If I install Windows Vista on my Laptop, will i lose all my data?

Question

I have Windows XP Professional Edition and im wondering if i will lose all my data. what if i put my media files on CD, would it be easy to upload again? also, would you recommend me upgrading at all? why and why not?

Answer 1

I would recommend staying with XP for now unless you really want a prettier desktop.

You would lose your data if you reformatted. Upgrading would leave it intact, but backups would be a good idea regardless.

Answer 2

If you 'upgrade', then no, you won't lose files unless something goes very bad.

See, if you have XP, all you have to do is insert the Vista CD while running XP, the rest should be automatic.

Beware, that there are applications with versions that are not compatible with Vista. If any of these applications is running while you install Vista, you are almost guaranteed a Blue Screen of Death, and a somewhat difficult path towards keeping the files on your computer safe.

Personal experience: my dad was running Zone Alarm when I installed Vista on his computer. Got a couple of BSOD, and although we didn't lose any files, it did make the process harder than it should have been - specially trying to figure out why installation failed..

My best advice is, do make a back up copy of everything that's important to you.

About recommending the upgrade: First check, and then double check if your system is Vista ready. Then check your programs, all of them, see if they are Vista ready. If everything is OK, go ahead, it's a nice OS, but you won't really feel the jump from XP-Pro, unless you get Vista Premium

Answer 3

Getting ur media files backed up on a CD is exactly what u should do !!

Now, assuming u not to be familiar with computers so much, u should know -
ur Hard Disk will be divided into Partitions namely C:, D:, and so on......
generally an OS (MS Windows XP & Vista) will be reciding on C: partition
so if u are to install a new OS, the Drive or Partition which does not contain any OS files, will not be disturbed at all !

No, I dont think u should upgrade to Vista as of now as it not so common, and also its rather difficult to get hold of all softwares which are commonly available in Windows XP.

I suggest u should wait for some time to upgrade !!

Answer 4

This depends how you install it.

Before you go and purchase Vista run the Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor.

Download it from the microsoft link below.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/buyorupgrade/upgradeadvisor.mspx

If it is an upgrade and you do not select to re-format your Hard Drive; your data should be OK.

Make a directory on the root of C:

Example C:\_0

I would strongly advise you to zip your data the directory to C:\_0 before installing Vista.

Example C:\_0\Pictures.zip
C:\_0\Data1.zip

Then copy the zipped files to CD or DVD.

Zipping the data ensures you do not run into a problem with long filenames/directory names

Copy them back to your hard drive and unzip them before you install Vista.

This ensures the files are retrievable.

Good Luck

Answer 5

Unless you have a computer you bought right before Vista came out, it is probably a good idea to not upgrade. Vista takes a pretty beefy to run smoothly. Unless the computer came with Vista, I wouldn't upgrade.