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General discussion

Operating system question......

by Hell1234 May 7, 2009 2:14PM PDT

My Gateway laptop just crashed and I cannot repair it for less than what it is worth.....I am thinking of getting a new Dell or HP laptop...I am curious though about Window Vista and whether or not my 2003 Office version will work with it? I am also wondering about all the crap I have heard about Vista...Isn't Windows 7 available and it will take less memory to run? Sorry...I know lots of questions. Thanks for the imput!

Discussion is locked

5 Posts
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Windows 7 is in Release Candidate stage.
by orlbuckeye May 7, 2009 8:02PM PDT

The the stages of software development goes 1. Beta 2. RC 3. RTM (release to manufacturing) 4 Released to public.

With Vista which ahd 2 Betas and 2 RC's it wit was 2 months between RC2 and RTM and then 2 months before released to public. RTM is the completed version that is released to hardware manufacturers to install on there machines. Microsoft is supposed to give coupons for Windows 7 if you purchase a machine with Vista. The offer was supposed to be sometime in June or July. You can download RC from Microsoft's website but it will expire in July 2010 and their may be minor differences between the RC and what is released to public.

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OS Question
by RonS [WINDOWS-TEAM] May 8, 2009 1:23AM PDT

Hell1234 ? You?re going to want to go with Vista on your replacement laptop, especially if you are getting it soon.

While Windows 7 is in the RC stage (which means it?s a release candidate and is in the stage right before the full release to market) there have been no announcements as far as the actual release ? despite what people will say. Also, just as added info, there have been no announcements about vouchers for those who purchased Vista.

Good luck with your new laptop.

Cheers,
Ron
Windows Outreach Team

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Office 2003 on Vista
by Joliet Eddie May 8, 2009 1:44AM PDT

To answer the simpler question: yes, Office 2003 runs just fine on Vista.

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SP2
by JonTitor May 8, 2009 10:27AM PDT

Vista SP2 releases soon so that might help, just go with a powerful enough system and it will be fine really, most of the hate against Vista comes from people running $600 laptops

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Vista now, Win7 not commercial yet
by deniceels May 9, 2009 12:22AM PDT

Vista will come with current laptop setup as Windows 7 is still not yet released for commercial and manufacturing pre-installation setup, thus, you'll still end up with Vista for now, which, of course, if you get a netbook, then most will come with Windows XP (save for some which comes with Vista or one Linux flavour-to-go).

Office 2003 will definitely run on Vista. If not, openOffice is another alternative.

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