What operating system would you use on this machine and why?

[DEredita]

The old system:
AMD K6-2 - 450 MHZ
384MB PC 100 SDRAM
8 MB shared ram for video
8GB 4700? rpm Hard drive (it's less than 5400 rpm)

Now, I have a old 40GB 7200 RPM Maxtor hard drive which I plan on installing in there and removing the old 4700 rpm drive.

I plan on installing Windows 2000 Professional on it. My friend is arguing to the death that XP wil run quicker and better than 2000 on this machine. I disagree.

What do you guys think?

- Mike

 

[halfadder]

I have found that an optimized WinXP runs even better than an optimized Win2K! WinXP is great, IMHO.
http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/supertweaks.htm

Out of the box, WinXP will probably feel much slower than Win2K until you do some tuning:
http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=1590

 

[neuralfx]

Does your friend think XP is uber optimized or something? That is the silliest thing I have heard all day. Now if he said "it wouldn't run much slower on XP" then I could be ok with that. Yes, I would put Win2k on there as with WinXP you would probably need to turn down some of the GUI effects to get it to run on par with Win2k, but I don't think the performance differences between either would be very dramatic at all.
-neural

 

[halfadder]

Originally posted by: neuralfx
I don't think the performance differences between either would be very dramatic at all.

Yeah, you're not going to see a huge difference either way once you drop WinXP down to the Win2K style GUI by disabling the Themes service.

I'm not really sure if there would be any real advantages of WinXP over Win2K. They're basiclly the same under the hood. Almost all software that runs on XP will run just as well on 2K. If you have a Win2K CD and license handy, then go for it. If all you can currently legally use is XP, then that'll work just as well once you do some tuning.

 

[DEredita]

How about using Windows 98?? Would that be quicker - I'm not working with much power, especially graphical power.

- Mike

 

[Rhin0]

I'd run windows 98 and fully update it. I said Win98 not Win98 second edition.


Win98 has such little overhead, I still love 98.

 

[Cerb]

Win98 or Mepis.
Win2k/XP wouldn't be terrible, but not great.

 

[mdaniel73]

I'd take the stability and slightly less speed of Win2000 on that box over ANY Win9x variant any day.

 

[NesuD]

Originally posted by: mdaniel73
I'd take the stability and slightly less speed of Win2000 on that box over ANY Win9x variant any day.

:thumbsup:

 

[Zepper]

If I had to put any Win on it, it would be 2k for the simple reason that you won't have to kiss Billy G's butt every time you want to change something. And that hard drive will be too large for the BIOS on that machine to handle. A $20. investment in a Silicon Image based controller would be a good idea: Syba
.bh.

 

[stevty2889]

I think win2k would run decently on that machine. I had a dual P2 266 with 384mb of ram, and win2k ran better on it than win xp.

 

[biostud]

winXP with all eyecandy turned off, stability and compability > speed

 

[heartsurgeon]

win2000 pro..

faster than 98
stable
no product activation

win98.arghhhh.....a pox on thee!!!!!! what a worthless operating system.

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: Zepper
If I had to put any Win on it, it would be 2k for the simple reason that you won't have to kiss Billy G's butt every time you want to change something. And that hard drive will be too large for the BIOS on that machine to handle. A $20. investment in a Silicon Image based controller would be a good idea: Syba
.bh.

He could just cap the drive to 32 GB and it should work fine, assuming there are no BIOS updates available to let it use the full 40 GB.

I agree with Win2K/XP anyway, either would be fine IMO, you have the RAM for it and that's what counts the most.

 

[raanemaan]

Originally posted by: Zepper
If I had to put any Win on it, it would be 2k for the simple reason that you won't have to kiss Billy G's butt every time you want to change something. And that hard drive will be too large for the BIOS on that machine to handle. A $20. investment in a Silicon Image based controller would be a good idea: Syba
.bh.

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: raanemaan

Originally posted by: Zepper
If I had to put any Win on it, it would be 2k for the simple reason that you won't have to kiss Billy G's butt every time you want to change something. And that hard drive will be too large for the BIOS on that machine to handle. A $20. investment in a Silicon Image based controller would be a good idea: Syba
.bh.

What's he doing with it?

If gaming is a concern Win98(speed and compatibility with older games, especially for Audio) is the choice. Just surfing, email, etc, WinXP(stability). That said, Win98 is ok for everyday use , as long as it's setup well. I had Win98 up 24/7 for a couple months way back when, only rebooted due to new drivers install.

 

[Boobers]

If you still have a Win98 install disk, throw that thing out! Don't even think of it. What junk! It isn't supported anymore...there will never be any udates.

I'd suggest Win2K. I have it running on a 233Mhz laptop, and it works great.

 

[piroroadkill]

Win98 is far over-rated by so many people.

It's going to have to be 2000 or XP. I would personally put XP on it.

 

[Texun]

Either will work but I would go with Win2K since it would take less tweaking. I've used 2K on a 366 Laptop with less memory than that and and it worked fine for normal use, web, email, office apps, etc.

Note: Your friend thinks XP is quicker, maybe he is getting the load times confused. It's his computer so let him deal with it if he insists, unless he expects you to be his tech support.

 

[DEredita]

This old computer is my syster's. I forgot about the 32GB cap, but I'm thinking about going with (2) 20GB partitions - do you think that'll work?
I am keeping a 20GB partition on there of a back up of my current AMD 1800+ system, just in case.

- Mike

 

[HardcoreRobot]

i would use 2k pro

 

[sandorski]

Originally posted by: Boobers
If you still have a Win98 install disk, throw that thing out! Don't even think of it. What junk! It isn't supported anymore...there will never be any udates.

I'd suggest Win2K. I have it running on a 233Mhz laptop, and it works great.

The system is so old what need is there for Updates? Sure, Win98 certainly isn't the best OS, but with that Hardware the Software likely to be used is goning to be Old and Outdated as well(if Gaming is involved), which will likely have problems with Win24/XP.

 

[DEredita]

This machine will be used for internet, office (mostly Word), and IM. No gaming.