Windows 7 question

[jronald]

Dont really think this fits in the regular forum, so here goes.

Moons ago, I inherited an XP VLK, I say inherited because the owner of the business purchased it, handed it to me and died of a massive coronary about 18 hours later. His widow liquidated the business. I approached her numerous times about the cost of and importance of the VLK and she told me to keep it. Anyway, I have used it very, very sparingly as I have always purchased "shells" that have good serials on them.

Told you that, so I could tell you this........

Doing research on Windows 7 options, trying to justify whether its worth trouble to go that route, buy a single, triple or say the heck with it and go solely to .nix of some flavor. I have NOT poked around the Microslouth website, but have gotten pretty mixed reviews and downright wrong info from some sites.
I Honestly believe the day is not long off when Im going .nix, but will need to keep one machine Windoze for compatibility sake. The other issue is of the machines I build and donate, most will need to be Winblows of some flavor. Im not sure how long XP is "really" going to be viable.

Thoughts, Comments, Suggestions
Ron

[craigmontHunter]

IMHO XP has just about reached the end of its useful life - official support ends in April? 2014, at which point you're on your own - for that reason I upgraded my Mom's computer to 7 last week, and while its not much overall (3ghz P4HT, 3gb ram, Fx5200), it does what she needs and should serve its purpose for the next few years. Obviously I would recommend that any system you get with a newer COA, install that (vista is actually decent when it is entirely updated), and you may want to look into becoming a “Microsoft Registered Refurbisher” and see if that applies to you – from what I understand, it allows for a system that already has a windows COA but no recovery media to have a restricted (AKA for refurbished computers only) license that is cheaper that a normal upgrade/full license. I know I have seen it used to put windows 7 on systems that came originally with either XP or Vista COAs originally, so it may be a good choice for what you want to do.

The only other option I see is using some *nix variety with software like wine to run any windows only programs required, a solution that is obviously limited by the type and compatibility of the software.

My $0.02