Windows 7 question of the day: Do you get 32-bit or 64-bit discs? And the answer is.... (UPDATED)

I am starting to think that these news releases from Microsoft were put together by a 5 year old and not checked by anyone if people have to ask Paul for basic info.

Paul, I received an email from Staples in Canada promoting this offer, and their info page clearly says that you get both x86 and x64 versions. http://www.staples.ca/ENG/Static/static_pages.asp?pagename=win7

@DarkSages - Probably because of the price to make both discs.

UK Pre-Order prices, Home Premium E £49 Pro E £99 Not bad considering they are full versions (sans IE of course)

@Jimmy422 "I want to know if we ordered from store.microsoft-ppe.com if we'll still get our orders." Do you mean is the store legit? I never boutgh from there but the domain is registered to MSFT and it is pointing to the right MSFT.net servers

meason, Microsoft hired away one to the primary authors of Apple's famous Release Non-Notes. "___ improves stability and reliability. ____ is recommended for all users of ____". (It was partly those notes that caused me to try this Dell desktop machine as my primary personal machine. [Work remains Macintosh, as does eCommerce for the most part])

@DarkSages, i don't question it being a legit site, just whether or not we get our orders.

Why is this an issue? Didn't Vista come with both 32-bit and 64-bit discs in the same box?

When MS offered a free upgrade [$10 shipping] of Office 2008, the web site did not specify media vs student version. After it shipped they sent a notice along stating that if you received the wrong version, there was a number to call and have the correct version sent as well as refunding the $10 shipping, AND YOU GOT TO KEEP THE OTHER VERSION!!!!!!!! The call took 5 to 10 minutes. including hold time, and they apologized. They made a fan out of me.

Yeah, it is pretty sad that they do all of this work to get a great promotion going, then do an epic fail on what exactly you're getting. We're spreading the word though, I have people at Amazon and other places looking at this site, MS Store, the MS Store phone number, and a couple of confirmed blog posts.

@DRWAM LOL that happen to a firend of mine that bought a mac lab right before office 2008 was out. They sent him double the amount he needed. What I don't get is why is it so easy to install office 2008 on as many macs as you want but office 2007 you have to activate.

@realtestman I believe only ultimate vista had a disk for each in the box, all others were just 32-bit

"Allow me to once again remind people about the wonders of Windows Easy Transfer. It can be run on XP or Vista installs to pull off all of your personal stuff (when I did it on my laptop, it even found my installation of World of Warcraft). Settings, documents, user profiles, it all goes." Windows Easy Transfer is a GUI front-end for something called "User State Migration Tool" (USMT), but is designed for consumers, whereas USMT is designed for IT staff. USMT grabs everything as well. You can customize it with XML configuration files and such. Sometimes there are things like broken/unused shortcuts and such, or empty folders that you don't want to transfer over, but it has an option to not compress the source files, and I usually "prune" the copied files to remove the unnecessary junk. I also don't like that it grabs files that aren't recognized. That means that virus-infected computers can be compromised by restoring the backup, and that's another reason why I like to prune backups. One thing that bugs me is that for some unknown reason, it will still create Start Menu shortcuts that you delete in the uncompressed backup files. I'm guessing the log recreates them or something. I still haven't figured out why it does that though. Otherwise, it's a very handy tool for any IT person, and it's a small, easily manageable set of tools to work with. Oh, and BTW: USMT is designed to handle domain user accounts.

Didn't the precursor to Easy Transfer migrate programs as well? Microsoft then bought the company and decided to transfer only settings and files, I think.

For me this is a no brainer. x64 is absolutely better on so many levels. Now for those who only have a 32 bit processors, you really don't have a choice. However, since my x64 migration, I've really enjoyed the overall responsiveness even from a single core x64 with an x64 OS. There's no way I'll go back to a 32 bit OS. If you do have a 64 bit OS, just go for it. If you've got an old 32 bit system, upgrade at get 64 bit for cheap. Thankfully, I still have a copy of Vista on a separate hard drive and I'll just upgrade that one. For those in the U.S., MIcrocenter is offering the upgrades at $10.00 off the prices from Microsoft. $39.99 for Home Premium, $89.99 for Professional. http://www.microcenter.com/storefronts/microsoft/windows7/preorder.html

I wonder if people are making this out to be more complicated than it needs to be. What if... When you insert the Win7 install CD, it analyzes your PC and based on detected hardware (and maybe even software), makes recommendations on whether it would be better to choose 32-bit or 64-bit. It is possible to word it such that most non-techy people will understand the basic concept. Maybe it even has a super-simple mode that just goes ahead and installs the 32-bit if the user is unsure. Also, if the installer detects that you have a 32-bit processor, it doesn't even give you an option. This is just speculation, but something like that makes sense to me and is well within MS' ability to add into the installer. Maybe the whole point is that this complexity is hidden from the end-user for the most part. You don't even need to think of it while making the purchase. I like it.

Paul, What about the downloads? Can we download both x86 and x64 versions and choose to install one at any given time? Can you pester the powers that be a bit further, and obtain the finer details?

O/T, but kinda relevant. Leo Laporte, on the TWIT show was hoping for some kind of a Twitter campaign to bring Microsoft down, so that should give an incentive to some of the people that post here to open Twitter accounts and begin the process. @joiseystud: You can move from Windows Vista Ultimate to Windows 7 HP using the upgrade media. It would most likely be a clean install, as opposed to an upgrade. @sohaniabhishek, a lot of Universities have agreements with Microsoft where students get the software a lot cheaper. Check to see if your department has an MSDNAA site for students. Here's an example: http://msdn04.e-academy.com/elms/Storefront/Storefront.aspx?campus=arizo... If not, you might still find good deals at the bookstore.