which OS? [Archive] - Emuforums.com

cluthu

October 7th, 2001, 14:14

>which os from Microsoft is the best? Is it ME, 2k, XP...
Though you're likely to elicit quite an argument with this one, personally I'd rank them as such: 2k, XP, ME. Concerned as to why? Well bugger off, since I'm too busy! Just kidding. Sorry, won't happen again.

I like 2k simply because it's NT without much in the way of fluff thrown in (unlike XP). Not to mention it doesn't have XP's horrid registration procedures and such. That's not to say that it's bad, necessarily, just that I agree with something that's so invasive of one's personal life. If MS wants people to register with Passport and keep an inventory of their hardware config, fine, just *ask* and I'm sure quite a few people would agree to submit such information. Additionally, 2k doesn't contain MS' little "extras": firewall (don't need it, as I have a dedicated machine to do this), CD Burning (I swear by a combo of Nero and CDRWin), [reduced quality] MP3 encoding (my Linux box does it faster). That's also not to mention the fact that XP has yet to be hardened, as it were. It's generally the consensus that with NT you wait until the first service pack is released before you upgrade. Granted, XP is mostly 2k's kernel, but that doesn't mean it won't have its own problems.

As for ME...ick. It's possible to configure it such that it runs moderately well but, face it, it's still the 9x kernel infrastructure. Likewise, I still run 98SE if it's necessary (old games and apps) because it's considerably more reliable than Millennium Edition (for me, excuse the pun, at least). That's also not to mention that you can add the features of ME onto an earlier version if you wished, as most of MS' improvements are mirrored in third party software.

So in conclusion, if you're looking for a general, home-oriented OS go with either 9x or XP (since the home version is geared more toward compatibility with older apps). I, personally, have a tri-boot of Win98SE, Win2k and Redhat 7. As I'd said, I use 98SE for the (few) old apps that won't run under anything else, Win2k for my day-to-day work (As it's ultra-solid. Uptime is somewhere in the month range now) and Redhat for my development tasks (it's also solid, I just happen to use Win2k more).

Wow, that was pretty long winded, no?

SHIN GOUKI

October 10th, 2001, 03:32

id have to go with 2k,ME, XP

plus XP pro sucks beyond belief, but it sure is pretty

Bgnome

October 10th, 2001, 03:47

Originally posted by SHIN GOUKI
id have to go with 2k,ME, XP

plus XP pro sucks beyond belief, but it sure is pretty

i never heard anything that bad about XP pro, but definitely stay away from ME

Gk1986

October 10th, 2001, 04:04

Originally posted by Bgnome

i never heard anything that bad about XP pro, but definitely stay away from ME ...:emb:...my new computer came with ME, even though it said on the description that it's supposed to come with 98 with a ME upgrade coupon (which I had planned to burn :D). Plus study showed that ME is (get this) 14% slower than 98. Thus I'd have to go the classic Win 95, which almost never crashese.

Prafull

October 10th, 2001, 04:32

Hmm,It looks there is a huge anti ME wave going on here.

Btw I have been using ME for over an year now (you need some minor tweaks to make it work excellent)and I think it deserves some respect.Earlier I had Win 98 Se and Win 95 was the first OS I used.

14% ?I think most of it comes in office applications(where it surely is slower than win 98se but I still feel in gaming department Windows ME is always few frames better(that was the basic reason I upgraded to ME).Another thing in ME 's favour is it is much more crash proof than any Win 9x series OS.

2K I have heard is most stable(Cant say more as I havent used it).

Ok so finally ME isnt that bad but its not a necessary upgrade if you have Win 98 Se.

vivrantpig

October 10th, 2001, 04:50

wut about windows xo home version that any good?? i got home version on cd and didnt install yet...

kairi00

October 10th, 2001, 04:54

Originally posted by Gk1986
...:emb:...my new computer came with ME, even though it said on the description that it's supposed to come with 98 with a ME upgrade coupon (which I had planned to burn :D). Plus study showed that ME is (get this) 14% slower than 98. Thus I'd have to go the classic Win 95, which almost never crashese.

