MS Action Pack question

[WT]

I have quite a few PCs at home, all running W2K 24/7. Looking to upgrade all of them en masse, the easiest solution was the MS Action Pack for $300. The annual $200 fee is not an issue, and I was planning on buying it in early December, hoping that if Vista's release date of Dec. 7,2006 holds true (haha!) I would be eligible for that as well. Now, on to my question:

I'm used to popping in an OS CD and seeing the message "The OS on the CD is newer than your current version. Do you wish to upgrade ?" and off we go. I have not reinstalled my OS since ... ohhh ... 1998 ... and I really (honestly guys, my rigs runs for months with no slowdown, everything works 100% well) do not want to start over from scratch. Do I have this option using the Action Pack 10 CD licenses, or am I forced to install from the ground up. This is just NOT an option on 5 separate PCs, with years of accumulated files (no need to fix that line, I meant FILES, not JUNK). If I cannot upgrade, what are my (less expensive) options ?? I'm assuming I can purchase an MS Home Upgrade CD for around $85 and at least upgrade my main rig ... TIA

 

[JW310]

Originally posted by: WT
I have quite a few PCs at home, all running W2K 24/7. Looking to upgrade all of them en masse, the easiest solution was the MS Action Pack for $300. The annual $200 fee is not an issue, and I was planning on buying it in early December, hoping that if Vista's release date of Dec. 7,2006 holds true (haha!) I would be eligible for that as well. Now, on to my question:

I'm used to popping in an OS CD and seeing the message "The OS on the CD is newer than your current version. Do you wish to upgrade ?" and off we go. I have not reinstalled my OS since ... ohhh ... 1998 ... and I really (honestly guys, my rigs runs for months with no slowdown, everything works 100% well) do not want to start over from scratch. Do I have this option using the Action Pack 10 CD licenses, or am I forced to install from the ground up. This is just NOT an option on 5 separate PCs, with years of accumulated files (no need to fix that line, I meant FILES, not JUNK). If I cannot upgrade, what are my (less expensive) options ?? I'm assuming I can purchase an MS Home Upgrade CD for around $85 and at least upgrade my main rig ... TIA

I'm not sure about the Action Pack version, but I don't believe going from Win2k Pro to WinXP Home is a valid upgrade path. If you wanted to upgrade from W2K, you'd have to upgrade to XP Pro. That being said, I *think* the 10 licenses of XP Pro that come in the Action Pack work as retail version licenses in that you should be able to upgrade from a previous version. However, since I don't have an Action Pack subscription, I can't say that for sure.

JW

 

[WT]

but I don't believe going from Win2k Pro to WinXP Home is a valid upgrade path

True dat ... I had forgotten that until you brought it up. I mentioned the Home XP upgrade, as I had just done one of these about 2 weeks ago on a customer PC and it went surprisingly well. But its not a valid upgrade in my situation. My concern is more and more games that will eventually require Windows XP, even if the difference between that and W2K is practically nil for all intents and purposes.

I really wanted to make a go of OS legailty on my part and buy XP, but with 5+ PCs to update, that comes out to around $500 assuming $100 per XP CD. Ouch ....

 

[John]

Did you know that the MS Action Pack is a 1 yr. 'subscription' to use the software? If you don't renew and continue to use the software you violate the terms and are using it illegally.

 

[spyordie007]

The action pack includes licenses of XP pro; I'm pretty sure that whether you want to do clean installs or upgrade installs is up to you (they dont restrict you either way).

 

[magomago]

You should still backup that data...no way I would leave information that is important to me dating back to 1998 go without being saved. Regardless of what you do, do yourself a favor and spend the time to back everything up

 

[WT]

Did you know that the MS Action Pack is a 1 yr. 'subscription' to use the software? If you don't renew and continue to use the software you violate the terms and are using it illegally.

John, reread my post, you missed this part - The annual $200 fee is not an issue.

Spy, I have a buddy trying it out using a W2K box and a CD from his Action Pack, so I should know for certain over the weekend. Its a tough question that remains unanswered for certain.

mago, all my files are redundant, I maintain the same directory structure and partitioning on all of the PCs, so its not a true backup, but its redundancy which is fine for me. I also have a 40gb external USB drive that holds a boot partition backup of my main rig which is the most heavily used PC.

