(OT Computer OS) Which Should I Use Win2000 or XPpro?

[Tom Cashel]

XP Pro 0wnz - it's hands down THE BEST MS OS EVAR.

OT--why do people keep spelling the word "ever" e-v-a-r? Is it a phonetic representation of the Comic Book Guy's signature pronouncement?

Now back to your regularly scheduled thread....

Why does Windows Me suck so bad?

 

[Bronn Spellforger]

Tom -- Don't you see that this is why everyone hates you?

Worst. Post. EVAR.

 

[MaxKaladin]

I plan to avoid XP just because of the big brother stuff like having to tell them what I have installed and so forth and the spyware reported earlier is just more reason not to ever use it. I will have to upgrade from 98 someday and I'm sure it will be win2k.

Oh, and I don't hate Tom. I'd wonder the same thing, actually.

 

[thatdarncat]

Definitly w2k Pro SP2.

W2k Pro is NT v5
WXP Pro is NT v5.5

essentially WXP Pro is w2k with all the patches applied, a different user interface (although to a certain extent you can change it back to w2k) and a few new features bought from other companies. Ex: the built in CD burning software is a striped down version of Easy CD Creator 5.

However, M$ broke quite a few things in WXP. When an OS has 10MB of patches on the release day, you know there is something wrong. If I recall correctly (it's been a while since I last had to do any WXP downloads) the patches are upwards of 30MB, maybe 60MB, in size. They completely rewrite the Remote Assistance feature, for instance.

Stick with W2K, you don't need anything WXP will give you.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Hmm. I did not "register" my Windows XP Professional. It is a legal version, but at least in Germany most of this registration crap is not legal. (At least, it is not legal to force someone to register XP.)
As far as I heard there is a easy way to deactive the registration (there are just three files to be deleted or copied? Don`t know any details...)

Mustrum Ridcully

 

[Anakin]

I'm running XP Pro Enterprise edition....and I gotta say I love it. very stable for me, and somewhat "pretty-fied" for the fiancee. It has quite a few little features that, while barely mentionable, are nice. Overall, I'd recommend it in a heartbeat.

As long as you patch it. Which is true for pretty much anything. Very little software comes perfect right outta the box these days.

 

[Kvantum]

XP Pro

Gotta go XP, if you ask me. The main thing is reboot time. If you update your video drivers as soon as new betas come out, it doesn't matter which one you use, you'll need to reboot. The only difference is that rebooting 2kPro takes about twice as long as XP. And as far as the silly interface, just set the Start Menu to Classic, and then go into Display - Appearence and set your Windows And Buttons to Windows Classic. Boom. XP Pro without the stupid window designs.

 

[Tom Cashel]

Tom -- Don't you see that this is why everyone hates you?

Worst. Post. EVAR.

Bronn--remember this when you're the first to die at the beginning of the next game session!

edit: and why does Windows ME suck so bad? Should I attempt to trade it for XP?

 

[buzzard]

I would say Win 2K myself. A good policy on M$ OSes is to wait until they finally fix them to adopt them. Win 2K is pretty much fixed. Not completely since I still see more than enough weird stuff here in my support job for 1000+ machines, but good enough. The one on my desk works reliably enough. Mind you I prefer my OS X box sitting next to it, but I'm a partisan.

Buzzard

 

[SpikeyFreak]

If you're really worried about security, go Win2K because WinXP is a PRIME target for hackers because of the raw sockets.

If you don't really care about security, go WinXP becuase it has a lot more functionality and is generally easier to use than Win2K.

And remember, you can make XP look like 2K.

Also, if you can, you should try to get XP Corporate. It's basically the same as XP Pro, but you don't have to mess with all the registration crap.

And someone asked why ME is so bad....

For one thing, MS doesn't support it in any of its upgrade paths or with any MOCs (MS classes).

As for a simple desktop OS, it's pretty good IMHO. If you have a machine that you don't plan on upgrading and can't run Win 2K or XP, ME is a good compromise. They fixed somethings that really sucked in 98, like the disk degragmenter taking hours.

--Busy Spikey