I hope you're talking about Win95 OSR2 (i.e. Win95B).... I've had two different 95s before on my old computer, and suffice to say I like W95B a million times better than W95A.

W98/W98SE would actually run pretty fast and stable without the stupid IE "desktop integration" crap going on.... :p

Xeven

October 10th, 2001, 05:16

well one thing is for sure... stay away from ME.. (no.. not me... silly ehe)... i went back to 98SE which is probably one of the best moves I ever made, of course I only realized that after using ME for a couple of weeks... sucks..

Ryos

October 10th, 2001, 05:17

Run away from ME at any and all costs. There's a reason why retailers offered customers a choice of Windows 98 or ME, and it certainly wasn't for nostalgia.

sk8bloke22

October 10th, 2001, 22:23

winxp is the bomb, im running the final version (2600 build), without....er.....product activation.....hehe. it is so much better than win98/ME its unbelieve. theres practiacally no framerate loss between xp and win98, and everything is compatable. and my god it loads under 40s. theres so much to it, id recommend it to anyone and everyone with a decent machine. :D

it hasnt creashed once ive been running it for almost a month. definitely the oS to get. also i think product activation is a shame as without it, it installs hardware so easily, i mean every piece of hardware i hav has reasonable native drivers installed automatically, then all u hav to do is update. also the system restore feature is a lifesaver, i mean when ive ****ed around with like say for example creative lab's Live!Ware 3.0 for win2000 and ruined ****, i was able to restore my system to before i messed around with it. of course now the xp version of live!ware 3.0 has been leaked, so im happy.

Kraelis

October 11th, 2001, 02:17

I agree with cluthu. In terms of overall quality, and of course stability, 2k is better than the rest. Of course, we can't always play games normally as we do with the others.

Oh... XP is bad. Not that its quality sucks, but it's got a major security hole in it. Besides, attempts at cracking the activation have been pretty successful as of yet. Not that I'm promoting it, but it's exactly that kind of mentality that fosters illegal activities. Intrusion is definitely a no-no.

Going back to XP, I'm still trying to confirm this, but is it true that it has RAW Sockets capability?

That, my friends is VERY bad for a home-based OS.

Arpanet

October 11th, 2001, 05:57

OK, how about this. I'm a home user, with my PC use oriented towards lesiure (games, surfing, downloading) with a little schoolwork on the side. Should I go with W2K or stick with Win98SE? What I want is a stable OS that can play most games and doesn't slow down too much.

Thanks in advance.

kairi00

October 11th, 2001, 07:00

Originally posted by Kraelis
Going back to XP, I'm still trying to confirm this, but is it true that it has RAW Sockets capability?

That, my friends is VERY bad for a home-based OS.

Yessire.... while only programs run under administrative privileges has full access to the RAW sockets capability, the default privilege assigned when you create a new user is (yep you guessed it) ADMINISTRATOR! woohooo!!

kairi00

October 11th, 2001, 07:01

Originally posted by Asfaloth
OK, how about this. I'm a home user, with my PC use oriented towards lesiure (games, surfing, downloading) with a little schoolwork on the side. Should I go with W2K or stick with Win98SE? What I want is a stable OS that can play most games and doesn't slow down too much.

Thanks in advance.

Well, how's Win98Se currently treating you? If it's been crashing at least 5 times a day, then an upgrade to W2k might be worth it. However, keep in mind that you usually get some penalty in terms of gaming performance..... so this is a tradeoff issue. The best thing, if you have the space, is to dual boot W2k/Win98.

SHIN GOUKI

October 11th, 2001, 07:34

ok well keep on saying ME is bad, fine.
Its not bad at all, it came with my computer so I t runs better, than that crap XP, well XP runs fast, and I also had XP, and it didn't support a damn thing.

ok if you want the best gaming quality go for ME
for steady speeds for hours for other computer uses go forXP or 2k
and dont even look at 98se,

Prafull

October 11th, 2001, 09:42

Originally posted by SHIN GOUKI
ok if you want the best gaming quality go for ME
for steady speeds for hours for other computer uses go forXP or 2k
and dont even look at 98se,

I agree with this man.He speaks truth for me.I dont know why others are hating WINDOWS ME such a lot,may be they didnt tried tweaking it a little bit.

