Windows XP Pro Upgrade

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jimbo
  • Start date Start date
J

Jimbo

Hi People,
I'm looking to upgrade the XP Home Edition on my laptop to XP Pro.
Because it is a laptop it has a million and one drivers installed for
things like the touchpad, power consumption, and wireless networking. My
question is, will the XP Pro Upgrade just upgrade the OS or will the
hardware specific drivers (and configurations like WEP keys) have to
re-installed?

Thanks
Jimbo.

P.S. Sorry if you've already read this on alt.os.windows-xp but that
list seems to be more about flaming than XP.
 
It really depends on the maker of the laptop.

You *may* be able to get a retail upgrade for XP and find the necessary
drivers on the website or extract them from a recovery CD.

The easiest would be to get the upgrade from the makers of the laptop.

hth
DDS W 2k MVP MCSE
 
That article is about upgrading from Home SP2 to Pro Non-SP2, which
apparently you can't do. That's not my problem.

I'm after info about how many drivers get wiped when I upgrade. Googling
doesn't find much of use, except one post in a forum where someone
upgraded and lost their wireless network - which is exactly what I am
trying to avoid.

Thanks anyway.
 
Jimbo said:
That article is about upgrading from Home SP2 to Pro Non-SP2, which
apparently you can't do. That's not my problem.

I'm after info about how many drivers get wiped when I upgrade. Googling
doesn't find much of use, except one post in a forum where someone
upgraded and lost their wireless network - which is exactly what I am
trying to avoid.

Thanks anyway.
Click to expand...
Could I ask why you want to upgrade from home to pro as from what I
understand there isn't really much point? I have a friend with 2 computers
networked together one is home and one is xp and it all works
satisfactorily. He was going to put pro on the home one but he doesn't see
any point.
Tricia
 
Could I ask why you want to upgrade from home to pro as from what I
understand there isn't really much point? I have a friend with 2 computers
networked together one is home and one is xp and it all works
satisfactorily. He was going to put pro on the home one but he doesn't see
any point.
Tricia
Click to expand...

Web Services mainly, it's for my Masters project - so I do kinda need it.
 
Jimbo said:
Web Services mainly, it's for my Masters project - so I do kinda need
it.
Click to expand...


Why don't you contact the computing services dept. at your college....they
may have some insights....I'm sure a lot of students and profs are in the
same situation you are in.
 
John said:
Why don't you contact the computing services dept. at your college....they
may have some insights....I'm sure a lot of students and profs are in the
same situation you are in.
Click to expand...

Cunning plan. I'll have a word :-)

Cheers
Jimbo.
 
In
Tricia said:
Could I ask why you want to upgrade from home to pro as from
what I
understand there isn't really much point? I have a friend with
2
computers networked together one is home and one is xp and it
all
works satisfactorily. He was going to put pro on the home one
but he
doesn't see any point.
Click to expand...


Tricia, saying "there isn't really much point" is an
overstatement. It's certainly true that for *most* home users,
there's no advantage to XP Professional over Home. But you don't
know that the OP is a home user, and even if he is, he may be
someone who needs one or more of the extra features in
Professional.

Here's the way I usually put it:

XP Professional and XP Home are exactly the same in all respects,
except that Professional has a few features (mostly related to
networking and security) missing from Home. For most (but not
all) home users, even those with a home network, these features
aren't needed, would never be used, and buying Professional
instead of Home is a waste of money.

For details go to

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_home_pro.asp

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/whichxp.asp

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/howtobuy/choosing2.asp

Also note that Professional allows ten concurrent network
connections, and Home only five.
 
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