Is Windows 7 Home Premium edition sufficient for software development?

Question

Is the Windows 7 Home Premium sufficient for software development?

Development would be in Visual Studio 2010.

I'm on a budget so would rather purchase 'Home Premium' rather than 'Professional' or 'Ultimate'.

The Microsoft site says there is next to nothing functionality wise between them that developers would miss. Can anyone confirm or deny?

BTW. Does it come with a version of IIS?

I realize that this is not a technical question. But it is important to me and I'm sure other developers wonder the same thing.

Cheers,

-- Lee

Answer 1

Yes. The OS you use really has little to do with development, unless you're targetting something specific to a version or edition of Windows (rare).

Answer 2

Yes. I write software using VS 2010 in WIndows 7 Home Premium without any trouble.

Answer 3

Basically, yes, it's totally sufficient.

A big upside to professional edition, though, is that it comes with Windows XP mode, essentially a virtual machine with a built-in XP installation (and included license). That can come in handy if you do web development (test things in IE6/7) or need to test applications in the old XP GUI.

Windows XP mode can also be a lifesaver if you need to run older applications that won't run properly in 7. I personally would consider choosing the Professional Edition for that reason.

Answer 4

What you won't find on the Microsoft site, but on Wikipedia, is a nice Comparison Chart.

Compared to Professional, the Home Premium edition lacks:

• support for more than 16 GB of memory: start worrying about that in a few years' time

• network support in the Backup and Restore Center: not a problem if you handle your own backups

• Remote Desktop server: not a problem if you develop only locally

• some advanced disk management stuff: not a problem

• features for a company network environment: not a problem

• Windows XP mode: handy if you want to test on XP, but can be replaced by e.g. VMWare running an XP installation

• Multilingual User Interface support: handy if you want to develop and test multilingual desktop applications

In conclusion: Professional may have some additional value if you develop Windows desktop applications for a diverse audience. If not, go for Home Premium.

Answer 5

Since you specifically asked:
Installing IIS 7.5 on Windows 7 Home Premium, Home Basic, or Home Starter (TechNet)

I guess in the past there were issues with developing for IIS on XP Home, but it looks like you can install IIS 7.5 on ANY version of Windows 7, including Starter, which I am surprised to see. I thought Starter was short of being useless for developers.

I agree with Pekka about XP Mode in Pro and Ultimate coming in handy if you need it. Sounds like Brian is already doing it and its working fine (I'm on Vista Ultimate until next week).

Answer 6

Don't purchase either, instead buy a MAPS subscription from them. In the UK these cost £199 p.a. (I imagine less in the states) for which you get virtually everything you're likely to need except Visual Studio. Currently you get

• 10 licences for MS Office 2007
• 10 for Project
• 10 for Visio
• 10 for Outlook
• 10 for Mappoint (North America only)
• 1 for Office Communications Server plus 10 CALS
• 10 for Windows 7 Professional
• 1 for Windows 7 Ultimate
• 1 for Windows Server 2008 R2, plus 10 Server CALS and 10 Terminal Server CALS
• 1 for Windows Web Server 2008 R2
• 1 for Windows Home Server 2008 R2
• 1 for Windows Business Server
• 1 for Windows Exchange server plus 10 CALS
• 1 for Windows Office Sharepoint, plus 10 CALS
• 1 for WIndows SQL Server standard plus 10 CALS

Plus a bunchload of other odds and sods servers and products of lesser interest.

MAPS is such good value - and I'm by no means a Microsoft fan - that purchase is pretty much a no-brainer for any software developer who runs Windows in any form.