It is usually not that easy to evaluate all the different editions to find a suitable one. Even users who buy a pre-build PC system should make sure that the included operating systems meets all their demands. Windows 7 Home Premium’s main advantage is its price and the fact that it offers all features that Microsoft would consider essential. Here is a small overview of those features:

Windows 7 Home Premium features that Windows 7 Home Basic and Windows 7 Starter do not have:

• Full Windows Aero support: The graphical user interface and theme for most Windows 7 editions.
• Home Group (Create & Join): Easy network creation (the basic editions can only join but not create)
• Multi-Touch (touch capabilities for the PC)
• Premium Games (Internet Backgammon, Internet Checkers, and Internet Spades.)
• Windows Media Center

There are on the other hand features that are not included in Windows 7 Home Premium. Those are only available in the higher priced editions:

• Backup and Restore Center (backup to networks)
• Windows Server Domain support.
• Remote Desktop Server support.
• Location aware printing: Automatically changes the default printer based on the location of the user.
• Encrypting the file system
• Presentation mode: Presentation Mode is found in the Mobility Centre (Windows Key + X) and lets you control your machine’s behavior while you are giving presentations
• Windows XP Mode: Windows XP Mode and Windows Virtual PC, available on Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Ultimate, allow you to run multiple Windows environments, such as Windows XP Mode, from your Windows 7 desktop
• AppLocker (Ultimate only): Helps eliminate unwanted and unknown applications within an organization’s network
• BitLocker Drive Encryption (Ultimate only): Hard drive and removable media encryption
• BranchCache Distributed Cache (Ultimate only): BranchCache offers the potential of being able to access large files stored on servers much faster.
• DirectAccess (Ultimate only): Utilises IPv6-over-IPsec to encrypt comms over the internet between remote workers and the DirectAccess server
• Multilingual User Interface Pack (Ultimate only): Ability to switch to other interface languages.
• Virtual Hard Disk Booting (Ultimate only): Create a virtual hard disk image, install an operating system and boot it.

Finally there are also hardware limits in place. Windows 7 Home Premium supports a maximum of 16 Gigabytes of computer memory. This limit is raised to 192 Megabytes in Windows 7 Professional and Windows 7 Ultimate. Windows 7 Home Premium seems to be the natural choice for most home users unless one or multiple of the features only included in Windows 7 Pro or Ultimate are needed to operate the computer system.

It was therefor welcome when rumors about a Windows 7 Family Pack emerged on the Internet. This family pack was supposed to contain three Windows 7 licenses so that the operating system could be installed on three computer systems in one household.

The pricing for the Windows 7 Family Pack and the Windows 7 Anytime Upgrade was announced yesterday in an official blog post over at the Windows Team Blog. The features remain the same: Customers can buy a Windows 7 Family Pack consisting of three Windows 7 Home Premium licenses to install the operating system on three computers in one household. Windows 7 Home Premium is the only edition of Windows 7 that is offered in the family pack. The price for the Family Pack has been set to $149.99 in the US. It should be noted that the editions are upgrade editions and not retail editions which means that users need a Windows XP or Windows Vista license to perform the update.

The Windows 7 Anytime Upgrade pricing was announced in the same blog post. Anytime Upgrade refers to the possibility to upgrade a Windows 7 edition to another edition by paying a certain amount of money. This process does not involve installing the operating system anew and could be interesting for users who purchase a computer system with a Windows 7 edition that they want to upgrade because of the increased functionality that the upgraded system offers.

Three different Anytime Upgrade editions are available. It is possible to upgrade Windows 7 Starter, a version aimed at primarily at the netbook market, to Windows 7 Home Premium. It is furthermore possible to upgrade Windows 7 Home Premium to either Windows 7 Professional or Windows 7 Ultimate. The prices for the different versions are as follows:

• Windows 7 Starter to Windows 7 Home Premium: $79.99
• Windows 7 Home Premium to Windows 7 Professional: $89.99
• Windows 7 Home Premium to Windows 7 Ultimate: $139.99

The pricing looks to be expensive considering that the Windows 7 Home Upgrade sells for $119.99 currently. Users safe between $40-$70 when performing the Anytime Upgrade instead of buying a retail upgrade edition of Windows 7 instead.