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Windows XP Myths

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Mastertech:
I purchased notebooks with each of the o/s's mentioned above (98SE, ME, 2k, XP Pro and XP Home) preinstalled (and desktops with 98 and 98SE), all labelled with the "Designed for Win [version here]" label attached, at least a year after the OS was released. I would rank ME far below the others in terms of stability. Whether these were driver compatibiltiy issues or not is irrelevant. As an end-user (and not a system administrator/techie) ME was a nightmare. All I did was install Office 2k on my ME system (which came with ME preinstalled and all the drivers were ME certified from the OEM - Compaq) and use it for light word processing and e-mail/net surfing, and it blue screened a lot more often than 98. So much so that I was leary of newer windows versions and stuck with the 98SE machine before discovering that 2k was a quantum leap over both in terms of stability. I switched to Win2k  late in 2001 and finally bought my first XP Pro machine in March 2004.  I'd rank 2k slightly ahead of XP Pro/Home for stability and speed, with XP far ahead of 98/98SE and ME dead last with a comfortable gap separating it from 98. I still use the original 98 machine, which has been upgraded to W2k, and it is ROCK solid (remarkable for a notebook that is 6 1/2 years old). The ME machine, too, shines with Win2k installed and is still in service with my sister, who uses it in exactly the capacity I had envisioned for myself when I bought it (light office duty and e-mail/Internet). I've numerous friends that had the same experience with ME preinstalled on notebooks/desktops from major manufacturers. The two XP machines see the most use now and are very solid, though I remain convinced (and it's a gut feeling only) that the Win2k machines (which saw two years service with me before I moved on to XP) were less susceptible to blue screening.

Just my 2 bits - an end-user's perspective.
-Darwin (October 13, 2006, 12:31 PM)
--- End quote ---
If you have a BSOD it clearly tells you the error, of which you can determine what hardware device or driver is the cause. Any BSOD's due to bugs in ME are documented in Microsoft's Knowledgebase and patched. The rest were all caused by Hardware and Driver issues. 98 should never BSOD either if you have working hardware and drivers. This is a very common logical fallacy with people blaming Microsoft for their problems.

Oh and XP is more stable, reliable and faster than 2k. Prefetching alone makes XP boot and applications load twice as fast as 2k. While 2k is very stable, XP is the clearly the better OS.

You should NEVER get a BSOD! If you do something is WRONG! And it needs to be fixed. I can't believe people just continue to use PCs that have problems thinking it is the OS. I work on machines and can tell instantly when something is wrong. People just reboot and curse Microsoft. I meet people all the time that are using PCs with defective RAM, failing HDs, defective Mainboards, are Virus/Malware infected ect... Hardly the fault of Microsoft and the OS.

Carol Haynes:
I read it somewhere a number of years ago - unfortunately I haven't got a photographic memory and I can't bothered looking for it. It was certainly the advice on MS forums from MVPs providing consumer support.

The main point is that the life cycle of ME was significantly shorter than 98 - and given that MS work on a fixed number of years support cycles I think that is a significant statement about their feelings on the viability of ME. It was also slated in just about every computer mag in the world when it was released for its apalling stability issues.

Mastertech:
I read it somewhere a number of years ago - unfortunately I haven't got a photographic memory and I can't bothered looking for it. It was certainly the advice on MS forums from MVPs providing consumer support.-Carol Haynes (October 13, 2006, 01:44 PM)
--- End quote ---
MVPs are not Microsoft employees. The fact is Microsoft never made any such statement.

The main point is that the life cycle of ME was significantly shorter than 98 - and given that MS work on a fixed number of years support cycles I think that is a significant statement about their feelings on the viability of ME. It was also slated in just about every computer mag in the world when it was released for its apalling stability issues.-Carol Haynes (October 13, 2006, 01:44 PM)
--- End quote ---
ME was just discontinued this year. That follows the standard 5 year product life cycle. The fact is 98's lifecycle was extended. I already explained why it made no sense to extend ME beyond the standard 5 years. And no it was not stated in every computer mag about ME having "apalling stability issues". Maximum PC was recommending ME before XP came out. Any rational PC magazine did the same thing (ones that understand the real cause of problems).

wr975:
You should NEVER get a BSOD! If you do something is WRONG! And it needs to be fixed. I can't believe people just continue to use PCs that have problems thinking it is the OS. I work on machines and can tell instantly when something is wrong. People just reboot and curse Microsoft. I meet people all the time that are using PCs with defective RAM, failing HDs, defective Mainboards, are Virus/Malware infected ect... Hardly the fauly of Microsoft and the OS.
--- End quote ---

100% agree!  :Thmbsup:

Darwin:
If I get a BSOD something's wrong? Really? Thanks for the insight... You've completely missed my point, which was not that I was whinging about BSOD in XP being the fault of MS but rather that under ME with certified drivers my notebook was simply not stable. This suggests to me that there were serious problems with ME that cannot be explained away by incompatibilities between my OS and the device drivers that I was using. I got BSOD with my notebook out of the box. Regarding BSOD under XP, I rarely get them - I simply noted that it seems to happen more often than under Win2k. When I do get a BSOD under XP, I note the error code, research it, and fix the problem.

Anyway, I respectfully disagree with you about ME in particular, but agree with you about BSOD in general. This discussion needs to move on.

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