I recently had to make the same decision, I went for Professional over Home Premium for a few reasons. I'm not a Windows expert (was a Mac user for 5 years prior to switching earlier this year), so there may be workarounds to some of these points? Firstly, no compatibility mode. While there hasn't been a lot of times I've…
Home 64bit = 8gb ram max Premium 64bit = 16gb ram max Professional/Enterprise/Ultimate 64bit = 192gb ram max All versions of 7 have 'XP compatibility mode', just not all of give you a license to download the xp virtual machine (its not built in).
Home has a compatibility mode I believe. What you are talking about is the XP emulator thats only available with Pro or Ultimate. In other words a virtual machine. No reason for home x64 edition. Other than... Its missing the interface for direct implementation of system rules. So turning off the built in tablet functions…
yeah you need 64bit to use 8gb ram. Can't agree on Ultimate tho. I've been using Home Premium on my main machine and I don't see a reason, except maybe win backup and remote desktop, to use Ultimate. I never had to use the XP emulator, and compatibility mode is included in Home premium. All recent 3D apps and games work…