Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade from Vista Home Basic
 

Just upgraded my laptop from Vista Home Basic to Windows 7 Home Premium. I decided on an upgrade instead of a fresh install because my laptop is only about 6 months old. If it was a 5 year old XP installation I would have gone with a new hard drive and a fresh install.

It took longer than I thought it would, about 3 hours, but it went smoothly. I really didn't need to do anything once the upgrade started. No mishaps to report.

The upgrade preserved my Vista desktop and user preferences very well. The only thing really missing is Windows Mail, but Windows Live Mail is available for free download. When I installed Windows Live Mail it imported all the the accounts and messages from Windows Mail automatically. Windows Live Mail is similar enough to Windows Mail that there was no learning curve to start using it.

System resources are looking good. Win7 doesn't use much more memory or CPU than Vista did, so it looks like the 2 gigs of memory I have will be satisfactory. I actually gained a little hard drive space. I'm assuming that's due to deleting Windows Updates and restore point data, which won't be useful after the upgrade.

I don't know enough about Win7 to really take advantage of any new features yet. I'm just happy I didn't lose any productivity.

That was about my experience with it as well. I forget the exact reason it takes so long - I think it has to do with supposedly (believe it or not) uninstalling/reinstalling drivers (as opposed to just blanket-overwriting them). My friend, who used to work for MS and helped design much of their stuff, told me that's why it takes so long.

BUT no issues with my upgrade, and it's definitely faster than Vista was, with less system resource usage.

I think I see why they changed from Windows Mail to Windows Live Mail. They've segregated the inboxes for each email account to make it more difficult for people with multiple accounts to manage email. I suspect they did that to create an incentive to purchase Microsoft Outlook.

I dunno that I'd say that; it wasn't all that manageable in Outlook Express either. :gaptooth: Then again, you might be right.

When I had windows I switched to Windows Live mail long before 7 came out as I also had Windows Live Messenger.
That way those with many mail accounts can merge them into Windows Live Mail. that was a great thing MS did. And to get rid of OE was a cool thing also to git rid of.
course now I have a Mac so the heck with Windo$e 7

Help me out here. How did you merge multiple email accounts in Windows Live Mail?

I have been moving forward with Win7 as we replace XP machines for my customers.

The biggest complaint from the EU is the Windows Live Mail. Not one of the customers I've done the swap with have had anything good to say bout it.

I played with it for a bit on a sandbox machine and I really don't like it too much with tthe multiple inboxes and what not but it is something that you can learn.

Ahhhh. There is the problem, it is new and has to be learned. That's why my people don't like it.

In one word Change. Most people don't like "change" no matter if it is for the best.

There's a lot to be said about change and computers. Most of us hold out as long as we can, primarily because we know that there is an unavoidable loss of productivity during the adjustment period. But we also know that change is inevitable when it comes to computer operating systems.

The fact is that new third-party software will be aimed at the latest Windows operating system, while support will be dropped for users of older operating systems. You'll need to upgrade to take advantage of the latest versions. Worse than that, hardware manufacturers (printers, etc.) will stop providing drivers for older operating systems long before Microsoft stops supporting it.

I was one of the last hold-outs for Win98 SE, upgrading in 2003 about 2 years after XP was released. I was already to the point where I couldn't use new software, and compatible printers were getting difficult to find. It's just something that has to be done.

Change. Egg Zackley

OK, N'vada, what was your problem exactly? You didn't state any problems with the upgrade, no BSODs afterwards, so why are you posting this? I was under the impression that this is where people post their PROBLEMS, and ask for SOLUTIONS.

I picked up a netbook off EBay for 120$ and it has 7 . I like it so far not good or bad but it boots up in 30 seconds or less now that i like.

It's a catchall forum for computer stuff; I've done the same as he has. Tone it down a bit.

