Reinstallation: Is OEM tied to a specific version of W7 (Pro, Home)?

[cjt20one]

My buddy who has a small business ordered a new laptop and accidentally (*cough* didn't know *cough*) ordered Home Premium instead of Pro. I have a bunch of W7 Pro Dell OEM discs laying around, is the OEM chip/code in the BIOS only going to let me reinstall Home Premium or can I install Pro on his machine without having to enter a product key?

Thanks!

 

[logicearth]

No you cannot. Use Anytime Update to upgrade the machine to Professional.

 

[theog]

No install files needed.
Only the Upgrade key is need.
Anytime upgrade only adds-on the Programs & Features from version to version.
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/95744-windows-anytime-upgrade-how.html

 

[maxseven]

What do you suppose it means if I click on Windows Anytime Upgrade's first option, "Go online to choose the edition of Windows 7 that's best for you, After your purchase Windows will upgrade automatically" and then I get a dialog with a red X "Windows Anytime Upgrade can't open the webpage, Close WAU and open it again".

 

[gregrocker]

It won't open the AU Download internet sales page for some connectivity reason.

Have you looked over the features of each to know for sure you need the additional feature(s) because there isn't really that much difference between the versions.

Compare Windows - Microsoft Windows

 

[maxseven]

All I was trying to do was to see what the official MS pricing was, on upgrades from HP. They certainly don't make this easy to find out!

 

[seavixen32]

What do you suppose it means if I click on Windows Anytime Upgrade's first option, "Go online to choose the edition of Windows 7 that's best for you, After your purchase Windows will upgrade automatically" and then I get a dialog with a red X "Windows Anytime Upgrade can't open the webpage, Close WAU and open it again".

Just click the option to go online and choose any edition of Windows, and you'll be taken to the Microsoft store, where you'll be asked to choose which edition of Windows you want, fill in the order form with you credit card details, and you'll be sent a new product key by e-mail.

Print it off and keep it safe, launch Windows Anytime Upgrade and insert the new product key when prompted.

Windows will validate the key as being genuine and the upgrade shouldn't take any longer than 30 minutes.

 

[maxseven]

I get a dialog with a red X "Windows Anytime Upgrade can't open the webpage, Close WAU and open it again".

You missed the punchline of my post--I can get nowhere with WAU.

 

[theog]

You are not getting this?

 

[maxseven]

No, when I click "Go online..." I get:



I thought maybe it was because I have Firefox as my default browser, but when I switched it to IE that didn't seem to help either. This on 2 W7 PCs I have!

I will try again to make IE my default browser--are you/others using IE?

 

[theog]

Try this MS website:
Buy Windows Products Windows 7 Special Offers Shop Your Favorite Store

 

[maxseven]

That works, thanks. I'd posted though simply because whenever Windows doesn't do what it's supposed to do, I try to find-out the reason--my old Service background which says "Fix known problems! (because you never know what others might be fixed along with it)".

 

[theog]

Would be worth running a scan:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/1538-sfc-scannow-command-system-file-checker.html?ltr=S
http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/433-disk-check.html?ltr=D