Bought Dell with XP HOME want to Upgrade to XP PRO

[hothouse_57]

So I have a Dell with XP Home, I would like to upgrade to XP Pro. Now I am assuming that my Dell came with an OEM version of XP Home. Since to do a Reformat I have to do it within the system, pressing the ctrl f11 or something like that, no disk needed. Now do I need to buy the full version of XP Pro, or can I buy the upgrade version. And also do I have to uninstall the XP Home edition that come with my computer? I'm am a little confused with what needs ot be done, as far as which version ot purchase along with how to exactly do it, since it is an OEM.

[chilifrei64]

you can buy the upgrade..

[Kelsenellenelvian]

Just by the upgrade and during install it will check for a valid copy of XP-home.

[FthrJACK]

The upgrade stinks and you are likley to encoutner software problems and wierd driver issues and other notorius bugs.

beter off doing a clean install, but before you do back up your OEM systems partition to a DVD or two. the partitions probably hidden so you might need to set it to viewable in partition magic or in windows disk manager (if its displayed there, depends on how its hidden)

never upgrade windows, ever. if you do your just setting yourself up for a world of pain and headache.

[prathapml]

True, doing an upgrade is a PITA.

But you *CAN* buy an upgrade CD. Boot from it, and before it proceeds, it will ask for proof of purchase (of old version). At that point, just borrow a friend's Win2k pro, or XP home/pro CD, and insert it into drive. After that, continue, and do a fresh install (format your C:).

[InTheWayBoy]

True, doing an upgrade is a PITA.

But you *CAN*  buy an upgrade CD. Boot from it, and before it proceeds, it will ask for proof of purchase (of old version). At that point, just borrow a friend's Win2k pro, or XP home/pro CD, and insert it into drive. After that, continue, and do a fresh install (format your C:).

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Basically what I was gonna suggest...almost all of M$ upgrade CD's still allow you to perform a fresh install, only needing to verify you have a qualifying product. This is by far the best way to approach it, as you could then get ride of that OEM parition that your WinXP Home is sitting on. I personally don't like those, but you may want to keep it there. Only seems to get in the way for me...

Just make sure that you have a CD that will allow you to use the upgrade...you could even make your own CD from the I386 files you probably already have on your hard drive. There are a ton of posts about doing that, just do a quick search if you want to try it out.