Do I need to have XP Pro and Office 2003 Pro to practise?

mackenzie2881

I just got the books for both exams. However it says I'll need to have Office 2003 Pro and XP Pro installed to practise. It also states that I should use a spare computer. First of all, I only have one PC, secondly I use Open Office, and have XP home edition and I don't have the cash to buy Office 2003/2007 Pro. Any tips?

Therhino

mackenzie2881 wrote: »

I just got the books for both exams. However it says I'll need to have Office 2003 Pro and XP Pro installed to practise. It also states that I should use a spare computer. First of all, I only have one PC, secondly I use Open Office, and have XP home edition and I don't have the cash to buy Office 2003/2007 Pro. Any tips?

I know this sounds like a mess but you may wanna either acronis your system and then use the disks from the books your purchases or just use virtual box but since you are running home i am worried about the amount of ram but you could most likely use a very slimmed down vm

dales

As stated you could use virtualbox or similar to run the software on top of your current set up, if your machine is straining as it is though it might be worth looking at a popular internet auction site for pc's being sold locally, pretty much anything post 1GHZ will be quite adequate for xp pro and office trials and they can be bought quite cheaply these days.

happytheclown37

dales wrote: »

As stated you could use virtualbox or similar to run the software on top of your current set up, if your machine is straining as it is though it might be worth looking at a popular internet auction site for pc's being sold locally, pretty much anything post 1GHZ will be quite adequate for xp pro and office trials and they can be bought quite cheaply these days.

the Microsoft Press Study Guides for the 70-271 and 70-272 exams come with a free trial version of XPP - which stops working after 120 days.

Amazon.com: MCDST Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-271): Supporting Users and Troubleshooting a Microsoft® Windows® XP Operating System, Second Edition (Pro-Certification): Walter Glenn, Tony Northrup: Books

dales

happytheclown37 wrote: »

the Microsoft Press Study Guides for the 70-271 and 70-272 exams come with a free trial version of XPP - which stops working after 120 days.

Amazon.com: MCDST Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-271): Supporting Users and Troubleshooting a Microsoft® Windows® XP Operating System, Second Edition (Pro-Certification): Walter Glenn, Tony Northrup: Books

Thats ok you can just format the drive and reinstall it for another 120 days! It'll work fine

mackenzie2881

In the end I went for the dual boot option and it went fine.