Solved Can I upgrade from XP 32bit to Vista 64bit?

Can I do a upgrade from a XP 32bit Machine to Windows Vista 64bit by just adding the disk, hitting intall and all that, or do I need to do a clean install when changing to 64bit.

Also, if it's just your average HP machine with a AMD Athlon 64 x2 3800+ with 2GB ram and a 200GB HD.. is 64bit even really needed, or should I just do 32bit. As I'm installing vista and then selling the machine to someone locally.

Thanks!

Hello Cory,

Unfortunately, it has to be a clean install when going from a 32-bit OS to 64-bit, or the other way around.

I would say ask the customer which one they prefered. 64-bit may limit what programs they can install, but could also give them a performance increase by supporting more than 3 GB of RAM if they wanted to add more in the future. Plus, all of the devices will need to have 64-bit drivers available for them as well.

http://www.vistax64.com/vista-news/99613-64-bit-more-than-just-ram.html

Hope this helps some,
Shawn

thanks for the reply.. we'll him and his wife will be doing simple and average things like just using Office 2007, they wont be running much other software other than Offic e 2007 stuff, and IE. they wont be doing any software downloading or anything to extreme, it's an older couple I know.

but he did say he had vista 64 on his laptop and to do 64 bit.

If all of the devices on the computer have 64-bit drivers available, then I would go with the 64-bit then. This way they will have no problems installing or transfering items or programs back and forth with their laptop and your computer.

cool, Thanks again

You're welcome.