XP Upgrade

Clarifications

Preferably an XP Pro CD with SP2 installed or SP3. you also need an XP Pro key, which currently run for about $500 each.

They have Win XP Pro SP3 OEM for about $140, free shipping.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832116515

That's not an upgrade version. However, you can do a clean install but if you want to upgrade the price is almost $200, free shipping. But that's because it's retail. And this version only has SP2.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16837116196

The best way to upgrade to XP Pro is going to be to perform a clean install from any version XP Pro CD. Then, install the service packs and updates.

You can go directly from SP1 to SP3.

Just back up all of your data and settings.
Make sure you have all of the product keys for your software. And, a good hardware inventory and drivers for all of the hardware.

While a bit of work, starting over clean will improve the performance of your system versus installing XP Pro as an upgrade.

One caution on updates is that it works best if you install all of the updates for one version of the .NET framework before installing the next version of .NET.

One last thing, what benefit do you expect from XP Pro? The primary difference between XP Pro and XP home is that XP Pro has more network functions.

Chas