Can i run vista 32bit?

hey so i'm new to this whole upgrading thing to vista ect, i am tech savvy when it comes to computers just not this haha...anyway so yeah ive been with windows xp for years with every pc i ever got and i'm woundering if my pc can run vista it's not one of the best but its decent-ish specs below:

harddrive-75GB
RAM: 1GB
CPU: Pentium 4 2.8ghz w/hyperthreading

any help greatfull thanks .

ps. the pc will be used to playing minor games like grand theft auto sanandreas or runescape or just for skype basically.

Hello Stephen, and welcome to Vista Forums

Well, you meet the minimum system requirements for Vista below, but IMO your system is going to be slow unless you are closer to at least 4GB of RAM. You'll also need to make sure that they have Vista drivers available for all of your devices on the computer.


Vista Home Basic

• Processor: 1GHz (32 or 64 bit)
• System Memory (RAM): 512MB
• Hard Drive: 20GB with 15GB available for Vista
• Video Card: 32MB Memory and DirectX 9 Support
• DVD-ROM Drive

Vista Home Premium, Business, or Ultimate

• Processor: 1GHz (32 or 64 bit)
• System Memory (RAM): 1GB
• Hard Drive: 40GB with 15GB available for Vista
• Video Card: 128MB Memory, DirectX 9 Support with: WDDM Driver, Pixel Shader 2.0, 32bits per pixel
• DVD-ROM Drive

Hope this helps,
Shawn

thank's for the quick reply,

Well if it's going to run slow it's not really any good to me im better off either sticking to XP or going to Linux(which i've never used before)

It'll be ok for internet and Skype usage, but you may suffer with games.

well i think grand theft auto doesn't need that much to run luckily and Runescape well that game is a browser type so i don't know lol.

I actually would recommend the upgrade, what microsoft says and what you will experience are different, as long as you keep good care of your computer and keep it clean, you'll enjoy your experience. Also, with the games you listed, you won't lag considering GTA is easy on the computer. I've ran GTA on a windows XP with 1gb ram and the worst possible graphics card you can imagine (Years ago,) changing the OS won't hurt.

EDIT: unfortunately your drivers may not work, so please make sure you have a backup handy from before you do the installation.

sometimes drivers that are only XP enabled may work for higher up versions of windows, but that just depends on luck.

make sure you have your drivers ready.

http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/04/Product/optiplex-210l

With this configuration I would stay with XP. If you install Vista, it will run like molasses. Windows 7 is probably a bit better, but still borderline. Linux would run great - but that is a completely different world (interesting though).

whs said:

With this configuration I would stay with XP. If you install Vista, it will run like molasses. Windows 7 is probably a bit better, but still borderline. Linux would run great - but that is a completely different world (interesting though).

Click to expand...

I have a computer with almost exact same specs, but with 150gb HD, as his running upgraded windows 7 ultimate (despite the drivers only supporting up to XP on the site, which is confusing).

I don't think Linux can run games though, so I don't suppose that its the best choice for him.

Yeah right, games would be a problem. But who needs games. They are just a waste of time.