Filed under: Hardware, News, Windows, Microsoft
CompUSA will Vista-proof your PC, for free
by Ryan Carter Jan 14th 2007 at 12:58PM
Mom and dad keep asking you what Vista is, if they need it, and how to tell if their computer is up to snuff for it? Tell them to take it to CompUSA for a free hardware evaluation. The techs will check out the goods and see if they are up to snuff. The evaluation is free, unless of course mom and pop have to upgrade memory or get a new video card. The evaluation will only take about five minutes and should tell your folks all they need to know about upgrading for Vista (if they even care). I guess you could just help them out your-hardware-savvy-self, but it is nice to know you don't have to if you don't want to. CompUSA says that the minimum hardware you need to run Vista is a 20GB hard-drive (15GB of free space), 32MB video card, and a 800MHz processor or better. Vista home Premium requires more than that under the hood, and CompUSA recommends at least a 40GB hard-drive (20GB free space), a DVD-ROM drive, 1GB of memory, and a 1GHz processor at least. With many machines now sporting dual cores this shouldn't be a problem, even for machines that are a year old or so. Note that these numbers are CompUSA's, not necessarily Microsoft's.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Paul said 5:01PM on 1-14-2007
Or they could just use the (also free) Vist Upgrade Advisor (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/upgradeadvisor/default.mspx).
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dejal said 5:01PM on 1-14-2007
Home much did CompUsa pay to get this little "infomercial" into downloadsquad?
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OldCat said 11:43PM on 1-14-2007
Microsoft does provide an advisor. Free and quite useful. You don't need to travel.
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OldCat said 10:14PM on 1-14-2007
Microsoft does provide an advisor. Free and quite useful. You don't need to travel.
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Ryan Carter said 12:07AM on 1-15-2007
The Microsoft Vista Upgrade advisor cannot upgrade hardware, if that is what the PC requires. CompUSA's service is cool if your parents live far away and you don't see them that often, or if you don't have the time to hand-hold and help them install the advisor.
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Mike said 3:01PM on 1-15-2007
"The Microsoft Vista Upgrade advisor cannot upgrade hardware."
Any electronic retailer is capable of upgrading hardware--this is not exclusive to CompUSA. If you walked into Best Buy and asked the Geek Squad "What do I need to buy to run Vista on this?" they'd do the same thing for "free." I have to agree this is a non-story.
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Mike said 3:01PM on 1-15-2007
"Vista Proof" in the headline doesn't make any sense. Your not protecting your computer *from* Vista like fireproofing protects you from fire.
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yeye said 7:30PM on 1-16-2007
CompUSA's service is cool if your parents live far away and you don't see them that often, or if you don't have the time to hand-hold and help them install the advisor.
and you want them to be subjected to a hard sell by asshole salesmen. Why not just have your parents send you the results of the microsoft advisor and then send them a list of what they need to purchase? seriously, this is like advising someone go into a car dealership and have the dealer recommend them a car and option package.
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The Dude Dean!! said 9:55AM on 1-25-2007
I wonder when the guys at Firedog and Geeksquad with think about post a helpful post here to drive more business to (Short) Circuit City and Best(worst) Buy...
http://thedudeoforkut.multiply.com/
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