How to upgrade to XP Pro? (from XP Home)

HelpneedHelpneed
edited August 2010 in Science & Tech
I would like to upgrade XP Home to Pro with retaining datas in the hard drive (in-place upgrade?); I would really appreciate if you would teach me the Home to Pro in-place upgrade. (I have XP Pro CD).

In the past at here in this SW forum, Primesuspect told me I need to purchase an external harddrive to upgrade PC from XP Home to Pro, but I am wondering whether tech has improved since then and made the in-place upgrade possible.

I visited these websites (1) , 2) for the reference, but am confused:confused2 .

Thank you for your time and assistance!
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Comments

  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited September 2006
    You can do an upgrade install of Pro right over Home. If you insert the Pro CD while running home, it should bring up the install menu and you should have the choice to upgrade without losing any current data.
  • HelpneedHelpneed
    edited September 2006
    Kwitco, I have never had the lighting-speed response; I am astounded.
    Thank you so much, Kwitco!:thumbsup:
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited September 2006
    Are you sure, Kwitco? I've always understood that you cannot cross-grade editions, and you must do a reinstall.
  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited September 2006
    Home to Pro is okay. Pro to Home is a nightmare, from what I've read. You have to make sure your SP is less than or equal to the version you're installing. So if you're going from Home SP1, you need a Pro upgrade or full version of 1a or better. You can't use an OEM version to upgrade.
  • HelpneedHelpneed
    edited September 2006
    I still could not upgrade to the Pro. :bawling: I get this error message at the setup: "Setup cannot continue because the version of Windows on your computer is newer than the version on the CD".

    Would you be able to tell me if you have found any methods to enable the in-place upgrade? (Upgrade from Home SP2).

    Thank you Primesuspect and Kwitco!
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited September 2006
    I'm almost positive you cannot do an upgrade from home to pro. You need to reinstall from scratch.
  • PumalitePumalite Santiago-Centro
    edited September 2006
    I did it about 2 years ago. From plain Home to XPSP2.Itwas very simple
  • KwitkoKwitko Sheriff of Banning (Retired) By the thing near the stuff Icrontian
    edited September 2006
    primesuspect wrote:
    I'm almost positive you cannot do an upgrade from home to pro. You need to reinstall from scratch.

    I've done it. Upgraded a PC at the office from Home to Pro. Like I said, Home's SP release has to be less than Pro's, and you have to use a retail CD.
  • HelpneedHelpneed
    edited October 2006
    To Pumalite: Would you be able to tell me the method used in your Home-XP SP2 upgrade?

    Thank you very much!
  • zero-counterzero-counter Linux Lubber San Antonio Member
    edited October 2006
    Officially, Windows XP Home can be upgraded to Windows XP Professional, given that service pack levels are either equal (no post updates on home), Windows XP Home is pre SP1 and the Pro setup is newer, etc. If the Home version that you have is higher than the Pro version, then you can only perform either a clean install, or a dual-boot.
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited October 2006
    How about a repair install with the Pro disk? Would that work?

    Or you might be able to do an overlay install with the XP Pro disk, just have it overwrite the Home install. You would have to reinstall your apps after, but all the data would still be there. But I don't know if that would work either because I've never tried that before (Home to Pro overlay install).
  • dvdchasdvdchas
    edited May 2009
    Best thread about this that I found. Anyway I had WinXP Home on my Samsung NC10 Netbook, and wanted to upgrade to XP Pro. This was running SP3 including post SP3 Updates via windows update. I also had IE8. I downloaded XP Pro slip streamed with SP3 - Retail, from Microsoft (We are gold partners). And run the install. It recommended an upgrade so I went through all the steps.

    All went fine though on one of the restarts it sat on an XP "Please Wait" screen. No probs, power off and restart. Logged in and all appeared to be working well. However I clicking on the activate prompt didn't apper to do anything, and there was an msoobe.exe (or sommat like that). Also starting IE and trying to go to some sites including windows update gave some weird "The request lookup key was not found in any activation context". So I uninstalled IE8 as per prompts on another site "%windir%\ie8\spuninst\spuninst.exe'

    All fixed. It seems the re-install process automatically kills in the post SP3 updates. I also used ccleaner, to cleanup any old registry entries, including all the missing post SP3 updates.
    Then off to windows update and 48 updates to install. All good.
  • HawkHawk Fla Icrontian
    edited May 2009
    Would it be possible to uninstall SP2 to make it a lower SP version,then upgrade?
    I never tried it, but thought it might be possible.
    Has anyone tried it? Ha, I love a resurrection.
    But I do see there was never a resolution to the problem except to clean install or dual boot..
  • miragemirage
    edited May 2009
    Hawk wrote:
    Would it be possible to uninstall SP2 to make it a lower SP version,then upgrade?
    I never tried it, but thought it might be possible.
    Has anyone tried it? Ha, I love a resurrection.
    But I do see there was never a resolution to the problem except to clean install or dual boot..

    I would just slipstream the latest service pack on to the install CD.
  • HawkHawk Fla Icrontian
    edited May 2009
    mirage wrote:
    I would just slipstream the latest service pack on to the install CD.

    That makes more sense to me.
    I assume you CAN slipstream it onto the install CD so the install sees it as a later version..
  • miragemirage
    edited May 2009
    Hawk wrote:
    That makes more sense to me.
    I assume you CAN slipstream it onto the install CD so the install sees it as a later version..[/Q

    Yep, that's right. :)
  • dvdchasdvdchas
    edited May 2009
    mirage wrote:
    I would just slipstream the latest service pack on to the install CD.

    So the question is how do you take a WinXp CD (lets say its the one with SP2 built in), and slipstream it with the SP3 installer?

