Upgrade XP from OEM CD?????

[WildTech]

Hey Gang

I have a client that recently purchased a system from me with Windows ME. He would now like to upgrade to Windows XP Home. Is is possible to do an upgrade from a standard Windows XP cd??? When it starts the install it doesn't offer the upgrade option. He has quite alot of data and information and I would like to be able to do this without reformatting and reinstalling.

Thanks in advance for your help

[Low_Level_Owl]

If you start the CD while in Windows...the Upgrade option should be available.

[WildTech]

Its not available, it only gives me the clean install option!

Thanks for the reply though!!

[mrwilhelm]

I don't really have an answer to your question, but I would highly recommend you back up the guy's data and do a clean install anyway. I've done several WinME to XP upgrades and they almost never seem to go well.

It's a little more work on the front end, but there's a good chance it will actually save time in the long run and your customer will be much, much better off.

Just my two cents...

[WildTech]

thanks for the reply Mr that's usually how I would do it but there are some other things to consider

[geoscomp]

Just like any other version of windows, you cannot do an upgrade with an OEM cd..you need either a retail full cd, or an upgrade cd.

[WildTech]

thanks geos............thats what I thought!!

[geoscomp]

Yeah..and that gets to be a real annoyance when a customer brings in a computer with win95 that needs an overlay install and only has a 95 oem cd

[Jeff the Brit]

Dunno about upgrades to XP, not attempted it yet, clean is the way to go. But, if it's Win95/98/ME, you CAN use a full version to do an upgrade, just rename win.com. Similarly, you can use an upgrade version for a clean install, just show it the old Windows CD when it asks for a "qualifying product".

[goinpostal]

You can do a reinstall/install/overlay of 95/98 with an oem just copy the CD to the harddrive restart in DOS rename win.com and run setup just make sure you install in C:\windows not the suggested C:\windows.000. I'm pretty sure this cant be done going from 9x/ME to XP though. At least this works with all my Dell OEM 95/98 CDs even on non dell PCs.