Windows 7 install

[Torque]

Ok, so for xmas, I want to get my girlfriend a copy of windows 7. She's got a fairly old system now, and it's starting to get really buggy on her. I wanna do a full format, wipe the shit out of her drives and install windows 7. problem is I don't know if her system is capable of running it! :(
Anyone know if she's got the system to handle 7? screen shot below. Any more details needed to make the call?

http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h288/jaxm/Untitled.jpg

[Nikose Tyris]

Needs another Gig of Ram to run 7, and that's to run it shitty.

2.1 GHz (Dual core or more) and at least 2.5gb RAM, should be the standard. I don't think you'd be doing her any favors wiping her drives and installing 7.

Edit: Mind you I'm slightly out of loop so I'd rather wait on Synk to confirm or Barrel to confirm and add a comment about communism rocking.

[Torque]

hmm.... Shit. Well NOW what the fuck do I do for xmas?!?! lol.

[akaSM]

Maybe 7 isn't a bad choice, I mean, she's running vista already o_o

[Krylo]

hmm.... Shit. Well NOW what the fuck do I do for xmas?!?! lol.

New computer.

Edit: Wouldn't take much to be an upgrade over that POS.

Edit to the Edit: Could probably scrounge something up out of the garbage.

[synkr0nized]

You could give her RAM. That would likely be a much better and worthwhile upgrade than just bumping her to 7. For the same price you shouldn't have trouble upping her another 1-3 GB of RAM.


The upgrade advisor (http://windows.microsoft.com/upgradeadvisor) can be helpful if you are curious if a machine can handle 7.


e: How is that a POS? I mean, solely based on the screenshot, it's a dual-core machine that's recent enough to run Vista. Mine is older than that and still runs modern games... Unless we are just assuming this HP is a terrible model, it's got an integrated video card, and things like that.

[Torque]

well, I'd love to do just RAM, or some such thing, but ultimately that wouldn't solve her problem. She's not a hardcore user, just a regular chick who likes Facebook, and her blogs to actually work. Her system is starting to get too buggy to upgrade the hardware for her, and make her happy. It's a reboot, or a new computer at this point. I suppose I could pay to have a repair shop do it, but I dunno... that seems... less than personal for a "Gift"

[synkr0nized]

Well then maybe you should buy her a class in how to not bog down her machine with malware and/or improperly configure things?

[Torque]

lol. actually, she's had this system for.......... 5ish(?) years now, without so much as a twitch until she moved in with me.
So either I project some kind of field that just fucks up electrical equipment, or 5 years without so much as a defrag cycle has taken it's toll.

[synkr0nized]

There's your present! Break up with her and tell her it's for the good of her electronics. She will thank you later.

[Torque]

but... But.....
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_NsmtDfuMA6w/SsyowrC4uNI/AAAAAAAAA1U/RiQER3qjWdM/s400/tigger46sad.gif

[synkr0nized]

http://home.comcast.net/~synkr0nized/emotes/001.gif

[Torque]

I don't get it :(

[Eltargrim]

Um...why don't you just get her the RAM, reformat, reinstall Vista, and patch the hell out of it? If the problem is hardware, Windows 7 won't fix it; and if the problem is an infested OS, then a clean install of Vista will fix it just as well as a clean install of 7 would.

I mean hell man, you're in Winnipeg. Head up Century to Memory Express and they'll hook you up with good advice. I buy all my parts there.

PS: I was going to write "bloated OS" and then realized that'd be redundant. Less so now, but still.

[Torque]

I tried finding a copy of Vista. No dice. The problem is decidedly a corrupted OS. It's just getting old, loopy, and a little borked. All I wanna do is format her drive a few times, and start out fresh, but her system, being as old as it is, is getting hard to find options for.

edit: you called it century, and not Route 90.... SHAME on you!

[Eltargrim]

...wait, you don't have the install disc? Ok, there's your first problem.

If piracy is cool with you lol buy the OS kthx

Or you could install Ubuntu. That'd work.

Looking at the listed requirements, you could probably run 7 with just a RAM upgrade. It wouldn't be particularly pretty, but it would only run you an extra $20-50, depending on the variety of RAM you need.

