Is this box too old for Win 7 (2.4Ghz P4)

I have an older box with an Intel 2.4C processor (2.4Ghz Pentium IV). It does have a lot of memory for its age (2GB) and 2x120GB hard drives.

I'm thinking of using it mainly for my iTunes sync (actual media files are on a network share) and maybe MS Office (not intensively). Not all at once though Inevitably, I'd have to have some sort of anti-virus I suppose, which always slows things down, especially on a single processor machine.

Anyway, don't need high performance, but if it's going to be unusably slow, I won't bother. I have an unused copy of Win 7...worth trying?

Can I install Win 7 and then not activate immediately to see if performance is acceptable? If it is, I would activate within a few days - I just want to try things out before I burn the license.

Yes you can. just pop in the disk and trial it. If you like it activate it.

MSE or Avast 6 won't slow a P4 with 2gb RAM at all. Use the Win7 Firewall.

To see if any conflicts possibly exist, run Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor

Adapt the steps for Perfect Reinstall in my signature below to get the best, leanest, cleanest install.

I installed and the box is surprisingly snappy. Works great.

One bummer is that the mobo is an Intel D865GBF and they never released Win 7 drivers for it. Since the video is on the board, that left me with Standard VGA as the display adapter. However, following advice elsewhere, I installed the driver in Win XP compatibility mode and it worked fine.

So all and all, a good experience.

You should get sleep and hibernate now with the XP mode driver. Good work.

I would download and run the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor from Microsoft. It might also be worth a check on the Windows Seven Compatibility Center at Microsoft. These are great resources for investigating if Win 7 will work on your PC.

raindog308 said:

Can I install Win 7 and then not activate immediately to see if performance is acceptable? If it is, I would activate within a few days - I just want to try things out before I burn the license.

That's the way Windows 7 should always be installed on a new build or a system that's never had it before. I actually never input the key during the install, because I'd rather copy and paste it. You'll have 30 days to give it a run, load drivers, and see if you want to keep it.

I don't think there will be any problems running Windows 7 in that configuration. I have been running Windows 7 on less hardware than that. But ofcourse it depends on that you plan to use the computer for.