Will these computers run 'Windows 7 Home'?

[LondonMX]

DELL OPTIPLEX GX270 DESKTOP
INTEL PENTIUM 4 HT 2.8GHZ
2GB RAM (PC2700 333MHZ)
40GB MAXTOR ATA


Dell LATITUDE 110L laptop
1.4ghz celeron
1.2 gb RAM
40gb hard drive


Will these run ‘Windows 7 Home’ okay or will it be slow as hell?
Would I need a second HDD on the desktop computer? If so what capacity?

Many thanks….

[IrishRover]

First one I would say will be fine. Laptop would probably be ok with another 1GB of RAM.

What I've found is if anything runs XP smoothly, then Win7 will run fine on it.

[matt077]

1st would should work ok mate, the 2nd may be a hit or miss tho but saing that, i been running the full win7 on a vmware system at work, 1.73ghz 1gb and worked ok

[Scott]

should be ok, just make sure the GFX card is reasonable.

40gb hard disk is probably going to be a bit slow, and we all know how windows 7 and vista likes to hammer the disks, but luckily for slower systems, a 2gb mem stick can really help offload the page file / registry work to the USB to help save the hard disk and make a noteable improvement to systems with low ram...

At a push, to get windows 7 working faster, you can pick up a geforce 6 series or similar for 20quid new, that will help offload some of the graphics acceleration via direct x 11 direct to the nvidia GPU.

[Sheaf]

What I've found is if anything runs XP smoothly, then Win7 will run fine on it.

If that's the case then he's definately sorted. I've run XP on ~300mhz/128mb machine before. Takes a while to boot but once running works ok.

[Mark16v]

I hear loads of people running Win7 RC on netbooks with the Atom 1.6Ghz and 1Gb ram, so your Latitude should do fine.

[IrishRover]

What I've found is if anything runs XP smoothly, then Win7 will run fine on it.

If that's the case then he's definately sorted. I've run XP on ~300mhz/128mb machine before. Takes a while to boot but once running works ok.

There's a very noticeable difference between a machine running XP which has 1GB of RAM and one that has 2GB of RAM.
I would say that 2GB is needed to run smoothly - whether that's XP or Win7. Otherwise, physical memory is used up very quickly and virtual memory is used much more often, meaning the hard disk is constantly being accessed, which slows everything down. As a general rule of thumb, if your PC is slow and has less than 2GB, adding more memory will make a huge difference.

[Scott]

in the olden days XP was fine on slower machines.

Now you have SP2 and SP3 with all the updates that add a fair bit to the package.

I recently formatted / reinstalled a 2.8ghz p4 with only 256mb ram, the install was ok-ish, then pile on the updates and only msn messenger and the page file is going crazy with the disk access...

Wack in 1gb of ram (2x512 for 20quid from ebay), and the pc is much better.

Then took his 256gb ram and donated it to a mate with a similar machine with only 256mb ram, and the jump the 512 on xp was also noticeable interms of pagefile being used less, and just generall snappier usage.

even on like for like hardware, windows 7 seems faster, but that might be a perception thing because of the GFX. Dont even compare win 7 with vista, its miles ahead...

running XP and win7 on the same machine, win 7 is miles better / happier (amd 4800, raid 0 stripe disks, geforce 8800, running 2x widescreens), its a nice place to be...

[rovex]

Netbooks run it fine and a 1.6ghz atom is about as fast as a celeron at half that. RAM is the only real issue, and its cheap to add a little more.

[Sheaf]

My old laptop came with XP installed out the box.

1.1 Ghz Celeron
128mb RAM

It used to be fine, think I even had SP2 on it tbh, definately SP1.

However it developed a slight fan issue I think and used to just overheat and reset itself, lol.


The netbook (NC20) ran absolutely fine with 1GB ram. I've upgraded to 2GB now but it made no difference, I only did it because ram's dirt cheap.

Not run 7 on anything bar my desktop which is totally broken though, so I cant judge.

[IrishRover]

The release date for Win7 is October 22nd. You can still pre-order Windows 7 Home Premium on Amazon for £65
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Microsoft-Windo ... 002DUCMT2/
(Professional version is £148 and Ultimate is £160)
Here's a table which shows the features each includes here:
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=14198

There's a lot of hype about Windows 7. I'd take it with a fair pinch of salt. Yes, it does seem to use resources more efficiently than Vista did, and the task bar has changed, having obviously been influenced by Mac OS X's dock. However, i can't help raising an eyebrow at how forcefully and unanimously people have been singing its praises. It's really not so different to Vista, and yet any randomer in the street who couldn't tell a cdrom from a usb stick seemed to be willing to tut about how awful that was.

