Is the XP Mode in some versions of Windows 7 just automatic?

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I'd had an old Adobe program that I wanted to keep using, but heard it wouldn't work in Windows 7 without XP Mode. I deliberately looked to get a version of 7 with XP Mode.

Thing is, now that the computer has been upgraded to 7 Pro, my program installed and seems to be working fine ...without me doing anything.

I don't know where XP Mode is, haven't turned it on, at least not deliberately, but the Adobe program seems to run just fine. (Seems to...I'm witholding judgement for now, but see no problems.)

Does XP Mode just work automatically, without you needing to do anything, or is something weird going on with this new OS I've had installed?

Thanks for any reliable answers you can offer.

Well, to use XP mode, you have to have a PC capable of running a virtual environment. Most of the newest processors do that. In Windows 7, it's under Windows Virtual PC, and you normally have to install it by downloading the XP version off of Microsoft (be where you have broadband service).

If your program is running under Windows 7, then the claim that it won't run under Windows 7 is probably false or there are possible glitches that may happen when running under Windows 7.

XP mode won't run automatically unless you use a shortcut to open the virtual mode when you click on it. I did that for Photoshop 6. The icon won't open Photoshop, but it will direct open into XP mode so I don't have to hunt for the shortcut on the start menu of Windows 7.

XP Mode needs to be installed on Win7. See here:
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/wind ... -windows-7
Also, what zer0netgain said - you can find out if your machine is suitable by checking the "Before you begin" link on that page.

If your software is running then there's possibly nothing you need do - test it thoroughly!
Without having XP Mode installed, a right-click on the application's icon should allow you to set an OS compatibility for it - select properties, then the compatibility tab. (note that this isn't the same thing as XP Mode, which provides a virtual machine running XP. Setting a compatibility for the application tweaks the way Win7 runs it)
I needed to do that for a MIDI sequencer which was written for NT/XP so I didn't expect problems. It seemed Ok at first but I found a weird display problem while testing it (certain fonts couldn't be found), and setting the compatibility to "Windows XP Service Pack 3" fixed it.

"XP Mode" is just a pre-packaged VM that comes with certain high-end versions of Windows 7, mainly Professional and Ultimate.

There is also a difference between "XP Mode" and "XP Compatibility Mode." All Windows OS higher than 95 had reverse compatibility options. The OS would try to run a program with protocols from an older Windows OS if you told it to. It wasn't really running the program in that OS...just trying to better emulate (probably by disabling newer processes that didn't exist when that older OS was the standard).

XP Mode, in a VM environment, is an actual pure version of XP operating in memory...100% isolated from the Windows 7 operating system's processes.

Would Windows 8 also have that compatibility mode?

It should. I've not checked.

XP Mode was thrown in for Windows 7 because too many people have XP programs they didn't want to have to upgrade to run under a 64-bit OS (another key difference is that compatibility mode is still working under a 64-bit OS while a VM would be running a 32-bit OS).