Windows 7 is a great operating system, but it can be a little difficult to upgrade to the latest version. If you’re not sure which upgrade Advisor can help you choose the right one for your computer, read this article to find out more. When you upgrade to Windows 7, you’ll be asked to choose an Upgrade Advisor account. This account will allow you to access and manage your upgrades and installations. You’ll also be able to view and manage your installed software, as well as view and manage your computer’s security settings. If you don’t have an Upgrade Advisor account, or if you’re not sure how it works, follow these steps:

  1. Open the Start screen and type “cmd” into the search bar. This will open a command prompt window.
  2. Type “netstat -an” into the command prompt window and press Enter. This will show all of your network connections.
  3. Type “netstat -a | grep ipv4” into the command prompt window and press Enter again. This will show all of your IPv4 addresses.

We ran Upgrade Advisor on an older IBM Thinkpad currently running XP.  You will need Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 installed, but if you don’t it allows you to easily install it first the restart Upgrade Advisor installation.

After everything is installed successfully Upgrade Advisor is ready to be launched.

In the first screen you get an overview of the advisor then click on the Start Check button.

It will take a few minutes while the check is completed.  Time will depend on the type of system you’re checking.

When the check is complete you will get a report on what isn’t compatible and what needs to be changed.

You can also save the report as an HTML file so you can easily share it with other users.

The minimum system requirements for Windows 7 are a 1Ghz CPU, 1GB RAM, and a 16GB Hard Drive.  Less important is you will also need a DX9 capable graphics card with 128MB of memory to be able to run the Aero interface. If you think your system might be on the fence, this is a handy tool to find out if your hardware will run Windows 7.

Download Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor