Parallels Desktop Upgrade to Windows 7 review

Upgrading from an older version of Windows to Windows 7 can prove to be a bit of a nightmare, but with Desktop Upgrade to Windows 7, Parallels hopes to make things easier. It’s designed for non-techy users wanting to make the upgrade and works in two scenarios.

First, for people who’ve bought a new computer, Desktop Upgrade will transfer your existing programs and settings to your new computer. As some applications may not work in Windows 7, Desktop Upgrade bundles your old computer into a virtual machine so you can access it in its entirety.

Secondly, for anyone that wants to upgrade their existing machine, Desktop Upgrade automatically retains your existing settings and applications, saving the entire original machine as a virtual computer, in case some programs don’t work in Windows 7. This is an important step for many people, as some Windows 7 upgrades, such as from Windows XP, require a clean installation that wipes your PC of its existing applications and settings.

To test, we upgraded two machines with the software, one running XP Professional, the other Vista Ultimate. The upgrade process in both cases is straightforward. You install Parallels Desktop and tell it whether you want to upgrade the PC it’s running on or migrate your programs and settings to a new Windows 7 PC. Currently for new computers you can migrate files over a network or using a hard disk; however, a version of Desktop Upgrade with an included USB transfer cable should now be on sale.

In both cases we chose to upgrade our existing PC. Once Parallels is running, it quite literally talks you through what you have to do, with a video in the right-hand corner of your screen telling you when to put your Windows 7 CD in the computer, when to enter your serial number and so on. After a while, you’re politely told that you’re no longer necessary and can check back in an hour or two. During this time Parallels does its thing and when you come back, you should find a working Windows 7 PC with all your old programs on it.

In practice this worked mostly, but not completely. When we upgraded XP, all of our programs but one migrated perfectly. The one, Ahead Nero 7, simply disappeared. The only way to use it was by opening the Parallels virtual machine containing the copy of our old OS. Fortunately, the virtual machine was clever enough give Nero direct access to the optical drive, otherwise we wouldn’t have been able to use our trusty old software at all.

Apart from this glitch, everything worked fine. All of the programs we used under XP worked on Windows 7. This included some programs that weren’t listed as Windows 7 compatible, which is possible because Parallels installs its own XP virtualisation mode. If a bit of software won’t run under Windows 7, all you have to is open the Parallels Program Switcher and you can get it to run under the Windows XP mode.

By comparison, the first time we upgraded from Vista we had some real problems. For no obvious reason Parallels stopped working half way through the upgrade. We were left with some functioning programs and some only half-migrated that wouldn’t run at all. Adobe Dreamweaver helpfully told us that it had experienced a “catastrophic” error with its licencing system and we would have to reinstall.

We started the process again, this time with more luck. Second time around the process worked as it was supposed to and our old programs and settings appearing as if by magic under Windows 7. Given, though, that the upgrade process takes several hours (overnight, if you have a slow PC) we weren’t thrilled to have to repeat it.

Even with the hiccoughs we experienced, using Parallels Desktop Upgrade to Windows 7 to move our old programs over to Windows 7 was a lot quicker than reinstalling them all by hand. It’s a good program, if you’ve got loads of old applications, but it didn’t work as seamlessly as we’d expected from the blurb.