I’m thinking about getting a new computer, and if I do, it will undoubtedly come with Windows XP Pro. I have two other computers in my home network, a second desktop and a laptop. All three of my current computers have been happily running W2000 for years. I love 2000.
When XP was first announced, and it was going to have that lame subscription requirement, I swore I’d never get it. Thankfully, consumer outrage scuttled that evil plan. Since then I haven’t been paying much attention to XP, but it seems not to be all that bad.
So if I get the new machine, should I go ahead and change my other machines over to XP Pro? Or should I remove XP and load familiar old W2000 on the new machine? (I don’t want to mix OSes among my machines. It’s just easier to have everything the same.)
Probably the biggest argument pro switching 2K->XP is hardware/driver support - after that, maybe legacy software support, but I’ve not found XP to be particularly wonderful in this latter respect (the ‘run in compatibility mode for…’ thing makes little difference in my experience).
It’s easier to run XP as a non-administrator, which is always a good idea, because XP has “fast user switching”. So you can have an admin account logged in in the background, and switch to it only when you need it. And if you’re lazy you don’t even need to give it a password, because under XP passwordless accounts cannot be used remotely, nor with Run As.
My favorite XP extra has always been ClearType.
Turn it on and you instantly give your flat panel monitor triple the horizontal resolution, making all fonts amazingly smooth.
Windows XP is pretty darn similar to 2000, so it won’t be much of a difference. Just switch back into classic mode, instead of the stupid fisher-price interface that comes with XP, and you are set.
In what situations did you find 2000 unstable? The only problem I’ve had with it has been some crappy software by Sony for transferring audio data from minidisc, and I blame Sony for that, not W2000. Otherwise I’ve found it bulletproof for the last 5-6 years.
leandroc76: What do you mean by BS software?
The new machine will be my main work machine. My primary apps are the MS Office suite: Word, Access, Excel, Publisher, FrontPage, plus Photoshop Elements and some other graphics programs. No gaming or CAD or other heavy graphics uses. My current machine is a Dell Precision 330, 1.8GHz Pentium 4. It works fine, but it’s about three or four years old.
If I get a new machine (it’ll be another Dell), I’ll demote this one to my family room, to replace a much older machine that is the network hub and gateway, and is used mainly for surfing the Web while I watch TV.
I’m pretty committed to making all the machines alike, and it sounds like there isn’t much of a downside to switching to XP. A faster bootup would definitely be welcome. The current machine in the family room literally takes five minutes from hitting “Restart” to getting a new desktop. Ugh.
I can’t stand XP. I hate how it interferes with everything you try to do with some cutesy wizard or dog cartoon or something. And no, I don’t want to clean up my desktop icons. I put them there for a reason. I just want to use my computer, not have the computer prompt me to let me use it.
Of course, I’m the guy who only stopped running Windows 95 in 2001…
Some of the themes available there are quite nice. I have this one installed and the one I’m currently using is similar. The program they require comes bundled with other themes, one of which is Panther–note the little Apple logo instead of Start.
XP’s “faster starting” has a lot of typical microsoft hype behind it. XP is faster at showing you a desktop (it’s still booting even though it’s given you a desktop and mouse to start playing with). It’s not necessarily faster at booting to the point where you can actually do something useful. If you time how long it takes between when you first turn on your computer and the time when the straight dope front page shows up on the screen in front of you, you’ll find that XP really isn’t significantly faster.
If your 2000 box is booting really slowly, you may have a problem specific to that box. My 2000 box isn’t all that terribly slow at booting. I have noticed that there is a huge difference in boot times on identical machines with different network cards in them. Some of the speed differences may be due to specific device drivers on your system. There are other things that could cause a machine to boot slowly too, such as various programs that run during startup.
As far as stability goes, XP and 2000 are essentially the same operating system underneath the hood (2000 is NT 5.0 and XP is NT 5.1 if you want to compare them, it’s really just a minor version change). XP has a few more security holes in it due to new features, but other than that 2k and XP are both on par with each other as far as stability goes.
I don’t have any real complaints about XP, other than the activation crap (which, by the way, is enough to make me want to drop microsoft like a hot rock if anyone else ever puts out an operating system that runs all of the software I need). On the other hand, I can’t say that XP for me has any real benefit over 2000 either. YMMV.
In talking to my computer buddies, I’ve heard XP Service Pack 2 can be a nightmare. I believe this is more with people installing SP2 as opposed to systems coming with SP2 already installed.
I’m having my own problems with my pc, I suspect it is a Windows XP compatibility issue.
