Most home business owners these days count a personal computer as one of their businesses’ main assets, indeed many could not operate without it. And close to 90% of these computers running on a Microsoft operating system.

Today marked the launch of Windows 7, the operating system that many hope will be a distinct improvement over the much maligned Windows Vista OS, which annoyed some users so much they elected to stick with, or even downgrade to Windows XP. Which, at eight years old is a “software dinosaur”. But is it really worth the small business owner taking a chance (and $100+ out of their budget) to upgrade to Windows 7?

The reviews so far are actually quite good. Windows 7 is far less “in your face” than Vista, with far fewer annoying pop up messages and not so many non essential applications. The start and task bars have been redesigned and Windows 7 offers new and more efficient ways to organize files.

Windows 7 appears faster than Vista, even on machines with a smaller memory capacity. To use Vista successfully you need at least 2GB of memory but, users report that Windows 7 seems to function very well with just 1GB.

If you use your computer often and store a lot of files, it may be worth investing in the upgrade to Windows 7. You can do this in a number of ways. New PCs are of course now being shipped with it standard and for those currently running Vista the upgrade will cost between $119 and $199, depending on the version- Basic to Professional. Upgrading takes about 30 minutes and is simply a matter of following the instructions on the install disc after backing up your data. XP users may have a harder time upgrading as it involves a little more technical confidence, but the Microsoft Help resources are quite extensive.

Read more about the release of Windows 7:

Five Reasons to Upgrade to Windows 7

Cnet Windows 7 Review

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