I just got Windows 7 Ultimate 32-bit from my school for 10 bucks. Anything I should know about upgrading from Vista?

some programs don't work in 7 yet, but that's about the only problem I noticed when I upgraded

Upgrading from vista? Uhm...no. There's really not too much difference between Vista and 7. Just a few tweaks, really.

If it were me I would have gone with 64 bit and reformatted, but that's just me. Obviously some people have reasons for sticking with 32 bit, though.

Based on the Windows Upgrade Advisor and some system requirement research, I don't think my lappy can handle 64 bit

Edit: Or rather, I don't think I can do anything useful with 64 bit because my laptop isn't souped up enough. Unless I can add RAM to it, which I didn't think was possible with a laptop...

WHOA DOUBLE EDIT: So after a little more research I found my Insipiron 1720 can have RAM added, but it can't go above 4 GB, which makes 64 bit pretty much un-needed. All of the programs I run, including school computing software and whatnot, is offered in 32-bit form, which means I won't be _needing_ 64 bit, as far as I can tell. It seems that the most that I'll probably be doing in the way of servicing my laptop before I retire it would be adding RAM down the road, but it doesn't seem like it'll ever be enough where 64 bit would really do me any good.

Am I wrong?

The inspiron 1720 can hold 4GB. With 32-bit, your computer will only recognize ~3.25GB of ram, even if you have 4GB. Normally RAM isn't worth buying for laptops anyway.

If you would want to upgrade your ram, you will need to find out how many slots are open. I am guessing you have 2GB, so we would need to know if you have 1x2gb or 2x1gb. You would also need to check how many slots total there are for ram. (a program like CPU-Z can tell you this).

If you wanted to buy more ram, it would be about $50 for another 2GB.

On a side note: You do have a gaming computer... right? That inspiron isn't what you game on... or is it?

Yeah, I have 2 gigs. Not sure if it's 2 sticks or one though. I'm not gonna operate and check that tonight, too much work to catch up on.



What's a gaming computer? There's a reason I'm not very good.

I never played computer games until Mal and I roomed together freshman year and I saw the awesomeness of TF2 and found out my Inspiron could run it at low settings. I've gotta make this lappy last until the end of next year when I graduate, and even after that money will go to grad school and married life bills, so it's all I've got for now.