EDIT: dude I don't really care about the names I say go up Century and people know what I mean.

[Torque]

...wait, you don't have the install disc? Ok, there's your first problem.



Hey man, don't look at me... It's her system... Besides... she's a girl. She prolly either lost it or PMS'd on it or something, I dunno! It's all crazy.

[synkr0nized]

Most companies do not send you the OS install disks unless you request them. Many put a separate "factory reset" kind of partition on the drive, as well.

If you know what you are doing, neither of their decisions is helpful.


In any case, if you have a valid OS serial/key, then using someone else's disk will work fine.

[Torque]

Yeah.. trying to find a disk now, I believe the key is on a sticker on the side of her tower.

Fuck it... Can I just get her a kitten? Will I have to upgrade the kitten's RAM at some point? Do kittens still USE RAM?

[Sithdarth]

Said key is usually on a sticker stuck to the machine somewhere and it's usually in a place that is at least potentially visible without too much work. But seriously windows 7 is almost $200 for any of the versions that are even remotely worth getting when upgrading from Vista. As long as you are ok with messing with the guts you could probably pick up a bare bones kit potentially with the OS included at a much reduced price for not much more than $200. Then you can gut her old computer for whatever is worth salvaging including the peripherals and put together the new computer.

I pulled that same move on my Dad not that long ago for no other reason than I was sick of listening to him yell at his slowly dieing Dell media center PC. Completely replaced the tower and everything bumped him up to vista premium because I had a copy laying around from an old package deal I bought and he used the thing happily for hours before I finally told him what I did. Best part is you can move the old hard driver over as a secondary vastly simplifying the file transfer process. I did that for almost 8 years until it became absolutely ridiculous to have the older drive hanging around. So I partitioned a 1 terabyte drive and did a disk image onto the partitions. Basically the same as just keeping the hard drive but without keeping the hardware.

Anyways rambling aside if you've got the skill and the money I'm sure she'd much appreciate a bump in the system. Plus if the new one is good enough you can spring for an HD monitor for another holiday/birthday/special occasion and then a Blu-ray player for the next and get her watching HD on her desktop. The upgrade would also help with running Farmville because apparently absolutely everyone but me plays that stupid thing.

edit: Hey and who knows get her a system capable of running decent games and you might be able to get her into gaming.

[Torque]

She's into Farmtown, not Farmville. And with the Xbox now hooked to both computers, any and all videos she has on her computer get played on the TV in the living room. She's not much of a media person... she just really wants her shit to work, and it's slowly crumbling around her, alas.

[Sithdarth]

You know what instantly stops slow crumbling due to age? New stuff. Plus everyone loves new stuff. That and the frustration associated with getting new stuff working for her in my experience will be far less than the frustration of keeping the old stuff working for her. If for no other reason than your sanity go with the easy option.

[Torque]

All very true, but I'm still trying to balance the "make it work as a good present" with "throw a shitload of money at it till it works".... I happen to know what she bought me for Xmas, and while *I* don't take things such as money or time into consideration when making gift exchanges, I know she DOES, and if I go out and get her a 400 or 500 dollar(after adding all the taxes, warranties, servicing that I WILL get fucked for) computer system, she will feel like she didn't measure up. And no one wants that.

[Shin Amakiir]

Okay, this is what you do. You buy her a couple more sticks of RAM; NOT so that she can play games, but so that she can actually use her computer. Vista and 7 are stupid for the amount of RAM they suddenly needed. But I guess that's what happens when you don't release a new OS for years.

ANYWAY. Buy her the RAM. Stick it into her tower. (That's what she said.) MAKE SURE that when you go to buy the RAM, you take a current stick of RAM from her tower so you get compatible stuff. She may have 2 512mbs in there, so be prepared for some swapping. Once you have the RAM in, if you have the extra money, spring for 7 Home Premium. Otherwise, get a copy of Vista from the internet (You can torrent a clean Vista install disc, and therefore not piracy) and reinstall using her product key. However, if you can't find her key, then it's Windows 7 or long hours with debuggers.