I know most of you vote for XP, but I'm not going that route yet. I'm getting the CPU I need to finish my upgrade from my wife for Christmas, and had a Windows failure (after installing the latest Microsoft Ciritical Update, I haven't been able to get Windows to boot again, thank you Microsoft), so I'll be re-formatting my HD in a couple of days.
98 is more dated, but may be more stable -- I've been running it, and had no problems -- but ME is a little more friendly to my LAN.
Which do you suggest, barring XP. (I have CDs for 98 and ME, and don't want to buy a new OS at this juncture.)
I spent years using 98, so even though it sucks, I at least know how to make it do what I want. By the time ME came out I was too tired to play with all of that bullshit anymore and had already been using Debian for everything but games. So I guess I vote for 98. This poll is kind of depressing, though.
Hmm.
This poll is like... do I want to lose an eyeball, or a testicle? Just go to XP.
I'll reiterate that I've been very happy with 98 for awhile, and I have no job, so I don't want to drop 100 bucks on a new OS.
Just wondering if the fact that ME is newer and more network-friendly might tilt the scales for anyone here.
And yes, I'm planning on going with XP before too long -- just not now.
What! No Linux option!!
In that case I would choose Win98SE. Old Windows 98 isn't even supported by soundcards anymore. ME is just SE with a couple of extra features you probably won't need. But if you can't find SE pick ME instead.
I would go with ME.
It has the W2k network stack, I believe. Plus it has recovery options that 98SE doesn't have.
I really don't understand why anyone would suggest 98SE? ME has everything included in 98SE, plus a little more. If you don't like the new ME features, just don't use them.
SE should be cheaper than ME. And I just turned off the recovery feature (which is the main difference between the two), I don't need anything that reduces fps for a gaming OS. For some reason I just liked SE better than ME.
I already have CDs for ME and 98SE, so it's not about cost between those two. I've heard that ME is very unstable -- worse than 98SE.
I think I like the icons is 98SE better, but that's not a make or break issue. :)
XP is decent. ME sucks, but boots fast. 98 just sucks.
The differences that I can think of:
ME might have slightly updated drivers and similar but I didn't notice anything major myself. It also has the system recovery feature. It could be nice perhaps but it also reduces the performance.
SE is a little faster, even if the recovery feature has been turned off in ME.
I refuse to vote in the poll. XP is so much better than either that it's ridiculous. And it can be found for the cost of two games -- Amazon had it for $65 last week.
Of the two, though, go for Me. I think most of the people who hated Me did an "upgrade" on their system rather than a fresh install or something. I installed Me on two desktops and two laptops in our house and never had any more problems than I did with any of the other DOS-based versions of Windows.
Well, if you can obtain a copy of the pirated corporate edition of XP, it may cost you even less than $65. The most common corporate pirate keys have been blocked by MS from any future upgrades, but it's pretty easy to use the XP key generator to generate a valid unique corporate key-- simply edit the registry, run a MS key entry app, then reboot and you're good to go with Service Pack 1 and all that.
I do have an official copy of XP Pro I snagged for $40 through some crazy MS promotion, but I prefer to use the corporate edition so I don't ever have to "activate" due to hardware changes or whatever.
<subliminal>Go to college</subliminal>
Hell, for that matter if you took a class at your local university, you can get all your MS software dirt cheap.
<subliminal>Go to college</subliminal>
<subliminal>Go to college</subliminal>
They have a sepcial class of license for people in school, and it allows you to get full versions of XP, Office, VS for a fraction of retail.<subliminal>Go to college</subliminal>
We've been taking classes periodically. Next time I'm enrolled in one, I'll be sure and get some Microsoft software. :-)
How funny is it that the original poster said very clearly that he already has both CD's and that he is not considering XP at this time, and half the replies are about the cost of finding the CDs and going to XP at this time.
God bless the interlink!
ME (this was a clean install) is a festering pile of crap that continally decides to crap itself.
I really, REALLY hate ME.
Just get XP and save yourself future headaches.
Since everyone seems to be ignorning your "pick between these 2 oses" and instead sticking their $OS_OF_CHOICE in, i'm changing my choice to Minix. Sure, getting games/anything/the os itself to run may be a little hard, but i'm sure you'll love spending every single moment trying to get it to work.
Hell, after installing it, you can write your own drivers for all the stuff it doesn't recognise!
Someone else here made a really good point: If you're installing the OS clean to a new or reformatted hard disk, that helps a lot. Go with Me and try it out.
I heard people had a lot of problems with 98SE and Me. They've been OK for me even with the steady game install/uninstalls. Keep in mind that I don't leave my Me system on all the time, I shut it down every couple days because if I don't, it will do it itself :P
I would second Denny's recommendation of mwave.com for anyone looking for parts. I just bought my XP Pro machine parts and built everything from scratch from mwave. They didn't always have the best price on individual pieces, but collectively, they were competitive and I liked not having to order from 15 different places. They shipped everything on time and packed well.
I spent $129 for an OEM full edtion copy of XP Pro though...I thought that was a good price until I read some of the hardware threads here. Wish I'd talked to some of you first. $40...shit!
You cannot purchase XP pro for $40. The $129 price point doesn't sound too high, actually. The only place you can find it cheaper is going to be at a school or someplace with a special license.Originally Posted by Bernie_Dy
From friends who went overseas (some are still there) to work at the Big M, it's very cheap to buy stuff @ the company store.
Course, it helps if you don't commit a felony and sell licenses to your friends who in turn sell to other companies, but them's the breaks.
Yes, that's another option. I've get most of my software from Microsofties that live here on my block.
Man, tell me about it. Nine million. If he got 9 million before getting caught, can you imagine how badly that system has been abused over the years? No wonder there are so many MS millionaries here in the PNW.
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