Isn't that what it means?
I didn't do it, because I have never had more then one E Mail address in the 14 years I have been on the net~! i use only the e Mail addy from my ISP Provider, Period.
Even though I have always had and still have Windows Messenger, you can sign up without getting a Hotmail addy~! So I never made any other addy, well i do have one in Yahoo but never ever use it~
And the only reason I have that is because of the many horse message boards on Yahoo that I belong to but don't use the yahoo e mail addy at all.

You can configure Windows Live Mail for multiple email accounts, but each account has it's own inbox, sent, deleted, and junk folders. When I hear Windows Live Mail chime (indicating a new message just arrived) I have to look around to see which inbox the new message is.

With Windows Mail there was only one inbox, so messages were easier to see and service.

It sounds to me like you might be happier with Mozilla Thunderbird 3.0, than you currently are with Windows Live Mail. I can't help you with moving your existing emails from WLM, but I bet there are articles out there that'll help you. I may be wrong about thunderbird, but I doubt it. If it doesn't work, then you'll have wasted about 10 min of time trying something outside the "Blessed By Bill Gates®" market (don't ask me for the source on that, I can't remember where I saw it).

Your suggestion illustrates my point; which is that shipping Windows 7 without an email client application wasn't a smart move, assuming that Microsoft wants to maintain its cornered market in the software industry. The result will be that a certain number of Windows 7 users will look for alternatives with 3rd party developers, such as Mozilla. Regardless of how bad Windows Live Mail might be, if it was provided as a native Windows application then people wouldn't need to go looking to download solutions.

Well, he does have a point, although I'm not so sure that they're trying to force all people to buy Outlook. It's also possible that they're trying to funnel everyone towards the whole 'online' experience.

Interestingly, there may be a financial incentive to doing that. I participate in a Las Vegas forum that's trying to convert from a forum to a social network, in the hope that the social network will attract more visitors. The reason that a social network will generate more traffic than a forum is that the kinds of content that social networks attract (video clips, audio files, photos, blogs, etc.) are considered to be priority content by Google and other search engines. That drives more one-time visitors from search engines to their site, generating ad revenue.

This is true indeed. :)

I do not think that MS wishes for people to purchase Outlook. Here is my very recent experience.

I bit the bullet and purchased a new computer. It has a Windows 7 Professional operating system. We also installed the XP software so that I can have a virtual XP system. I asked for Outlook Express and got Outlook 2002. (I hired the items installed, and they got it wrong, but I accepted that.)

Right away, the Outlook had problems. The AutoComplete Does Not Save Username and Password. It was necessary to repeatedly enter the password in order to log into the Outlook. It was annoying, and I searched the internet for solutions. MS has a solution, involving changing many things, including (eventually) the registry. I did it all, and nothing worked.

To make a quite long story shorter, eventually I discovered that MS has no real solution, and does not intend to create a solution. All versions of Outlook and Outlook Express have incompatibilities with newer versions of MS operating systems. Sometimes people can get it to work, sometimes not. What I read was that MicroSoft wishes for people to use some other mail system of theirs (on the net, maybe?)

I ended up purchasing (for $16 US dollars), a program written by a German company that intercepts the password, and logs on Outlook for me. It was worth the cost.

I also had problems with the virtual XP operating system. (Thats another story that I will tell if anybody is interested.)

After while, I have it all working. The Outlook, the Virtual XP, and even IIS. I do like it a whole lot.

I pray that you haven't just paid for the "privilege" of installing spyware that allows the guy who made it to hijack your account. IMO, if you're not trying to import emails from a past Outlook® account\setup, you're MUCH better off going with something like Thunderbird (link in prev post); nowhere near as many bugs, most features work like they're supposed to, and if you wanted to you could even see what makes it tick (unlike MS garbage).

I also hope I have not installed spyware. I did check the executable out with Malwarebytes, and it checked out ok. Here is a link to the website where I found the software:
http://www.mgsware.de/index.php/OLAutoPW/138/0/#403

I will appreciate comments. Thanks.