Ryos

October 11th, 2001, 09:49

Kept this thread intact by lopping off the offending part. Shin Gouki, refer to the rules. Thanks.

Shiori

October 11th, 2001, 10:50

have had my current install of win98se for almost a year now, and i can really count the times i've had BSODs. basically, keeping it nicely defragged and virus-protected should make it stable enough for our computing needs, particularly emus/pc gaming.

sk8bloke22

October 11th, 2001, 13:52

when XP is officially released on the 25th Oct it will be very compatible. only now r companies begining to release software and drivers for XP. give it a chance, the thing is damn stable for a home user platform. and the speed will be as fast/faster than win98 give it time!!

Betamax

October 12th, 2001, 02:49

I'm playing the waiting game for xp. If M$ actually do the thing right (ain't that an if judging on previous home os's) and the comptiblity is better than 2K then I might upgrade. On the other hand I don't use IE(mozilla), I don't use media player (winamp), and heck I don't even use the default shell (Object Desktop) then the "benefits" for me would be that I would have problems upgrading.

Arpanet

October 17th, 2001, 03:49

Well, how's Win98Se currently treating you?

About as well as Tommy Lee treats Pamela :D Seriously, though, this is one cranky OS. BSOD once every two days at least, and normal crashes twice a day - we're talking cold reboot here. And since it doesn't run that fast anyway (can you say memory leak?) I think I'll just go with Win2K...

... now where can I find a compatibility list?

Arpanet

October 17th, 2001, 03:55

Oh yeah, almost forgot. PCGamer gave a review of WinXP in their latest issue. For the most part, they loved it. They said it ran almost every recent game they tried, and with a notable FPS increase (about 10). They said it was also easier to use (maybe a little too easy... I mean, desktop wizard? Come ON.) and prettier too. ;) Also very stable. Just a little public service announcement there.

My beef with WinXP is that it performs many functions third-party programs used to - burning CDs the most noticeable one. How can you not call this a monopoly? Who's gonna buy a $100 piece of burning software IF YOU CAN DO IT WITH THE FRIKKIN OS? Five years from now, I can see Windows being the only program installed on people's computers, and games are either part of it or plug-ins to it. Here's to you, Microsoft! :shout: :smash: :mg: :bash: :rockets: :spy: :fingers: :dead:

Xeven

October 17th, 2001, 04:00

yeah that really sucks.. if they keep on copying stuff other softwares do, like the 'skin' thing .. for example, then nobody else will make any 'new' software coz if its good enuff, microsoft is just gonna copy it or maybe buy them or just crush them.. sucks.

MICROSOFT :fingers: :shout: :rockets: :laser: :fart: :stupid: :shout:

Gk1986

October 17th, 2001, 04:03

I like MSFT, but I think they've gone too far on this one... :shout:

Arpanet

October 17th, 2001, 04:13

*invokes the pointy stick of doom on Bill*

Another feature of WinXP is that it can open and work with ZIP files... tell me how that isn't directly violating copyright/monopoly laws. Where's the Justice Dept. when you need 'em?

Gk1986

October 17th, 2001, 04:14

Aren't they still trying to solve MSFT monopoly from 5 years ago?

Xeven

October 17th, 2001, 04:23

nyahahaha!:D:D:D

Arpanet

October 17th, 2001, 04:23

Right.

Gk1986

October 18th, 2001, 02:10

:emb: Haven't checked CNN.com for a while and my TV's broken so no tv news either. Yup. That was excruciatingly humiliating.

Shiori

October 18th, 2001, 04:29

Originally posted by Asfaloth
My beef with WinXP is that it performs many functions third-party programs used to - burning CDs the most noticeable one. How can you not call this a monopoly? Who's gonna buy a $100 piece of burning software IF YOU CAN DO IT WITH THE FRIKKIN OS?

i dunno....Windows had a defragmenter, but i use Diskeeper 6.0. :) Sure, Windows XP has a lot of new utils, but they just do the basics. I think. :p

EfrainMan

October 18th, 2001, 04:38

Originally posted by Keiichi

i dunno....Windows had a defragmenter, but i use Diskeeper 6.0. :) Sure, Windows XP has a lot of new utils, but they just do the basics. I think. :p Yeah, MS's software "copies" are usually rudimentary, and third party stuff is better. I "shop around" to see if Bill's software works good or not (I never use anything but WMediaPlayer).

