Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 to W7 Pro 64-Bit Upgrade DVD

Hello All,

I just bought a new laptop with Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 and ran Windows 7 upgrade advisor to find out whether I can upgrade to W7 Pro or not. As per W7 advisor, I can upgrade to either 64-bit Windows 7 Professional or Ultimate with Windows Anytime Upgrade.

Here is the questions :

I am looking for 64-bit W7 Pro upgrade dvd in case my laptop crashes in future and then I find out that my recovery dvds are useless. I came to know that all versions of W7 are pre-installed and when you buy an upgrade you just get an upgrade key and not dvd. I am NOT sure if this upgrade key will work once or always - hence, I want an upgrade version which comes with a dvd. So, what upgrade version shall I buy if I want DVD ? If the upgrade key can work more than once (and this is a BIG If) then probably I do not need this upgrade with dvd and pray that recovery dvds are not useless. So, is upgrade key valid for more than once installations ?

Thanks a LOT

 

If it's a new laptop, it probably has a version of 7 licensed to the manufacturer. They don't mix with normal retail versions. You should check with the manufacturer about upgrades, especially since any changes made to your hard drive or partitions, including even formatting a drive, will cause you to lose the ability to recover.

With the "Anytime Upgrade", you should not need a DVD or anything else.

In any case, the very best recovery you can have is a backup of the hard drive when you have everything set up the way you want, and periodically after that. Then when you drive fails, and it will, you can restore to a new one and have everything, including all your programs, back in a short time.

Making such a backup before any major changes to your system gives you a way to get back if it fails.

Free drive backup software (imaging, cloning, and archiving - backups can be created on a second hard drive, internal or external, or on DVD's, or BluRay disks. One BluRay disk will hold most peoples' entire system drive's backup at 25 GB's using compressed images, 50 GB's double-layer):

Paragon Backup & Recovery (Recovery boot CD or USB key)
Macrium Reflect (Free)
O&O Disk Image Express or (mirror)
Easeus Todo Backup
Redo Backup & Recovery (Boot CD)
Clonezilla Live (A bootable CD of Debian with Clonezilla.)
Drive Image XML
PING (Partimage is not Ghost) (Boot CD with option Clam Antivirus)
Partition Saving
Clonezilla
Passmark OSFClone (Bootable, cloning only)

There are also many commercial products with more features.

 

Download upgrades usually install from the
version of windows that is already installed.
So in order to use it again,you would need to first
install the original operating system from the restore
disks,then upgrade again.
That leaves you with the same problem as you want to avoid.
If there is nothing extra that you actually need in those
upgrades,I would suggest you go to the computer manufacturer
website and order factory restore disks so you don't have to
worry about burned disks.
You can get them much cheaper.
If you really want pro or ultimate,consider buying the retail disk
package so you will get disks,key and manuals.

 

Thanks for replies ...folks .

"Download upgrades usually install from the version of windows that is already installed. install the original operating system from the restore disks,then upgrade again." - it means PAY AGAIN...to get the upgrade or the upgrade key after recovery. What if I upgrade to w 7pro 64 and then make the recovery disks (assuming the upgrade does not interfere with recovery disks creation) , will I need to PAY AGAIN to activate w7 64 pro (assuming disks are good)? Sorry, I do not know how recovery will work in this case.

If I buy the retail W7 then I have to worry about the drivers etc. after crash since I will probably start with formatting the drive(s). is there any utility which will help me back-up all the drivers currently installed on this laptop ? Also, if I order factory restore disks,will factory restore disks come with all the drivers for my laptop?

Any way....as suggested by Elvandi, I must check with the manufacturer first before upgrading to w7 64 Pro.

Please, note that this laptop has 2 HDD in RAID 0 configuration.

 

Folks ....Thanks a LOT. Will follow your GR8 advice. You guys are very helpful.

Finally.......Merry Christmas and VERY HAPPY & PROSPEROUS New Year to all of you.