I need a range of informed opinions quickly as I may or may not buy it after my current shift at work.
I have recently increased the amount of RAM in my computer to 1GB. This has caused a number of errors (with ‘workarounds’ but not fixes) that have shown the age of Win ME (and all 9x versions).
As someone who loves to have full control of my computer (even dislike WinME’s habit of telling me the CD is in use when I press eject) would it annoy the living daylights out of me?
Does it lower the performance of computer games? (all modern ones)
Are there any issues regarding installation?/ any known MFUs? (cannot explain that abrev here, maybe in the pit. Use your imagination)
Anything you need to know before you answer? (my system - 1GB Ram, 20gb HD, AMD athlon 1000MHz, Geforce 4, Sound blaster live)
I’ve been running WinXP Home since I built my PC, and it’s not too bad.
If you do install, I recommend turning the “plasticky”, brightly-colored look off and switching to the “Classic” scheme, because the other scheme will make you blind eventually.
On the upside, I usually can get about 3-5 days consecutive uptime without a reboot. That’s assuming I can avoid an “instant restart” that occurs when the system gets a BSOD.
It’s not a bad OS, it’s just not that good either.
I have a confession to make - I have an illegal (copied) copy of win ME. If I buy the upgrade version of XP will it a) know I have an illegal copy and/or b) not work?
<hangs head in shame>
I am a Macintosh person mostly, so bear this in mind:
I just got a new PC with XP Professional. IT IS SOOOOO MUCH BETTER THAN WINDOWS 98. I can’t speak for Windows ME, but all reports indicate that it sucks, big time. While I still prefer Mac OS X to XP, XP really isn’t all that bad (it does want to “do everything” for you, whether you ask it to or not).
If you have ME, my heartfelt advice is to upgrade to XP. My PC guru advised that I get XP Pro, which is what I did. I’ve heard other sources recommend Pro. You should be able to buy an upgrade, rather than buying the full version, since you have ME right now.
So, this Macintosh person is telling you to get XP!
Oh wait. I didn’t read that you got a bootleg version of ME. Shame on you. I don’t know if XP will upgrade from a bootleg. I wouldn’t chance it myself.
XP rocks ass compared to any 9x and ME. 2000 is really the only one that you could argue is better. IMO, both have their ups and downs, making them about equal in my book.
My favourite thing about XP? 90% of all the stuff I attach to it has a driver made for it by XP so I don’t have to find the old install disk for it.
I have XP pro and it really is much more stable than 98. It has the functionality of NTFS as opposed to FAT32, which is from Satan. And it made such an improvement on backup/recovery methods, as well as the oh-so-sweet “roll back previous driver” functionality for those of us who love to push the limit with all the beta drivers and software.
Security and encryption made leaps and bounds as well, along with compressable folders/drives etc…
Excellent functionality for asking a friend to help you remotely too. You won’t regret it. **BUT!!! ** Buy the FULL version and NOT the upgrade, even if you didn’t have a warez version of ME. This is so you can reformat your drive and blissfully re-install.
Actually, I did some research on XP because I had to install it on my new PC myself (I got it cheaper by buying XP Pro from someone else instead of the PC vendor.) I believe that you can do a clean install of XP even if you are using an upgrade version. There’s just some special step you have to take (I think you have to have the older version on hand and stick it in the CD-ROM drive when prompted?). I would think that there’s gotta be a way to do a fresh install with an upgrade.
(And Lobsang, I wasn’t really trying to bust you up too much over the “copy” of ME.) Do you have an old CD of Win98 hanging about? It could serve as an “upgrade path” to XP as well.
That is usually the way it works anyway.
I think the fact that I haven’t had a single negative response so far speaks volumes. I am definately going to get it. However, I decided to wait a few days until I have time to spend a whole day getting installing it (including getting the PC exactly how I want it - installing all my apps, and making sure everything works) so the urgency indicated in the OP and title is no longer there.
I have just been upgraded from Win 2K to XP (having been moved from ME to 2K sometime last year) so come with a slightly different perspective. What I have found is that XP is quite a bit faster at working within an application and is a bit more stable, but is quite a bit slower at dealing with network connectivity.
I think that ME should only use up to 512M, right? After that things start to get pretty weird. You shouldn’t use more than that with anything but XP. So that’s my input
I will submit that XP accepted my backup 98SE CD at the “please insert qualifying cd” prompt. Also note that it will accept pretty much any install cd for a previous windows version, including 3.1.
FWIW add one more “yes”. I’ve had 95, 98 and ME over the last couple years and XP is a huge step forward in terms of performance/stability. Also much more user friendly IMHO. I set up a home network for my other 'puter and my laptop in about 10 minutes (They run Win ME and Win 98 respectively - at least for now)
First be aware that RAM capacity issues are not all OS related but may be tied to your MB architecture and BIOS limitations regardless of OS. Your hardware platform will run XP just fine.
XP is far more stable than Win98/ME.
You will need the XP-Pro version if you intend on being part of an NT network otherwise the Home version should suffice unless you want to get fancy networkingwise.
On average about half or more of your older 95/98 /ME apps will probably not work properly with XP and will likely need to be upgraded.
You had best dis-abuse yourself of the anticipation having “full control” of your PC with XP on board. Remember the old Outer Limits intro - “We are in control of the vertical. We are in control of the horizontal”. That’s XP and usually it makes the right decisions.
Overall it takes some getting used to, but overall XP is a far better OS than 98 or ME.
(another Mac user with a thumbs-up for XP). The best Windows OS I’ve ever seen. Yes, turn the hideous default appearance off and switch to Classic. Spend a day disabling all the auto-whatever features so that it quits infantilizing you.
Not too shabby, though. Beats hell out of ME and 98.
I have the chance to copy somebody’s XP disk, and will probably go the illegal multiboot (98me, xp, red hat) route at least for a while to try it (I’m too lazy to deal with corrupted downloaded copies). Be aware that there is lots of existing hardware & programs that run fine on 98/2K/me/nt but that don’t run right on WinXP–and you will not find these until after you install XP. Check any tech message board for XP and you’ll see.
~
I upgraded my parents from win98 to xp a few weeks back. The process went flawlessly. No drivers needed to be installed. The computer ran infinitely better and more stable (800 mhz Duron, 256 mb ram). The only snag was that it refused to recognize the installation of win98 on the drive and they couldn’t find their win98 disks. I had to cough appropriate cough a backup copy of win2k to get it to install. You should be fine.
The OS is so nice, I’m kinda tempted to upgrade, myself, now.