Demigod

October 19th, 2001, 08:40

I think Microsoft's shooting for an all-in-one OS that can do everything. But as much as I hate their tactics I have to respect them. Microsoft has greatly assisted hardware/software developers, made PCs incredibly easy to use and brought PCs into the state they are today. Everyone seems to hate Microsoft and Bill Gates but without them the entire PC industry would break down.

And I don't see why everyone hates ME so much. For me it was a godsend. When I upgraded my old 98 SE system to ME I noticed huge benefits. The system was MUCH stabler, booted up incredibly fast and I didn't encounter any performance hits of any kind. My roommate at university also reported favourable results. I couldn't imagine going back to the 98 SE. Windows 2K is pretty good and I'm beginning to use it heavily, but it still has its flaws(I'm a 3D gamer, enough said). Still, I love its stability (haven't seen a BSOD in months) and network capabilities, despite its slower gaming abilities.

October 20th, 2001, 00:21

Uptime: 4w 11h 34m 16s
XP is almost passing my 'OS-test' (31 days of normal usage without a reboot), so I guess it's good ;)

Oh, and Demigod79, while I usually stick to the 'Your Mileage May Vary' stuff, WinMe is pure ****, plain and simple.
If you're using non NT-based Windows distribution, you have my sympathy..

sk8bloke22

October 21st, 2001, 15:35

does any one else hav big performance hits when using 32bit colour game - i lose like 30fps, wheras in win98se there wasnt too much a drop.

JuniorCRB

October 24th, 2001, 01:01

i have both ME and 98SE, yes ME requieres more work on your part but it's is better than 98SE even if its a little,
XP crashes less and is said to be faster on high end system, but it requires alot of ram and CAN be slow (depends on the system),
the xp pro ver isn't much good i prefer Win 2K,

If you have ME then there is little reason to upgrade(my opnion because of compatability problems) you can download most of the stuff xp has.
XP is made to easy for newbies but gets a little getting used to by windows9x/ME users

and unless your some kind of computer tech. i don't recomend Win 2K, it not for home users, but that doesn't mean it bad

and yes ME is better with games than 98SE

JuniorCRB

October 24th, 2001, 01:53

oh and i dislike microsoft
but like windows
bill gates just wantes to kick everyone out of busines
:dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :dead: :dead: :dead: :dead: :mg: :mg: :mg: :bash: :bash: :rockets: :rockets: :laser: :laser: :laser: :spy: :mg: :smash: :argue:

Prafull

October 24th, 2001, 02:00

Slowly but surely more and more people are giving favourable comments about Windows Me.Its nice to know that other people also share my thoughts.

EfrainMan

October 24th, 2001, 04:49

Hmmm . . .

At my work, we have 3 500MHz Celeron PCs running Win98SE and all but the most necessary disabled via "msconfig". Then we have 3 800MHz Pentium 3's running WinME, again all but the necessary disabled via "msconfig". All other things are almost the same. The celerys run 2-3 times faster than the P3's.

Go fig. :p

crue426

October 24th, 2001, 05:29

Originally posted by prafull

I agree with this man.He speaks truth for me.I dont know why others are hating WINDOWS ME such a lot,may be they didnt tried tweaking it a little bit.

i agree w/both of these guys - however, i have never seen XP and have had only a short look at 2000
i have ME on my toshiba laptop n homebuilt desktop, they both required some mem n autoexec.bat tweaks to run a few older dos games(X-Com/UFO defense, ect...)
i used 98se for quite awhile prior n it is pretty much the same as ME but it(98) boots slower - also did not have the unlikeable win media player - i dont care 4 it...
of course i used 95 b4 all that and the only reason i switched is i started to become a hardcore gamer and started to buy games that listed 98 as the prefered os...
ok - bsides running every game i can get my hand on i have used ME n 98 for lots of audio - trackin mods, drum machines, noise generation, virtual 48 track, ect... 98 will crash less on the studio machine than the desktop n laptop it seems/so we have not upgraded there yet - the studio machine only has 64megs of memory btw...
i like ME and 98se - im just an newbietesttype tho...

