A Little Birdie Made Me Buy A New PC

11/12/2009

On Monday, October 19 at about 9:45 AM, a little bird met his demise when he flew into an electrical transformer or some such thing on Main Street in Newington. At that time, I was working on my 5+ year old PC and the power went out. Fortunately, I have a battery backup so my PC kept chugging along and the power came back on a few minutes later.

At around 10 AM, I left my home office to go to a client whose PC had crashed over the weekend. While I was gone, the power went out at my house a second time. When I returned home, I discovered my PC would not turn on and it looked like it was pretty much dead. Since it was over 5 years old, I ordered a new PC at PC Farm, a few months earlier than I had planned.

My new PC has an Intel Quad Core 2.33 GHz processor with 4 GB memory, a 2 GB video card, and a 500 GB hard drive. It also has a DVD burner.  I ordered it without an operating system so I could install everything from scratch. I would later add a one TB hard drive for my data, a 500 GB backup drive, plus a modem to handle dialing phone numbers and sending faxes.

My New Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit

As luck would have it Windows 7 arrived the same week as my new PC. However, I could save some money on my unplanned PC purchase if I just reinstalled Windows XP Professional on it and then upgrade to Windows 7 later when I had more cash.

I dismissed the XP idea pretty quickly. Upgrading later to Windows 7 would involve doing a total install of Windows 7 plus reinstalling all my other programs. I didn't want to reinstall everything twice so I went directly to Windows 7.

I chose Windows 7 Home Premium because the update cost about $80 less than the Professional version and I didn't need any of the added features of the Pro version.

I also chose to go with the 64 bit version of the operating system since this is the future of PCs and it would allow for more memory in the future. Also, I had no third party software that would not work with a 64 bit processor.

I really do like Windows 7 but I suspect what I like most about my new PC is that the thing is so much faster and more stable than the one it replaced.

A Few Things You Should Know About Windows 7

· Any new PC you buy off the shelf will likely include Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit.

· The 64 bit operating system will work with most standard programs but may not work with certain specialized business programs.

· Upgrading from Windows XP will require a full reinstallation of all your programs but upgrading from Vista will not.

· The Windows 7 Home Premium upgrade package costs $120, however a special home 3-pack costs $150 that allows you to upgrade up to 3 PCs.

· Windows 7 Professional is needed for anyone who  logs on to a domain server (usually only in larger businesses) or who needs to operate some programs in XP compatiblity mode.

· Businesses that don't use a server can use the Home Premium version and upgrade to Professional later if they add a server.

· If your PC is 3 years old or older, consider buying a new PC with Windows 7 already loaded rather than upgrading.

· Upgrading to Windows 7 may cure pesky problems your system has. This is especially true if you are upgrading from XP since everything gets newly installed.

Please feel free to call or email me if you have any questions about upgrading to Windows 7 or would like my help in doing an upgrade.