The feature I'll be buying it for is Media Centre. It now supports DVB-S as well as DVB-T and is basically a rollup of Vista with the OEM TV-pack.

[Cableguy]

The release date for Win7 is October 22nd. You can still pre-order Windows 7 Home Premium on Amazon for £65
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Microsoft-Windo ... 002DUCMT2/
(Professional version is £148 and Ultimate is £160)
Here's a table which shows the features each includes here:
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=14198

There's a lot of hype about Windows 7. I'd take it with a fair pinch of salt. Yes, it does seem to use resources more efficiently than Vista did, and the task bar has changed, having obviously been influenced by Mac OS X's dock. However, i can't help raising an eyebrow at how forcefully and unanimously people have been singing its praises. It's really not so different to Vista, and yet any randomer in the street who couldn't tell a cdrom from a usb stick seemed to be willing to tut about how awful that was.

The feature I'll be buying it for is Media Centre. It now supports DVB-S as well as DVB-T and is basically a rollup of Vista with the OEM TV-pack.

Hi colin, Vista and xp both run DVB S quite nicely without any mods out of the box using a hardware decoder.

[IrishRover]

A patch was needed with XP MCE to make DVB-S work. It made media centre think the sat card was really a digital terrestrial card. Once that patch was installed though, you couldn't use a real DVB-T card. It was either/or.

It was the same story with Vista, until they brought out the TV-pack, but this was only strictly available to OEMs and not on release to retail.

[Cableguy]

Well that is the case, but i thought you were having trouble getting it to work at all hence my suggestion.

the FloppyDTV S2 has an MCE driver with it that just tells MCE that particular card is DVB-T and works fine with subsciption packages like Sky and Virgin media. You can still use a DVB - T as a secondary card if you go down this route, which is what ive done a couple of times so people can still watch freeview whilst recording subsciption packages.

Would love to use 2 x DVB-S cards and do a proper sky + setup but because the way the decoders work you would need two sky subscriptions on that machine

[rovex]

The problems with Vista were exaggerated anyway. It was slow and did spontaneously stop working properly for no reason, 7 fixes that, along with the new look it fixes most of the issues Vista had. The others were about drivers (which always happens with a new OS) and general anti-MS BS that is around.

[agw_01]

The netbook (NC20) ran absolutely fine with 1GB ram. I've upgraded to 2GB now but it made no difference, I only did it because ram's dirt cheap.

I found exactly the same thing with my NC10. Doubling the RAM made naff all difference. I guess the little Atom really struggles.

I like Windows 7, having used it since it was released as a beta. I instantly noticed it to be much much quicker than Vista and having a few little extras which I found handy. I liked it that much, that I bought it ( ) and am looking forward to having a play.

We've installed it onto a machine at work and despite only having 512mb RAM, it seems to be coping fairly well. I installed it onto my NC10 as well and it didn't do a bad job, being only slightly slower than XP once booted.

[IrishRover]

Well that is the case, but i thought you were having trouble getting it to work at all hence my suggestion.

No, that until now, Media Centre didn't officially support DVB-S. There were specific manufacturer workarounds/patches like the one you mentioned.

Would love to use 2 x DVB-S cards and do a proper sky + setup but because the way the decoders work you would need two sky subscriptions on that machine

That's what I have on my Win7 media centre, except I have the freesat equivalent instead of Sky+. I have two feeds from satellite, one for digital terrestrial for the channels that freesat doesn't yet have like Virgin1, Dave Ja Vu, Fiver and Five US, and another for DVB-T2 for the Irish digital channels which are testing mpeg-4 transmission at the moment. They all appear in the EPG and you can order them in any way you like and as far as the user is concerned, he doesn't have to know or care what way the channels are being received.

As for the reports of Windows XP or Vista or 7 running ok with small amounts of memory, I can only guess that it's down to people's perception of what's acceptable or what they're used to.

[Sheaf]

I guess the little Atom really struggles.

.

The NC20s got the VIA Nano, which seems fine tbh. I can run dual screens (the external one in 1280 x 780 or something similar) and do run several programs at the same time and it doesn't have an issue. Nor does it mind outputting video (normal divx stuff) on the second screen.

I cant see me putting 7 on that though as XP does everything I want on it, it's got all the drivers and the processor speed control set up fine, and I figure if it's not broke, dont try and fix it. A mate has an eePC netbook, used 7 on it but found it no advantage to XP.

On the desktop I'm planning on going to 7 mind, as I want the extra media features etc. Plus I really want the handy option of dragging to the side of the screen and the window maximising to that half of the screen.... so useful on a decent size widescreen when you want windows side by side. Only a little feature, but a very useful one.