crue426

October 24th, 2001, 05:37

Originally posted by Asfaloth
*invokes the pointy stick of doom on Bill*

Another feature of WinXP is that it can open and work with ZIP files... tell me how that isn't directly violating copyright/monopoly laws. Where's the Justice Dept. when you need 'em?

(hope u like ur pointy stick billl... ;-) )

btw 'ME' also opens zip, not sure bout arc...
no sub for winzip(tm) but nice if i reinstall os on laptop n forget winzip(tm)
doh!

Prafull

October 24th, 2001, 07:31

Ya win ME also opens the zip files but I dont think its such a great feature .I never use this feature coz I trust and use good old WINZIP.Its surely the best.

Btw I think MS is not breaking any copyrights coz zip files can be opened by many third party tools and not restricted to winZip only.

Prafull

October 24th, 2001, 08:10

Ok ,now when people are discussing Windows Me here so I would like to ask a question in this thread itself.

Months ago when I used to have Win 98SE running on my 810 chipset I was really tired of crashes and hangs (every 2-3 days).Another problem was that my 810 chipset didnt have opengl support and I was unable to play opengl based demo pc games like quake 2 and quake 3 . I downloaded demo of scitech gldirect (20 day demo) which enabled few opengl games to run OK but soon 20 days were over.

I was already tired of crashes and hangs so I decided to get the newest version of windows (windows Me at that time).The first thing I installed was scitech gldirect but it refused to run.So I removed it and was hopeless for few days.One day I was running another game and I accidently selected opengl mode instead of direct 3d and it worked.

I installed other games like Quake 3 and quake 2 and heretic 2 and they all run perfectly.So whats the matter? Is there some inbuilt opengl emulation in Windows Me or I am missing some point ?

Xeven

October 24th, 2001, 08:12

windows should have a native opengl driver which is usully overwritten when you install card specific drivers...

Prafull

October 24th, 2001, 08:15

Originally posted by Xeven
windows should have a native opengl driver which is usully overwritten when you install card specific drivers...

Then why opengl games didnt ran on Win 98 and did on Win Me ?I think the original drivers were installed on both.

kairi00

October 24th, 2001, 08:16

AFAIK, Windows comes with a software opengl32.dll.... so you can write opengl apps in Windows even without a fancy schmanzy video cards, but everything's done in software... and I think it's only OpenGl 1.1, so if your code/app uses new opengl features and extensions, won't run on it.

[edit] so a possibility is that the WinME opengl32.dll is actually a newer opengl.. maybe 1.2 or newer... I'm not too sure on this though...

Prafull

October 24th, 2001, 08:19

Originally posted by kairi00
AFAIK, Windows comes with a software opengl32.dll.... so you can write opengl apps in Windows even without a fancy schmanzy video cards, but everything's done in software... and I think it's only OpenGl 1.1, so if your code/app uses new opengl features and extensions, won't run on it.

[edit] so a possibility is that the WinME opengl32.dll is actually a newer opengl.. maybe 1.2 or newer... I'm not too sure on this though...

Ok got the idea (Well sort of).:)

October 25th, 2001, 00:23

Win2K handled zip by default as well, if you choose to install that package..

Badaro

October 25th, 2001, 02:04

Originally posted by CD
Uptime: 4w 11h 34m 16s
XP is almost passing my 'OS-test' (31 days of normal usage without a reboot), so I guess it's good ;)

Oh, and Demigod79, while I usually stick to the 'Your Mileage May Vary' stuff, WinMe is pure ****, plain and simple.
If you're using non NT-based Windows distribution, you have my sympathy..

WinXP is pretty good actually, have been using it in my notebook since Beta 2. But the benefits might not be worth the upgrade if you're already using Win2000.

Just my $0.02.

[]s Badaro