Upgrade to Windows 7 or keep Vista on a HP Pavilion Dv2-1030us?

frh1 · 30 Oct 2011

I got home a little late this afternoon, so I barely had time to delete McAfee and start the MCPR removal tool. My wife and son were waiting in the car so I did not have time to install Microsoft Security Essentials. Heck, we were on the way to pick up a couple of grandkids while the MCPR tool finished. Fortunately, we made it to the local Staples store before they closed.

When I took the netbook (that I am typing this on) to Staples, in addition to removing all traces of the previous owner, their $10.00 tune-up made it run way faster than I ever expected. (In fact, right now this netbook is running a lot faster than the notebook.)

Because I don't fully understand what I would be doing, I figure it would take a lot of hours to research and plan... For $10,00 they will check the notebook for malware, check the registry for errors, stop unnecessary programs from starting, defrag the hard drive and do several other tweaks suggested in above posts.

When I get it back tomorrow afternoon, I plan to install Microsoft Security Essentials, run the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor, double check what they allow to start and make sure updates only happen when I want them.

Regarding the thing running hot, just about every review I read complained about that. Seems kind of stupid to me that a laptop computer has to sit on top of a cooling fan. What worries me is the system fan makes so much noise I thought the hard drive was failing. (That's why I bought a new hard drive and ghosted the existing drive onto it.)

I am a little confused about something in a previous post. The laptop is currently 64 bit Vista Home Premium. If I decide to do a clean install of Windows 7 Home Premium, are there advantages / disadvantages to sticking with 64 bit or going to a 32 bit installation.

ignatzatsonic · 30 Oct 2011

frh1 said:

If I decide to do a clean install of Windows 7 Home Premium, are there advantages / disadvantages to sticking with 64 bit or going to a 32 bit installation.

You may as well stick with 64 bit unless there is an over-riding reason for 32 bit. The most common reason to stick with 32 bit would be that you have an application that won't install and run properly on a 64 bit system. Such applications exist, but they are uncommon. In most situations, you can't tell if you are running a 32 bit system or a 64 bit system--the apparent differences are minor. You can't use more than about 3.3 to 3.5 GB of RAM on a 32 bit system and that may be a consideration.

marsmimar · 30 Oct 2011

frh1 said:

I am a little confused about something in a previous post. The laptop is currently 64 bit Vista Home Premium. If I decide to do a clean install of Windows 7 Home Premium, are there advantages / disadvantages to sticking with 64 bit or going to a 32 bit installation.

The biggest advantage of 64 bit vs. 32 bit is how much memory (RAM) can be accessed. A 32 bit system is limited to 4GB and of that about 3 - 3.25GB can be accessed. (A portion of the RAM is set aside for other hardware.) A 64 bit system can make use of more RAM.

32-bit and 64-bit Windows: frequently asked questions

Since your computer was already set up for 64 bit I'd stay with it.

IMHO. :)

DustSailor · 30 Oct 2011

frh1, If you have UNDER 4 GB or RAM installed (located in computer>system properties>Installed memory (RAM): there at the bottom of the page) and you plan to keep it that way, than 32bit (or x86) is the one you want, as it is recommended for that amount of RAM. If you have 4GB or higher, than 64bit is the best option for you. This would be the most important reason to choose between the two, in my opinion, and it is highly recommended you base your decision on how much RAM you have (or plan to upgrade to).

seavixen32 · 30 Oct 2011

If you were using Windows Vista 64-bit you should have no trouble installing Windows 7 64-bit and you should also have no problem with drivers.

However, if you decide to install Windows 7 32-bit you MAY have a problem with drivers so on balance I'd be inclined to stick with the 64-bit version of Windows 7.

DustSailor · 30 Oct 2011

seavixen32 said:

If you were using Windows Vista 64-bit you should have no trouble installing Windows 7 64-bit and you should also have no problem with drivers.

However, if you decide to install Windows 7 32-bit you MAY have a problem with drivers so on balance I'd be inclined to stick with the 64-bit version of Windows 7.

I've never heard or experienced this before. Very strange. You sure about this? How can this be?

seavixen32 · 30 Oct 2011

DustSailor said:

seavixen32 said:

If you were using Windows Vista 64-bit you should have no trouble installing Windows 7 64-bit and you should also have no problem with drivers.

