You have to hoop to embroider. But they also have endless hoops that can make it easier. Marking where you want the designs can make it easy to get them where you want them. I have vista and never and an issue with it. I have pedesign 7. I have the 8500 as well as a bigger one and the older program works better with that machine. I can only write one design to the disk at a time for it or it won't read the disk with program. When I upgraded I gave the old one to my mom who I got into it as well. She also has the 8500 but she has updated and bought a newer pfaff