Win2k or WinME???

[Phat3800]

Hi guys--I just bought a brand new Dell 8100 1.3ghz P4 and am wondering if I should keep ME on there (which seems to be working fine so far, but I haven't had the pc for a week yet, but have already cleaned it up a bit) or blow everything away and install WIN2k. I'm a big gamer and I have a few peripherals installed that might not bode well w/Win2k, but seeing how it's been out longer, there should be drivers available for them. Anyone have Win2k and use it for leisure/gaming as well as for business apps? I would want it to work w/EVERYTHING. Anyone have any problems upgrading to it and installing all the current drivers?? Do tell....

 

[reicherb]

If it aint broke don't fix it. Especially if you have hardware that might not work in 2000.

 

[Brazen]

Win2k is way better than winME. I had no trouble installing it on my rig. I played all the same games I played in Win98 with no problems, I actually think that games and apps seem to run smoother and faster in Win2k. I have also used WinME, I did not think it ran games, or anything else for that matter, as fast as win2k. It takes a little longer, mere moments but still longer, to load things, where-as win2k seems to fly right through. I also like the look, feel and options in win2k MUCH better.

 

[GT1999]

I'd say install Win2000

 

[Phat3800]

Any compatibility problems? Did it take awhile to get all the drivers loaded/configured. I want this to be as painless as possible if I decide to go through w/it....

 

[jacobnero6918]

Dual boot...keep WinME for games and do most of your work with Windows 2000. Windows 2000 has a built in boot manager so it will allow you to create a new partition and install windows 2000 on it.

 

[jyrixx]

i installed 2k over win me and it's fine, if need be, i can boot into me and do all the gaming, or whatever, and win2k for anything else.

that might be the way to go if you're worried about stuff not working..

good luck

 

[Biggs]

Win 2K definitely.

 

[Noriaki]

<< Anyone have Win2k and use it for leisure/gaming as well as for business apps? I would want it to work w/EVERYTHING. >>

In october I went Win98SE/Win2k dual boot. By the end of novemeber I never bothered with Win98SE anymore. Last week I took it off completely.

Win2k runs all my software....

and games run perfectly fine. If you check out Anand's November2000 budget video card guide, you'll see nVidia's Win2k performance is sometimes better than their Win98 performance.

Win2000 is the core of Windows XP, and Windows XP is going to replace WinME...

I run:

Diablo, D2, Starcraft, Broodwar, Quake3, Soldier of Fortune (Quake2 engien), Dungeon Keeper (DirectX 3!! woot!), War2 BNE, AOE2, EverQuest, Rune (Unreal Engine), halfLife...even Myst and Maabus that are Win3.11 games on the WinG API...

That's OpenGL, DirectX, Glide and WinG games...all work fine.

Win2000 Pro IS the basis for WinXP, just without that horrible Mac-wannabe User Interface. Win2000 Pro simply rocks Win95/98 or ME's world.

I have no regrets for ditching Win98SE compeltely.

 

[Shudder]

While I haven't removed WinME, I pretty much NEVER boot to it. I don't even think I have my video drivers set on it, just a reminder how much I hate 9x based OS's.

At first it was a tad rough since I have a USB burner and scanner, but I can do anything I want in Win2k probably better than in 9x.

If you must keep WinME, which given the size of hard drives these days, go ahead and just dual boot. I like it just in case I can't get something to work.. just in case, but I don't use it. So I lose a gig of HD space.. boo hoo. Use Win2k for a week and you'll never touch WinME again. Hell, if you're even set on buying it I can give you my 120 version to try out before you do.

 

[ddiccico]

That depends on how much RAM you have. You need >128 MB to run games in 2k (unless you don't mind disk swapping in the middle of an online game).

 

[Noriaki]

<< That depends on how much RAM you have. You need >128 MB to run games in 2k (unless you don't mind disk swapping in the middle of an online game). >>

Oh yeah...he's got a good point I tend to forget about that...you want 192MB at least to play games in Win2k...256MB would probably be more comfortable. But RAM's pretty cheap now that shouldn't be a problem. But if it is then you probably want to avoid Win2k.

 

[Phat3800]

Well, I've got 128 meg of pc-800 rdram. I wonder if that's enough..

 

[Noriaki]

128MB is a Bare minimum for gaming....try and get a 64MB stick as well...192MB should be ok.

When idle my Win2k machine is using about 65MB of RAM.
Diablo2 will use about 110MB
Leave a few MB for ICQ and stuff like that...

I used to run Win2k on 128MB...I wanted a bit more (I went overboard becuase SDRAM is so damn cheap right now)...if you get get 192MB you should be pretty well fine. I don't know what PC800 prices are like right now..

 

[BruinEd03]

Let's just put it this way...win98/SE/ME = BSOD(Blue Screen of Death). With win2k i haven't had a single BSOD yet. There's also better memory resource and more control over your processes (programs that your running) so that you can kill the ones you want without having things seriously screw up. But hey if you like the Blue screens along with memory leaks by all means go for win98/SE/ME (Though you should check for hardware compatability with win2k first)

 

[MuffD]

2000!!

 

[Mikeb33]

I have stopped liking WIN2000. It normally runs great and smooth, but when I do have an problem, it's a disaster. I bought a MSI 694D 2 cpu motherboard and installed it. Got it working for a few weeks then intalled a upated video driver from Matrox. Upon reboot it had a stop error and rebooted again. Again, and again, and again, etc. I tried safe mode, vga mode, last known good, everything. Then I booted off of the CD and tried recover, repair, everything. I had to reinstal the whole damn OS! All for a video driver?
I've been on WIN2K for 6 months and I have reinstalled my OS 4 times! Most recently last week. I thought I finally had it rock stable, I was going to use a Adaptech backup program to burn a CD of my system for an easy restoration. IT DOESN&quot;T WORK WITH WIN2000!
Yesterday I come home and turn on the PC. It begins to load, but just when the progress indicator bar reaches the end, a blue screen stop error flashes on and then it reboots. It is so fast I cannot even read it. I tried all the steps to save it again but nothing works except a complete reformat and reinstall. AGAIN! Win 98 wasn't great, but I could usually figure a way to boot up to check things out.

Good luck

MIKE

 

[geeoff1]

I have a dual boot (Win 98 SE and 2K), and, like everyone else, I only go into (* if I have a hankering to play OLD games (Duke 3D, Redneck Rampage) as while these will play in 2K, there is no sound. Other than that, I use 2K exclusively. With 384MB of RAM, it just ROCKS! I do ahve an interesting note here. I have benchmarked a dozen different ways on 5 or 6 different machines, and although 2K does pretty much everything better and faster than 98, the actual read and write speeds are markedly slower in 2K than in 98. I understand that this is due to a minor deficiency in the DMA support, which is to be resolved when SP-2 is released. I also understand that UDMA 100 support will be added. The interesting thing here is that although it is both reading and writing to &amp; from the disk slower, it still kicks 98s ass in performance. That deffinitely says something as to the power of Win 2K!