

For more detailed info, check out Microsoft’s Additional Requirements to Use Certain Features. Since your computer is already running Windows 7, it should be good to go with Windows 8.1. Processor: 1 gigahertz (GHz) or fasterRAM: 1 gigabyte (GB) (32-bit) or 2 GB (64-bit)Hard disk space: 16 GB (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)Graphics card: Microsoft DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM driver Here are the basic system requirements to run Windows 8.1: In fact, even if you have your data backed up to the cloud, I recommend having it backed locally up to an external drive, NAS, or other network location. Hopefully, you’re already using an off-site backup solution like CrashPlan, so your data is already taken care of. Backing up your data is the most important thing to do before you start.

If something goes awry during the upgrade process, you’ll definitely want to make sure all of your personal files – music, photos, documents, pictures-are safe. With this upgrade, Windows will retain your files…ideally, that is.
