Microsoft Say It Isn’t So

Since I’m a wild and crazy guy with nothing to do on a Saturday night, I just did a “Windows Anytime Upgrade” on my Nokia Booklet 3G from Windows 7 Starter to Windows 7 Professional. Nokia ships Windows Starter and performance was pretty bad. It was so slow I found it almost unusable until I finally installed Ubuntu 9.10. That sped it up enough that it seemed to me it was was Windows, not the netbook hardware.

Tonight I had some free time and decided to try the Windows upgrade. I couldn’t imagine that Microsoft would actually make you PAY for a version that worked. We wouldn’t have done that “back in the day” on Windows 95 under BillG. Steve Balmer say it isn’t so. The difference between the Starter and Professional is night and day, even with “advanced” features like Aero turned on.

If you have a netbook and aren’t satisfied with watching the spinning cursor in Windows 7 Starter, see if an upgrade to Windows 7 Home or Professional will help. It’s expensive to spend $100 in upgrading a $500 netbook (thanks again Steve Balmer) but so far it seems worth it.