However, if you decide to install Windows 7 32-bit you MAY have a problem with drivers so on balance I'd be inclined to stick with the 64-bit version of Windows 7.

I've never heard or experienced this before. Very strange. You sure about this? How can this be?

Probably didn't explain myself very well, but speaking from experience, Vista drivers can often get you out of trouble when you can't find a Windows 7 driver.

However, if an OEM computer has the 64-bit version of Windows installed, finding 32-bit drivers can be a problem if you install a 32-bit version of Windows instead.

DustSailor · 30 Oct 2011

seavixen32 said:

DustSailor said:

seavixen32 said:

If you were using Windows Vista 64-bit you should have no trouble installing Windows 7 64-bit and you should also have no problem with drivers.

However, if you decide to install Windows 7 32-bit you MAY have a problem with drivers so on balance I'd be inclined to stick with the 64-bit version of Windows 7.

I've never heard or experienced this before. Very strange. You sure about this? How can this be?

Probably didn't explain myself very well, but speaking from experience, Vista drivers can often get you out of trouble when you can't find a Windows 7 driver.

However, if an OEM computer has the 64-bit version of Windows installed, finding 32-bit drivers can be a problem if you install a 32-bit version of Windows instead.

Ah, now I gotcha. thanks for explaining

DustSailor · 30 Oct 2011

frh1 said:

I am a little confused about something in a previous post. The laptop is currently 64 bit Vista Home Premium. If I decide to do a clean install of Windows 7 Home Premium, are there advantages / disadvantages to sticking with 64 bit or going to a 32 bit installation.

I appologize if you mentioned this already, but you say you have the full windows 7 cd or just a oem version? I guess I just assumed you had full. and your system specs indicate you have windows 7 starter, which I guess I overlooked. could you do this for me, please? Fill out your system specs (this tool may help you out a great deal).

frh1 · 31 Oct 2011

DustSailor said:

frh1 said:

I am a little confused about something in a previous post. The laptop is currently 64 bit Vista Home Premium. If I decide to do a clean install of Windows 7 Home Premium, are there advantages / disadvantages to sticking with 64 bit or going to a 32 bit installation.

I appologize if you mentioned this already, but you say you have the full windows 7 cd or just a oem version? I guess I just assumed you had full. and your system specs indicate you have windows 7 starter, which I guess I overlooked. could you do this for me, please? Fill out your system specs (this tool may help you out a great deal).

DustSailor, I noticed the left sidebar lists Windows 7 Starter underneath my username. I never filled out any of the user profile stuff, so I'm not quite sure how that got there. However, my first posts in this forum were about a used Samsung N-150 netbook with Windows 7 Starter. It's system restore function (F4 during boot-up) would only take it back to after "first run" instead of factory fresh. That problem was resolved by my local Staples store for $10.00.

The little 12" HP laptop I am asking about in this thread has Vista Home Premium on it. I bought it a little over 2 years ago and spent quite a bit of money installing programs (including Microsoft Office) on it. After my wife got a virus on her desktop computer, she borrowed the laptop and used it in the bedroom for browsing the internet, participating in a couple of health related support groups and checking her AOL web mail for about a year. When I got it back, it ran extremely slow.

I got it back from Staples this afternoon. They charged me $10.00 for a "tune-up". The guy had it on his bench for several hours today. After he gave it back, I set it and the Samsung netbook side by side on the counter. The first thing I did after connecting both of them to a Verizon 4G LTE wireless Mifi was to take both computers to speedtest.net. I ran the speed test several times on each machine and the numbers were fairly consistent each time. The last test the HP laptop was a Download Speed of 18.60 and the Samsung netbook got a 12.21 Mbps Download Speed. (The store must be real close to a tower.)

After that, I opened this forum, my industry trade association's forum, XDA Developers forum, Android Central Forum, then Home Depot and a couple of other retailer's websites on both machines. They all opened faster on the netbook than on the laptop.

That's not at all what I hoped to see. Even though they both have slow processors, I thought a 64 bit dual core laptop with 4GB of ram should run faster than a 32 bit single core netbook with 2GB of ram.

Unless something that can be fixed is causing it's performance to suck, I will probably figure out how to get a spill-proof keyboard cover and put parental controls on it so my developmentally disabled adult son can play Angry Birds and go to PBS kids on it...