Sometime back (Dec 2012), I've purchased a Windows 8 Pro license at a good low price and I've received the product key, still unused and is intended for my future DAW PC (that I'm expecting to setup soon) - and to upgrade to Windows 10 before the deadline of July 29.
 
Reading on the Pro vs Home features such as
- join a domain
- BitLocker (don't need this encryption .. will slow down disk access)
- group policy management
- remote desktop <- especially this that I don't need to prevent any sort of possible ..erm..hacking ?
- etc..(don't need all of the Pro features really)
 
I'm beginning to wonder if a Home version is better off for DAW use ? Which version do you use ?
 
I've also read that in case of future hardware change after activation, the "retail" version can be re-activated easily, but not the OEM version. Can I assume that the version (Windows 8 Pro) that I purchased must be the retail version ? The invoice simply print "Windows 8 Pro".

The main difference you have outlined plus the amount of addressable RAM that can be used by the OS.

Now IIRC Win 10 Home can access 128 gigabytes of RAM, which is also assuming that your MoB bios can handle that much.  This is considerably more than Win 7 Home could address.

Check your MoB BIOS for addressable RAM, I use Win 10 home it appears to function fine.

Definitely HOME.
 
I just read an article this morning that the minimum requirements for Win10 32-bit are changing in July when the Win10 Anniversary edition is dropped on us. 32-bit Win10 will require a minimum of 2 GB of RAM instead of 1 GB. The minimum for 64-bit remains 2 GB.

You should have no problem running either Pro or Home with 16 GB of ram. Save yourself some money and trouble, and just clean install Win 10 Pro on your new DAW. You do not ever need to install the Windows 8 Pro, just download the free Win 10 upgrade 64 bit version via the Media Creation Tool, and install it on a clean drive . When asked for an installation key just type in the Windows 8 key that you have and it will install Win10Pro. You may lose a small amount of ram to the overhead in Pro vs Home, but probably not a significant amount running applications. As noted previously, the 32 bit version is likely to use nearly as much memory soon, and there is no other reason to prefer it. 
 
http://www.howtogeek.com/224342/how-to-clean-install-windows-10/
 

tomixornot
Sometime back (Dec 2012), I've purchased a Windows 8 Pro license at a good low price and I've received the product key, still unused and is intended for my future DAW PC (that I'm expecting to setup soon) - and to upgrade to Windows 10 before the deadline of July 29.
 
Reading on the Pro vs Home features such as
- join a domain
- BitLocker (don't need this encryption .. will slow down disk access)
- group policy management
- remote desktop <- especially this that I don't need to prevent any sort of possible ..erm..hacking ?
- etc..(don't need all of the Pro features really)
 
I'm beginning to wonder if a Home version is better off for DAW use ? Which version do you use ?
 
I've also read that in case of future hardware change after activation, the "retail" version can be re-activated easily, but not the OEM version. Can I assume that the version (Windows 8 Pro) that I purchased must be the retail version ? The invoice simply print "Windows 8 Pro".

 I think the retail version will say Full instead of Retail.  I was shopping around for W8 retail licenses and that was my conclusion.  Buying Windows licenses can be tricky.  The easiest way is to install it and find out. I have a thread that shows you how to find out if your OS is retail. 
 

Thanks for all the feedback.
 
If I don't have a license yet, Windows 10 Home Full Retail is the right choice. So, I'm going the direction of using my existing PRO since I've already purchased it.. but the following comparison of Windows 10 versions got me thinking otherwise
 
https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/windows/windows-10-editions
 
Specifically
- Windows Defender and Firewall is _not_ supported by Windows 10 Pro ?
- All the gaming features , especially Direct X 12 - not supported by Windows 10 Pro. Not that I'm a gamer yet, but it'll be a nice OS feature.
 
 

tomixornot
Thanks for all the feedback.
 
If I don't have a license yet, Windows 10 Home Full Retail is the right choice. So, I'm going the direction of using my existing PRO since I've already purchased it.. but the following comparison of Windows 10 versions got me thinking otherwise
 
https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/windows/windows-10-editions
 
Specifically
- Windows Defender and Firewall is _not_ supported by Windows 10 Pro ?
- All the gaming features , especially Direct X 12 - not supported by Windows 10 Pro. Not that I'm a gamer yet, but it'll be a nice OS feature.
 
 

Where did you get that information? I did not see that nor do I believe.
DX12 is in all versions.  You need a card that supports it otherwise its DX11.
Defender is the new MSE.  You can choose to update Defender everyday in Pro.
 
For the average user Windows 10 Pro is good if you like to network stuff and to add more memory in hardware that isn't available yet for the common man.  Even Home which supports 128GB of RAM check out the prices of motherboards that support that much and then price 128gb of DDR4 RAM.
 
 

kitekrazy1

tomixornot
Thanks for all the feedback.
 
If I don't have a license yet, Windows 10 Home Full Retail is the right choice. So, I'm going the direction of using my existing PRO since I've already purchased it.. but the following comparison of Windows 10 versions got me thinking otherwise
 
https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/windows/windows-10-editions
 
Specifically
- Windows Defender and Firewall is _not_ supported by Windows 10 Pro ?
- All the gaming features , especially Direct X 12 - not supported by Windows 10 Pro. Not that I'm a gamer yet, but it'll be a nice OS feature.
 
 

Where did you get that information? I did not see that nor do I believe.
DX12 is in all versions.  You need a card that supports it otherwise its DX11.
Defender is the new MSE.  You can choose to update Defender everyday in Pro.
 
For the average user Windows 10 Pro is good if you like to network stuff and to add more memory in hardware that isn't available yet for the common man.  Even Home which supports 128GB of RAM check out the prices of motherboards that support that much and then price 128gb of DDR4 RAM.
 

I'm all for the Home, but since I've already got the Pro, I just dig a bit more, never used a Pro before.
 
From this link :
 
https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/windows/windows-10-editions
 

Looking at the chart again, I'm suspecting the middle column title (Mobile) should have the least feature - moving it to the end seems to make sense..

That information is incorrect.