    I was lucky enough to be able to download XP already slipstreamed from microsoft. But I've often wondered how you do this stuff yourself.
  • miragemirage
    edited May 2009
    dvdchas wrote:
    So the question is how do you take a WinXp CD (lets say its the one with SP2 built in), and slipstream it with the SP3 installer?

    I was lucky enough to be able to download XP already slipstreamed from microsoft. But I've often wondered how you do this stuff yourself.

    Here
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited May 2009
    Mirage, I updated your post to include the link to Icrontic's slipstreaming guide. It includes information on SP3, drivers and programs. It's much more comprehensive than Lifehacker's guide.

    Cheers.
  • miragemirage
    edited May 2009
    Thrax wrote:
    Mirage, I updated your post to include the link to Icrontic's slipstreaming guide. It includes information on SP3, drivers and programs. It's much more comprehensive than Lifehacker's guide.

    Cheers.

    Thanks, that's better :thumbup
  • djmonstadjmonsta London, UK Member
    edited July 2009
    Perhaps it may be better to do a clean install?? Then your system would effectivally start from scratch, with none of the accumilated crap that has built up and slowed it down over time...
  • vinogradvinograd
    edited July 2009
    dvdchas wrote:
    Best thread about this that I found. Anyway I had WinXP Home on my Samsung NC10 Netbook, and wanted to upgrade to XP Pro. This was running SP3 including post SP3 Updates via windows update. I also had IE8. I downloaded XP Pro slip streamed with SP3 - Retail, from Microsoft (We are gold partners). And run the install. It recommended an upgrade so I went through all the steps.

    All went fine though on one of the restarts it sat on an XP "Please Wait" screen. No probs, power off and restart. Logged in and all appeared to be working well. However I clicking on the activate prompt didn't apper to do anything, and there was an msoobe.exe (or sommat like that). Also starting IE and trying to go to some sites including windows update gave some weird "The request lookup key was not found in any activation context". So I uninstalled IE8 as per prompts on another site "%windir%\ie8\spuninst\spuninst.exe'

    All fixed. It seems the re-install process automatically kills in the post SP3 updates. I also used ccleaner, to cleanup any old registry entries, including all the missing post SP3 updates.
    Then off to windows update and 48 updates to install. All good.

    Am trying to do the same thing. Have slipstreamed an XP Pro SP3 cd. When booted it recognizes that the C partition has an installed OS (XP home) and suggests that I not over write it. I quit at that point. Where does the update option appear ??

    Thanks,

    Dave
  • BuddyJBuddyJ Dept. of Propaganda OKC Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    Welcome Dave,

    With XP Home booted, try and run your slipstreamed disc. If it doesn't pop up with an "Upgrade" option, you'll need to do a full re-install.

    At this point though, I'd think it'd be more worthwhile to just install Windows 7 beta.
  • vinogradvinograd
    edited July 2009
    Buddy J wrote:
    Welcome Dave,

    With XP Home booted, try and run your slipstreamed disc. If it doesn't pop up with an "Upgrade" option, you'll need to do a full re-install.

    At this point though, I'd think it'd be more worthwhile to just install Windows 7 beta.


    Buddy,

    OK - the update is available when I run setup from command level. But this a multi stage process. The next step is to buy a barebones system and transfer the HD to it. I believe this will need a CD boot and redo of the HD mounted OS, using the same CD used to convert from Home to Pro.

    The goal is a much faster system without the pain of reinstalling / transferring the HD.

    Can you comment / provide helpful suggestions ?

    Dave
  • ardichokeardichoke Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    Just switching the hard drive over to new hardware will result in BSOD on boot. You can avoid that problem by using sysprep to prepare the Windows install beforehand.

    1. Download drivers for your motherboard and especially your network card. When you blow away your current setup it's nice to have these ready to install. The network card is essential, you must have this driver handy in case XP doesn't. Otherwise you will be downloading from another PC just so you can get on the internet.

    2. Extract the Sysprep 2.0 files from your XP CD (\support\tools\deploy.cab) to c:\sysprep. The deploy.cab can be downloaded here.

    3. Run Sysprep.exe

    4. Select Mini-Setup, PnP, and then Reseal. Your PC should shut down when complete.

    5. Install the new motherboard and or other hardware.

    6. Boot the machine, it will show screens similar to when XP was first installed, this is the Mini-Setup Wizard.

    7. At this point the instructions will vary depending on your hardware, you will be prompted for drivers that Windows does not already have.

    8. Once you have installed the drivers you are ready to go.
  • vinogradvinograd
    edited July 2009
    What are the advantages of using sysprep prior to moving the HD to the new machine compared to using the repair function of the XP CD (which is the suggested mechanism of others) with the HD mounted in the new system?
  • ardichokeardichoke Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    using the repair function wipes out your registry. You'll have to reinstall all your programs so they can recreate registry entries. You'll end up with the vanilla XP desktop and lose any customization you've done to that end. All your drivers will get wiped out and need to be reinstalled. Trust me, sysprep, it will save you a hell of a lot of work.
  • ardichokeardichoke Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    Oh... the link in my instructions is outdated... You'll want the XP SP3 deployment tools (provided that's the version you're running). You can get them here.
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited July 2009
    Ardichoke is 100% right.
  • vinogradvinograd
    edited July 2009
    Ardichoke,

    The current HD has an OEM XP Home SP3 OS. Can I use sysprep on this OS, or should I first upgrade it to XP PRO SP3. Note that I have an XP PRO SP3 CD with a valid product code. As the current OS is OEM, I DO NOT have a XP Home CD.

    Thanks for all the helpful advice.

    Dave
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