Upgrading to Windows 7

By now, a lot of people have migrated their personal machines to Windows 7. Businesses are still being a little poky, but they’re getting there. So here are a few tips to moving you business over.

If you already have a machine upgrade plan - meaning a set schedule that each person has their computer before it’s upgraded with a new one - then it’s probably easiest (and most cost effective) to just order their next machine with Windows 7 pre-installed. However, if you are wanting to move your whole group at once there are a couple of things to remember:

First off, pick the version your users will need. For most small businesses, Windows 7 Professional will be sufficient. If you’re needing Microsoft’s BitLocker Drive Encryption to encrypt the contents of the hard drive or needing multiple language capabilities on the machine, then you’ll want the Ultimate version.

Next, if you’re machines are running Windows XP, there is no way to just upgrade. Some people have found ways to do it out there but in all of those cases the results aren’t stable. You’ll have to backup those machines and then restore the files once you have Windows 7 up and running. Luckily Microsoft has a nice migration program for such a case. You’ll need to download and install the Windows Easy Transfer program on your XP machines and then walk through the wizard to backup all information you want to preserve to an external hard drive. Then when Windows 7 is back up, just launch the Easy Transfer program (it comes installed with Windows 7) and choose to restore your data.

Windows 7 is a pretty stable version and people are overall quite happy with it’s new features. You’ll have to upgrade eventually anyway, so start planning your move now.