 

[MrChad]

Originally posted by: WT

Did you know that the MS Action Pack is a 1 yr. 'subscription' to use the software? If you don't renew and continue to use the software you violate the terms and are using it illegally.

John, reread my post, you missed this part - The annual $200 fee is not an issue.

Spy, I have a buddy trying it out using a W2K box and a CD from his Action Pack, so I should know for certain over the weekend. Its a tough question that remains unanswered for certain.

mago, all my files are redundant, I maintain the same directory structure and partitioning on all of the PCs, so its not a true backup, but its redundancy which is fine for me. I also have a 40gb external USB drive that holds a boot partition backup of my main rig which is the most heavily used PC.

Wouldn't it be easier and more efficient to set up a basic file server that holds all your files?

 

[WT]

Different strokes ..... here's my current setup:

1)Main gamer PC
2)Spare gamer (aka the wife's PC after her PC was sold)
3)Media rig - all TV/Movie content s shared from this
4)Bench PC - used with a KVM when I am working on customer PCs

I also used to host a few LAN parties, so having more PCs=better, at least in that environment. You didn't need to bring your rig to play, just use one of mine. A file server is OK for that purpose, but in that case I would have one or even two less PCs to do my work.

Researching the Action Pack, the 10 XP copies are indeed full retail installs, so I see no point why it would not upgrade an existing OS, as opposed to the OEM version which will definitely not upgrade, only a fresh install.

 

[John]

 

[rbV5]

I'm pretty certain you can upgrade, action pack also includes a MCE 2005 licence you might want for your media rig, and I just got 10 XP64 licences a couple weeks ago. I doubt that the next subscription will include Vista however as we just got XP64, but I dunno.

You certainly can't beat the deal if you qualify, especially if you have multiple rigs.

 

[WT]

rbV5, I was counting on that MCE 2005 license to do just that, as I'm currently using GB-PVR for recording, and its a nice product, but it really is not integrated into the OS in the same way as MCE, so I will finally have the OS on the media rig that will be a better fit. As far as Vista, the currently announced release date is December 7, 2006. I see no immediate need for it, as every MS OS has its fair share of bugs and kinks to be worked out, but since this is Anandtech, we love discussing cutting edge.

Someone please send John a happy pill, he's not feeling all that well apparently.

 

[rbV5]

rbV5, I was counting on that MCE 2005 license to do just that, as I'm currently using GB-PVR for recording, and its a nice product, but it really is not integrated into the OS in the same way as MCE, so I will finally have the OS on the media rig that will be a better fit.

I'm definately sold on MCE 2005 after using it on a couple rigs for the past year. Too bad action pack includes a single licence, I ended up buying another licence for my 2nd PVR.... at least MS is selling MCE cheaper than the other OS's.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: WT

My concern is more and more games that will eventually require Windows XP, even if the difference between that and W2K is practically nil for all intents and purposes.

I wouldn't be to concerned about that. Publishers want to hit the most demographics possible, XP doesn't really have anything in it above 2K that would push a publisher away from supporting the later as well. As you said, the difference is practically nil. Unless new games start requiring a firewall or colorful themes I don't anticipate any manufactorers dumping support for 2K anytime soon. The amount of work required to get a title designed for XP working on the virtually identical 2K is also probably nil. The one exception might be microsoft developed games, since they have a vested interest in forcing you to upgrade. And they've been no stranger to doing this in the past. Even then, I bet some one would crack it.

 

[brainwrinkle]

AOE3 from Ensemble Studios already doesn't officially support Win2k. Of course, Ensemble Studios is owned by Micrsoft, and MS doesn't officially support Win2k anymore. I hear that it is a big hassle to get the game running on a Win2k computer.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: brainwrinkle
AOE3 from Ensemble Studios already doesn't officially support Win2k. Of course, Ensemble Studios is owned by Micrsoft, and MS doesn't officially support Win2k anymore. I hear that it is a big hassle to get the game running on a Win2k computer.

Yeah, I suspected MS would start doing this. Same deal with IE7.

 

[WT]

I popped a retail WinXP CD in a W2K box last night, and sure enough, it offered to update my OS from within Windows, so we can now safely assume that this does indeed work as expected. I am putting off loading MCE on my media PC, as I would like to upgrade the board in that in the early spring and don't want to go through the hassle of calling MS to register it after swapping the board.