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How to upgrade your PC for Windows 8

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Sharath Kumar
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BANGALORE, INDIA: Is you PC or laptop ready for newly launched Windows 8 ?

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With Microsoft officially launching Windows 8 and offering special price upgrade offer there is a renewed interest among PC users to upgrade their systems. However, not all PCs or laptops may be capable of running Windows 8 and only recent Windows 7 purchases qualify for the special price offer.

Are all PCs purchased with Windows 7 between 2 June 2012 and 31 January 2013 eligible for the Upgrade Offer?

According to Microsoft's official site, the eligible PCs are new PCs purchased during the promotion period with a valid Windows 7 OEM Certificate of Authenticity, product key for and pre-installed with:

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  • Windows 7 Home Basic;
  • Windows 7 Home Premium;
  • Windows 7 Professional; or
  • Windows 7 Ultimate

Note: Windows 7 Starter Edition is not eligible for this offer.

According to Microsoft site the offer is not available for refurbished PCs. The offer is only available for new Windows 7 PCs.

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Consumers currently running PCs with Windows XP, Windows Vista or Windows 7, are qualified to download Windows 8 Pro for an estimated retail price of Rs. 1,999. And Windows 7 PCs purchased between June 2, 2012, and January 31, 2013 can download Windows 8 Pro for an estimated retail price of Rs. 699 with the Windows upgrade offer.

System requirements:

In order to upgrade a PC to Windows 8, the PC must meet the minimum system requirements for Windows 8 and pass required compatibility checks.

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Visit http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=262205 for information on Windows 8 minimum requirements.

If your PC doesn't support Physical Address Extension (PAE), NX processor bit (NX), and Streaming SIMD Extensions 2 (SSE2) which refer to features of the processor then you won't be able to install Windows 8.

According to Microsoft, the Upgrade Assistant will provide you with an error message if your processor doesn't support PAE and SSE2. You'll also see a notice if the processor might not support NX or if NX is turned off in the PC BIOS. Windows 8 Setup will attempt to turn on NX during installation and, if it isn't able to, will return your PC to the current operating system.

SKU:

Windows 8 upgrade SKU can be used to upgrade to Windows 8. For this the system has be licensed for an earlier version of Windows (Windows XP SP3 or higher). Depending on the Windows version you are upgrading from, a "clean install" of Windows 8 may be required.

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