Windows 7

Hardware/Software Compatibility

Microsoft has announced Windows 7 "Release to Manufacturing".

W7 RTM will be available to the general public on October 22nd; vendors will have access to the English version August 7th.

A couple points to keep in mind:

— There is no "upgrade path" from XP to Windows 7. By upgrade path I mean: pop in the operating system disk, select upgrade, and all your existing files and setting remain and are migrated to the newer OS. If and when the day comes you wish to upgrade your current XP hardware you will need to export the files off the machine, do a complete install of the new operating system, import your files and reinstall any programs. For more information on Vista upgrade paths refer to: Vista to Windows 7

— "XP Mode" has very particular hardware requirements.
2GB of RAM
A CPU that supports virtualization

The 2gb of RAM is dependent on the capability of your system motherboard and it is more likely you may already possess this ability; CPU virtualization, however, is a greater concern. AMD and Intel both offer tools to help you test this ability:

Check my Intel processor

Check my AMD processor

Plan your Migration Needs

For your computing system to be of the greatest asset to you it is necessary to ensure it performs in your particular environment. Not only should you understand your hardware capabilities, now is also the time to research your other software, are the suppliers doing their R&D? Ideally you would want to avoid XP mode and have everything run fine on W7.

Is Vista Still Relevant?.pdf

Windows 7, page 1