When it comes to Windows operating system and upgrading through to the newest versions of it Ed Bott has your back. This time around he has The Ultimate Windows 7 Upgrade FAQ for you to bookmark just incase you need it when you go to install that new copy of Windows 7.

I’m currently running the Windows 7 Ultimate Release Candidate. What are my upgrade options?

From a licensing point of view, your installed copy of Windows is irrelevant. What matters is the sticker on the side of the PC. If you have a Certificate of Authenticity for Windows XP or Windows Vista on that computer (or a certificate of authenticity from a retail copy of Windows that has been assigned to that machine), you qualify for an upgrade license to any edition of Windows 7.

As for the installation itself, you are subject to the following technical limitations:

• An upgrade installation is blocked on the RC build (7100). To perform an in-place upgrade, you must modify an installation file using the technique described here.
• Because you are running Ultimate edition, your only option for an in-place upgrade is to install Windows 7 Ultimate edition.
• You cannot change from Windows 7 x86 (32-bit) to x64 (64-bit) or vice versa. If you’ve been testing the 32-bit version and you want to go 64-bit, you’ll need to do a custom install.

Get the rest of this helpful post over on his blog.