Info on windows upgrade

**Lazarus** · 02-13-2011, 10:16 PM

The kids needed a computer to do some school stuff so I found them a cheap used desktop. It has Windows 2000 on it. What do I need to do to upgrade it? I have a Windows xp home edition upgrade disk.
With my luck the computer's hardware won't except anything more then Windows 2000.

**JACKSJE4** · 02-13-2011, 10:31 PM

In my experience, if it is that old, it's probably not worth upgrading.

That being said, you will need to make sure there is at least 1 GB of RAM installed in the machine and minimum 40GB hard drive (more of each is always better!!). If you have the installation CD for WinXP, all you will need is a license key to activate the software (one that is not already in use). Most PC's have a Microsoft sticker on the back or bottom that has the installation key (format is xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx, where the 'x' is an alpha numeric character). It must be a key for WinXP and not another version of windows.

I had an old Dell desktop with 1 GB of RAM and 40GB hard drive that ran WinXp just fine. You couldn't do much with it other than Word, Excel and internet, but it fit the need as a PC for the kids to use.

**luckydog** · 02-13-2011, 10:40 PM

i have an olde laptop with 8gb hard drive, i installed xp on it and the upgrades just about filled the whole hard drive,

i finally had to shut off upgrades on it

**Drunkenclam** · 02-14-2011, 04:38 AM

I'm still using Win2000 on my old laptop. Just bin most microsoft products and use firefox and other programs.

**alstonj1** · 02-15-2011, 12:23 PM

For xp you can use 512 and any Pentium 4 processor with no problems except for high tech gaming . it all depends on what your going to do with it . if you need a windows dvd or cd send me your address and ill send you one . Microsoft doesn't support windows xp anymore so you cant get one from them anymore . if you have a decent pent 4 over 2 gig in speed and over 1 gig of memory you can most likely purge the current install and up grade the machine to windows 7 .Dont even think of windows vista it aint worth the time to put it in . 7 will load the drivers usually with no problem except for some old sound cards and modems but in most cases if it doesnt have a 7 driver you can load the xp driver using the compatability mode set to xp sp3 .