Why should I upgrade to XP?????

I do not want to start a long thread, as this is a loaded question. Not familar at all with XP. I am currently running W2K Pro and very, very satisfied with it. So why upgrade? Don't want to for the sake of upgrading? Is it really more stable? Is there a major difference between XP and W2K?

My current system can handle XP (see Murf's Garage for my specs) - that will get you to my site......

Anyway, just looking for the pro's and con's. Is XP really worth the investment. Not a gamer, multi-task, lot of troubleshooting, downloading programs, trying them and quite frankly spend too much time in here......

Having known ya for a fews years now, the only reason I can think of to upgrade would be for "experience" of it all. It'd make you an even more well rounded guy.

Ok, second reason. EVERYTHING being developed now is geared around XP. Few months from now there will probably be some new gadget you just have to have but will need XP. Ok, I'm stretching it a bit.....

Think I'll go look for your "why should I move to Win2k thread."

That didn't take long:

Why should I load W2K??
May 2002

A couple of things I like about XP:

Native dual monitor support. Instant recognition of both monitors and easy setup. W2k has a definite problem with dual monitors. (why they would leave out this feature in a business OS is beyond me, I believe it was included in a pre-release version) 98 of course also has native support.

An amazing array of hardware drivers. I tried 2 different dialup modems. I didn't have time to get the driver CD's into the ROM drive before XP had loaded a perfectly useable driver both times. Same with NIC's, (finally got back on DSL) XP loaded useable drivers before I could get the driver floppy into the drive.

I also went 2 weeks before I loaded my vid card drivers. The generic driver XP loaded was so good I couldn't tell the custom drivers hadn't been installed. That is until I tried to adjust resolution. (which I couldn't do until the proper drivers were loaded)


So ghost your w2k and give it a try.

Edit: the only thing that was a problem was networking. But once I got NetBEUI loaded, problem solved!

I think XP is great. I think that anyone using Windows 98 should immediate get one. It's tougher to say that someone with a 2000 Pro that's working well should do it. In fact, I've heard some excellent arguments in favor or skipping XP and waiting for Longhorn (spring of 2005, maybe). I can't think of a lot you'd be missing if you wait. Although, Steve R Jones had two good points. It's a great experience and developers are looking forward (they don't seem to like the phrase "backward compatible").

I don't think you would be making a bad decision either way: moving to XP or waiting.

First time i tried XP-home was back in January. Was running Win98SE at the time and it was an OS i'd spent many hours getting tweaked and learning to make it behave itself. Wasn't thrilled with XP at all. Tried all the 'trusted' settings and tweaks available at the time and still got many errors. Dumped it and went back to SE. Been watching and lurking around XP sites and here, to see how others were fairing as the new patches and updates came out. With the advent of service pack 1a, i decided to give it another shot. Been on it with my main PC 4 days now and finally have all the updates from M$,all my main progs installed and have meticulously gone thru' 'services' and set them to my liking. I have to say, it's considerably faster than Win9x, i have 'no' shutdown/startup problems and the NTFS file system has not even stuttered when transferring very large files, unlike Win98. I know much of this doesn't pertain to your Win2K,'cause you already have much of this. But i have 2K Pro and wanted to put that on my networked PC which wasn't practical or feasable with Win98. Mostly because of the file system conflict.
Been putting off the 'activation' until i was sure it would suffice,but as of now it looks like i'll do so in the next day or two...

Just my "bloated" 2¢ worth. :D

Quote:

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Originally posted by Murf
Why should I upgrade to XP?????

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So you can join in on the fun of the blaster32 worm!!!!!

The only thing I like about XP over 2000 is driver support. OK so it's a little prettier, but that's all. I end up de-tuning most of the services and goodies so that it really resembles 2000 anyway.

I’ve bean running XP Pro for about a year now and am very happy with its performance and stability. The driver base is one of the perks of the system, and all the toys that are out there for XP are a lot of fun. There are some bad holes in XP, but there are places other then MS to go get fixes, like Steve Gibson's site. There lots of toys there to.

I ran 2000 Pro for a time, and was also happy with its stability. Not as attractive as XP but just as stably.

Lance.

XP is WAY better than 2000. #1 reason, it is about 3 times faster to load. Also everything just works. Plug in a digital camera, bam works. Don't have to install drivers or any of that crap.

