Question: I would like to upgrade from XP Professional to Windows 7 Professional. Could someone give me a few basic steps of the process? I keep reading about "clean installs", "migration", and saving everything before upgrading. What specificly, must be saved...or should I not have skipped Vista all these years?

Answer: 
Your friend [How-To-Geek](https://superuser.com/users/4102/the-how-to-geek) has a step-by-step guide entitled [Migrate XP to Windows 7 with Easy Transfer and a USB Drive](http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/3179/migrate-xp-to-windows-7-with-easy-transfer-and-a-usb-drive/) available on [HowToGeek.com](http://www.howtogeek.com/).
You won't be able to do a direct xp to 7 upgrade. for some inane reason, microsoft decided against it. you can only do a clean install which means you'll have to backup all of your settings, documents, media and do a clean install of 7 then import your stuff. 

i think this is microsoft's way of giving us the finger back for rejecting vista.