[LondonMX]

Im upgrading from XP PRO SP3...

So have we got to the bottom regarding how 'windows 7 home premium UPGRADE' and 'windows 7 home premium FULL' are different? Apart from the price??

[Cableguy]

Im upgrading from XP PRO SP3...

So have we got to the bottom regarding how 'windows 7 home premium UPGRADE' and 'windows 7 home premium FULL' are different? Apart from the price??

Well yeah , one you dont need an install of XP or vista installed , the other you do

[LondonMX]

so for 'upgrade' you need XP installed on the computer. (or is it based on having an XP product key)?

if i formatted the hard drive could i install using just '7 upgrade' or would i have to install XP then do WIndows 7 Upgrade after.

and im guessing for 'full' you dont need any operating system installed at all?

Also one last question how come when i format c: and reinstall windows XP why does it not ask for my product key? I dont understand where it retains it if i formatted the hard drive?

Thanks,

[Cableguy]

You got that all right as far as i can see mate, and yes you will need a copy of XP or Vista installed.

It should ask for the product key at the final stage, if it doesnt its an activated version by the looks.

[syzsounds]

Use the windows 7 compatability thing and find out if everything will work ok.
I didnt and now cant get drivers for my graphics card.

Even the ones that are supposed to work don't.
Im not alone either, Looked on the microsoft forums last night and the amount of people having problems with drivers and now random bits just not working is unreal.
Looks like another rushed unfinished product from microshite, Well, You wouldn't expect anything else now would you.

[rovex]

Microsoft isnt responsible for 3rd party driver compatibility. IHVs often report their products will work, but later it proves they don't. Ive seen the forums and i have some of the hardware others say doesnt work, but it works for me, this implys that its not windows 7 thats faulty, its their hardware or configuration.

It doesnt happen with MacOS so much because its a closed market with limited hardware, it happens less with Linux because no ones using it. Windows is used on more diverse hardware than any other software on earth.

[syzsounds]

Microsoft isnt responsible for 3rd party driver compatibility. IHVs often report their products will work, but later it proves they don't. Ive seen the forums and i have some of the hardware others say doesnt work, but it works for me, this implys that its not windows 7 thats faulty, its their hardware or configuration.

It doesnt happen with MacOS so much because its a closed market with limited hardware, it happens less with Linux because no ones using it. Windows is used on more diverse hardware than any other software on earth.

On xp my graphics card works fine without installing any drivers for it.
Windows 7 loads the wddm driver and will not let me load anything else.
I have tried vista drivers,xp drivers, old,new and even modded drivers and WINDOWS will not let me load them.
Having read through the forums im not the only one with the problem and its windows thats at fault.

[Scott]

Sy, nvidia for the win

[LondonMX]

I bought an invidia gforce 5500 256mb and its a standard AGP but my crappy old dell has a low profile agp slot *bashes graphics card into slot FIT DAMN YOU So im sending that back hopefully as the user accepts returns. Getting a decent Low profile AGP second hand graffix card for a low price is gonna be like finding hen's teeth? *kicks computer* I mean will windows 7 work okay without a graphics card and just wont look quite so flashy or is it vital? Its got a well wikkied built in Intel 82865G graphics controller chip with 96MB memory if that sweetens the deal in anyway .

Im also thinking about getting a bigger hard disk. If i want to do a fresh OS install using the CD can i literally take out the old hard disk bin it and plug the new one in its place and turn on the computer and install the OS from cd or at least get a command prompt C: or will doing that kill the computer? Id rather just bin the old one then plug the new one straight in and install the OS from scratch rather than mess about copying a partition from one disk to the other using software etc.

[Scott]

yeah, just wack in the new hard drive, check its set as master and cd drive is slave if on the same channel, use an 80pin ide cable if available.

check its recognised in the bios, then just boot from the cd (again you might need to change bios settings to boot from CD).

Dont forget to destroy old hard disk if its contains sensitive data (eg old work pcs)

[Cableguy]

I bought an invidia gforce 5500 256mb and its a standard AGP but my crappy old dell has a low profile agp slot *bashes graphics card into slot FIT DAMN YOU So im sending that back hopefully as the user accepts returns. Getting a decent Low profile AGP second hand graffix card for a low price is gonna be like finding hen's teeth? *kicks computer* I mean will windows 7 work okay without a graphics card and just wont look quite so flashy or is it vital? Its got a well wikkied built in Intel 82865G graphics controller chip with 96MB memory if that sweetens the deal in anyway .

.

If it resorts ti using a standard driver then you wont get any fancy aero effects.