General Discussion

So I bought retail Vista 32 bit home premium.  I had 4 gigs of ram but only 3.25 were recognized so I decided I wanted to upgrade to 64bit.  I give them my product key and information and they mail me the 64bit version.  What now???

I can't find a product key anywhere on the mailing container and I have been searching the internet for the next step with no success.  The email doesn't help me at all either.

Any ideas?

Personally, I think you should upgrade to Windows XP. If you don't feel like purchasing it, you could always... erm... "Obtain" it.

Sorry if this post wasn't helpful, as to what your problem was, I'm not quite sure how to fix.

I never actually tried it, but i've heard the keys/serials will work on both 32 & 64 bit versions.  So i'd suggest you try using your original key.

I can't swear by this, but I believe that when you order the 64-bit version MS 'approves' the serial number you provide for 64-bit use. That is, when you do the install, you use the original number. I cant say for sure, I have the 64 bit version to but I haven't installed it yet and I probably wont until I absolutely have to, maybe in a couple of years.

Originally posted by Isolation

Personally, I think you should upgrade to Windows XP. If you don't feel like purchasing it, you could always... erm... "Obtain" it.

Sorry if this post wasn't helpful, as to what your problem was, I'm not quite sure how to fix.

A good PC=Runs vista fine

An old or a low end machine=vista won't run as good

Thats what I've generally noticed anyways. I myself have a really really good PC, can run any game on high or max and Vista works great for me...I like it better than XP.

So do I format and install or install the 64 bit on top of the 32 bit version?

Originally posted by Vendayn

 

Originally posted by Isolation

Personally, I think you should upgrade to Windows XP. If you don't feel like purchasing it, you could always... erm... "Obtain" it.

Sorry if this post wasn't helpful, as to what your problem was, I'm not quite sure how to fix.

its only an upgrade if your PC sucks

 

 

A good PC=Runs vista fine

 

An old or a low end machine=vista won't run as good

 

Thats what I've generally noticed anyways. I myself have a really really good PC, can run any game on high or max and Vista works great for me...I like it better than XP.

 

My PC is more than efficient. This isn't a biased opinion considering the fact that I used to have Vista, but then switched to XP. I noticed quite a bit of a performance increase. I have 2 gigs of Dual Channel RAM, AMD Athlon X2 5400+ (OC'd to 3.0ghz), Nvidia 8800GTS, and an 850watt power supply (more than enough to handle that), so as far as specifications go, I should be fine to run Vista.

It's not that Vista is necessarily a bad operating system, it's just that it's a major memory hog, and it has a lot of annoying interface issues and certain "security functions" really get in the way of performing a certain task (okay, so maybe it is a bad OS...).

Sure, maybe a high-end PC does run Vista fine (it sure as hell should, 2gb of RAM and a dual-core processor shoudn't be the damn standard), but overall, Windows XP delivers better performance in almost every application.