Hi Murf,

I was like you a couple of months ago -- although with Win98SE. Like you I had spent a lot of time (a couple of years) figuring out how to make it behave itself. Then my computer died, and I just figured that with support ending in July, what was the point of even trying to keep Win98SE if I was buying new.

I had tried XP once before and ended up uninstalling it, like you -- lots of changes that I didn't care for. By the time I finally got it OEM they were at SP1, and that made some difference.

It was very frustrating at first figuring out how to make it look more like what I was famliar with, and I can't say it's a huge improvement. Only in this: 1. It certainly is a lot more stable and Task Manager is very obedient, it lets me close programs promptly and doesn't just sit there looking at me. 2. As someone who spends some time playing around with pictures and graphics (love it, in fact), I find the color in XP, only one way to describe it, eye-popping.

But if you're not into that, of course, it doesn't make a huge difference. And obviously, since you already have the benefit of the NT platform, it wouldn't be a big segue anyway. Which could mean one could argue for it either way -- no big change, so don't; no big change, so may as well.

I guess that's what ultimately scared me -- so many programs and drivers were being written for XP and not so many anymore for 98SE, and after a while probably many of my things would just refuse to run. In some cases they did already.

Cheers
Wendy

P.S. I gave my old retail XP to my husband. After I installed a fancy graphics card (he had had on-chip video) and gave him 500MB of memory, he was having a ball with XP. As a gamer, he found it was everything he wanted.

I am still running both OS's, and have yet to see the valid reason to go from one to the other, as far as stability is concerned. Win2K is just as reliable, and actually faster when running, than XP. If I were you, I would wait until Windows 2003 goes RTM, and then go to it instead of XP. Now that is an OS, fast, reliable, nice to look at, and just a great thing to work with too.

That is the route I am taking with it all.. IMHO, Windows 2000 is still better than XP.....

Stay with it until Windows 2003 is out. That's what I say.. :D

Im curious why you say wait till Windows 2003?

It is purely a server OS. A complete waste using it as a workstation. Sure you can "refine" it down to a workstation system, but in that case, you may as well just go with XP anyway...

I went with XP from 2k as soon as it was released.
LIke all the others have said, driver support has been greatly improved by MS. It can look FAR prettier, if thats your thing.
I would go with it just to try it...backup your current drive, and try it, what have you got to lose? When it comes down to it, no matter what people say, you wont know until you have a play with it yourself.
I personally would never go back to anything else.

Just to add my views...

I have been using XP Pro from Day 1 and have never regreted it.

The first thing that caught my eye was the User Interface (of coarse) everything is easier to find and use. At first there where problems with driver support for older hardware but i got though it.

Its a step that i did not hesitate in taking ( i had Windows 98 ).

Overall i have been impressed with its stability and great for multimedia.

Gets my https://discussions.virtualdr.com/im.../2012/05/1.gif https://discussions.virtualdr.com/im.../2012/05/1.gif

I have Win2000 on one PC & XP Pro on the other. Apart from a few extra bells & whistles in Xp there's not a lot to choose between them. I agree about the dual-monitor support with XP - I'm running a dual-monitor setup with the XP box which I never could get to work with 2K. It's also true about the driver support although a lot of those drivers are quite basic. I always prefer to get the latest drivers from the hardware manufacturer anyway, so I don't find that so much of an advantage.

As far as stability goes, there's nothing to choose between the two. And many of the "extras" built into XP (like CD burning and the firewall, etc) really aren't much to write home about, to say the least. I only upgraded myself because MS were running a promotion at the time and I got XP Pro at a very good price, and I knew that I'd need another OS for my second PC - I'm not sure I would have bothered otherwise. I really like XP, but I like Win2000 too, and I think the reasons for upgrading are a lot less compelling than going from W98 to W2K - that really was a good move.

Win2K or XP? hmmmmm.....Win2K or XP? hmmmmm.....Win2K or XP? hmmmmm.....Win2K or XP? hmmmmm.....

Navel Orange or Jaffa Orange? mmmmmm.......Navel Orange or Jaffa Orange? mmmmmm.......Navel Orange or Jaffa Orange? mmmmmm.......

Sure driver supoort is easier, for now what's the big deal about using a driver CD?, and XP will write to CD as incorporated into the OS, big deal I use Nero, XP loads faster, true but with age comes patience, XP doesn't out perform Win2K once they are both up and running. I can't really give you a good reason to 'upgrade'. I have been using XP since it was known as Whistler and watched it mature to a truly nice OS Win2K for only a year now. There is something intangible about XP that I do prefer over Win2K unfortunately I am unable for the life of me to indentify.

