advanced
warnings (about 1/3 of the software and several hardware items). Of course
it may be better by RTM. I won't be able to try that one.
In the same vein, a lot of the software that wasn't listed as a problem
would not install or work properly when I tried to install it on a clean
install. I personally have resorted to trying all software on a 'test'
partition before attempting an install on the system I want to use daily.
 
I don't doubt your experiences at all.

On the two machines I have used for testing
Vista, they are lean and clean. I do not install
a lot of software. If I do, and I don't like it- I remove
the program promptly. I only keep programs that I
like and use often.

I think my main point, regardless of an "upgrade"
or "clean" install- there will be no "old" code of
the prior OS left behind/mixed in. The Vista OS will
be *exactly* as the image on the install disk.

-Michael
 
Certainly can't argue with that. A good point.

MICHAEL said:
I don't doubt your experiences at all.

On the two machines I have used for testing
Vista, they are lean and clean. I do not install
a lot of software. If I do, and I don't like it- I remove
the program promptly. I only keep programs that I
like and use often.

I think my main point, regardless of an "upgrade"
or "clean" install- there will be no "old" code of
the prior OS left behind/mixed in. The Vista OS will
be *exactly* as the image on the install disk.

-Michael
Click to expand...
 
John said:
I am just going by what Darrell Gorter (MSFT) has written. He has been very
reliable for over a year in the x64 group. Do a search on his posts and
interpret for yourself on this subject. Quite a few yesterday were to the
point. Both here and on the installation newsgroup
Click to expand...

John:

I have to say I am amazed that this news has not brought the same howls
of protest that accompanied the initial decision to limit full retail
reinstalls to one new machine.

I don't do upgrade versions, so this does not bother me personally, but
this seems to me to make an upgrade version either totally worthless or
at best very inconvenient. If you pay for software, you should be able
to reload it on the same machine without jumping through hoops.

I would have thought that upgrade versions could have been saved from
abuse by having the user supply both the media and the product ID of the
qualifying product, and then linking the qualifying ID and the Vista
product ID in the MS database.

David Wilkinson
 
I'm surprised also. Seems very restrictive. I didn't get an answer as to
whether the installed os had to be both activated and genuine advantage
approved, but the fact that a clean install in most cases has to be done to
another partition seems very inconvenient at best.
 
Any idea how big the image will be for 65GB of OS/programs/data?

Thanks,
Brett

Richard G. Harper said:
Any of them will work - I use both Norton Ghost and Image from TeraByte
Unlimited on a regular basis, personally. As for storage, get a cheap
external USB drive and store the image file on that.

--
Richard G. Harper [MVP Shell/User] (e-mail address removed)
* NEW! Catch my blog ... http://msmvps.com/blogs/rgharper/
* PLEASE post all messages and replies in the newsgroups
* The Website - http://rgharper.mvps.org/
* HELP us help YOU ... http://www.dts-l.org/goodpost.htm


Brett said:
Do you have a preference on what you use to image? I only have one
machine now so how can it image if the OS is loaded?

Thanks,
Brett
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
 
The drawback still being you have to first install XP then Vista on upgrades
any time the machine is wiped...correct?

Brett
 
MICHAEL said:
I have tried telling folks this, no one listens.
That previous mentality of "upgrade install" is
bad or "unclean", permeates profusely in
these quarters... but Vista's install *is*
different. Old habits and old (justified)
assumptions die hard.
Click to expand...

Yeah I read that too, then I actually did some upgrade installs to test it
and of 5 machines tested, 5 died and couldn't complete the upgrade to Vista
nor roll back to XP. Vista worked on them all with a clean install.

The *last* time I heard the "ooh the upgrade is different this time really
it is" story was.. let me see now.. oh yes, when XP was the new juice. And
we all know that didn't end well for some upgraders.
 
Robert Moir said:
Yeah I read that too, then I actually did some upgrade installs to test it and of 5 machines
tested, 5 died and couldn't complete the upgrade to Vista nor roll back to XP. Vista worked
on them all with a clean install.

The *last* time I heard the "ooh the upgrade is different this time really it is" story was..
let me see now.. oh yes, when XP was the new juice. And we all know that didn't end well for
some upgraders.
Click to expand...

I reckon I've been lucky. More than likely, the machines
I've upgraded didn't have many programs installed, and
that presented fewer opportunities for conflicts.


-Michael
 
Brett said:
I need a new desktop but am not sure if I should wait until Vista is
released in January or buy an XP box and upgrade via a free Vista coupon
(HP). ...
Click to expand...

If you buy Vista - with or without a computer - end of January, you
will have Vista end of January.
If you buy an XP box and upgrade to Vista via the 'express' coupon,
you will have Vista 6 - 8 weeks after end of January.


Roy
 
Brett said:
The drawback still being you have to first install XP then Vista on upgrades
any time the machine is wiped...correct?
Click to expand...


Yes - first install XP and activate it, and then install Vista...

Roy
 
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