Upgrading From M.e. To Xp....

Wanted to go from windows m.e. to windows xp. Do i have to do anything special(delete m.e. .etc.etc.) or can i just load XP and it will do the rest??

 

Hi sniper and welcome to the forum.

XP usually does well by simply upgrading a clean system (no spyware/viri/etc.) from an earlier OS. The one time this is not true is for systems running ME. For some reason, it has a habit of causing horrible problems with XP down the road. Not always but often enough that I would not recommend even trying the upgrade route.

Make sure you have saved your email, address book, and any personal items like documents, pictures, etc. either to CD or if you have a partitioned drive, to a partition other than the one ME runs from now (usually C:\ )

Set the PC to boot from CD as the first option then boot from your XP CD. Early in the process you will have an option to delete the current system partition or drive, format, and install XP. That's the one you want.

If you are the least bit uncertain about any of the steps, please post back.

 

Thanks Newt,
I was told (by a source not much smarter than me i guess) that i could just install the XP disc and it would sort of upgrade from M.E. to XP. I guess this isn't the case . Any other help would be greatly appreciatted.

 

You can certainly use the XP install CD to upgrade to XP over an existing ME install. And if you put the CD in while you are in the ME gui, it will start up and offer you that option. So your friend was correct.

My point was that doing the upgrade to XP from ME can often cause problems that you won't be able to fix and you'll wind up either putting up with a flaky XP system or reinstalling from the beginning and maybe with enough problems you can't back up your personal stuff. XP just does not seem to like ME very much.

That being said, there are certainly folks who have done the upgrade (in the manner suggested by your friend) and had perfect results.

So,
- Can you try it? Certainly. It may work fine.
- Would I try it? Absolutely not.

If you do decide to go for it, just start the PC and after ME is running, put the XP disk in the drive and follow the directions to upgrade.