Now if that isn't enough to convince you to 'upgrade' how about because you're missing the whole XPerience!. My Dad taught me a long time ago "If it works why fix it?"

I feel you may eventually go over to Windows XP, since Longhorn isn't expected out till late 2005 or 2006. The dates on the release are still up in the air.... Manufacturers aren't expected to be fully in line with Longhorn till 2008, due to it working on a different file system than NTFS (or so I've read).

I've used XP a couple weeks after it came out, and it's stability is equal to that of 2000. XP has a lot of eye candy and people are attractive to that (I guess), but once you're familiar with XP it's a joy to work with. My current install is about 3 months shy of 2 years, and runs as good as the day I installed it.

There's really no reason to switch today over to XP, but maybe so in the coming months. Just may try holding out till Longhorn, but that maybe another 2 or 3 years, if you can't wait, go for XP if you see a benefit in switching. If not save your money!

If the 'eye candy' bugs you,you can go into 'Display Properties'>appearance and change to 'Windows classic style' anyways. What i did. :p

Hey Murf! Whadaya think? (so far?) :cool:

Like people have said, if u were using 98 then an upgrade would be well worth it, but since u already use 2000 and it works fine for you then i see no reason to upgrade to XP... both are in most cases as good as the next, XP is a little more newbie friendly but i'm sure u'r already used to 2000 by now :)

Perhaps a very important thing to consider since its getting close now, is 64bit computing...

My point is that if u plan on upgrading u'r PC to 64bit soon there's no point buying any 32bit OS.

If you use it as a multi-user system you will probably like it. For me I like the stability, but absolutely hate the multi-user stuff.

because you'd rather have yet another OS
then say a faster CPU
or newer video card or maybe a dvd burner

WOW

More response then I thought, and Steve I forgot about that thread.... actually it convinced me to switch and I'm still using it, dumped 98 and only have W2K now....

Lot's of good info here, you folks are great, hands full in the 98 and hardware forum, and our "95" " forum is dying. But I know I will try it, can't help myself, it's out there. Will dual boot when I do try it. But as TheGorx says, hardware is more important then O/S for me right now. Got to get a DVD, it's killing me.....

I really appreciate the responses and maybe it helps other folks that are on the fence right now. As others have said, I tweaked the hell out of "95", then "98" and now W2K and it's running great.

Getting too old to learn another O/S right now...lololo as I would spend all my time tweaking the thing....

But, When I make the plunge, I'm sure I will be here asking all them there dumb questions so you smart folks can answer them.

Ridgerunr I'm still thinking............... and thinking......... and thinking....... and as TheGorx said, the cost of XP could get me that DVD I'm thinking about.....humm

Again thanks for helping me out in my decision making, which I have not made yet.

XP might not seem to be the right thing for everyone, if you have an old system. If you do have an old system then it would take hours to install, I sould know, cause I had one and just went out and bought a new motherboard and AMD Duron 1.2gighzt. I know that this may sound silly, but the lay out and desing of XP it awsome! Everything from broswer software and some others, show an easy to navagate. Also XP offers a much easy uninstaller software, where 98/ME doesn't detect some program in the uninstall, and you got to hunt down the software and manully uninstall it yourself. As alot have mention "drivers" for devices are a snap! Microsoft has in away gone out of their way to provide lots of drivers for alot of devices. To those who knock Windows XP, all I can say is, if you are having problems, at least you got someone here at VirtualDr.com to help. But to tell you the truth, If you have Windows 98 or above, it alright but you'll be missing out alot in the near future. Microsoft is already coming out with another Windows (code name: Longhorn). Why they pick that name is way out there. So don't be left behind, and join us XP users. I sound like a computer junkie.

I'm from the Dark Ages of Windows 3.1/DOS 5.0. You can stop laughing now, and yes, I'm grateful for any software update. Windows XP Program Compatibility Wizard allows me to run some of my favorite "ancient" programs. I also like XP's Task Manager which I've used espcecially for Internet programs that "freeze." I've read that, "Microsoft has finally learned and separated home and office designed operating systems!" The article described user problems with Microsoft's operating systems because of repeated attempts to provide a combined platform. Windows XP propels the "user-friendly" tradition.