Win98 vs ME

[doanster]

Which OS runs faster/better?
I am planning to use it on an old computer just as a "media center PC"
in the living room.
I will also be using GeexBox Linux as a secondary OS.

 

[drag]

The answer would be Windows 98 SE. It's a toss up between win98 first edition and windows ME, IMO.

Linux is better, of course.

 

[doanster]

Linux IS probably better haha.... but as a media center PC for family use its perhaps a better idea to stick to good ol' windows

 

[dsa1971]

avoid windows me at all costs.

 

[Noema]

Originally posted by: dsa1971
avoid windows me at all costs.

Yep, like the plague.

 

[sourceninja]

I am a firm beliver that windows ME was designed in such a way to actually make NT more appealing. They released it as buggy as they could so they could point at XP when it was released and say "look how good this one is"

 

[stars]

Windows STD Edition
98 SE over ME if its the only two options. But like drag suggested, use Linux. It's honestly a better alternative over the two.

 

[Phoenix86]

I can't imagine any machine that needs x9 to run well will function well as a media PC. That and considering the known piss-poor memmory management in 9x I would think that would hinder the "always on" aspect a media PC needs.

 

[ShaneDOTM]

There are media center Linux distributions, although the names of them escape me at the moment. Try taking a look at distrowatch(www.distrowatch.com). I personnally think that if your gonna be running a lot of media through the machine, it makes sense to try and get it to run as quickly as possible(which isn't all that possible with windows).

 

[Nick5324]

very easy choice, 98 SE

 

[BW86]

Anything is better than Win ME.

 

[Harvey]

Win ME is the pits. If your machine isn't up to dealing with XP, go back to Win 98 SE.

 

[jadinolf]

Originally posted by: Noema

Originally posted by: dsa1971
avoid windows me at all costs.

Yep, like the plague.

Yep.

 

[Jolt2]

Between the two, 98SE. You have easy control over DOS with 98 then ME.

You are limiting yourself if you use either of those operating systems for a "media center PC". You are going to have all the FAT32 file size limits for one thing. For playing DVD or CD it should work fine. If you plan on recording shows as a "media center PC", then you had better look into some other operating system as it will be easier in the end to setup and use.

 

[P0ldy]

Use Linux.

http://www.anandtech.com/linux/showdoc.aspx?i=2208

 

[SoundTheSurrender]

Neither, they are both garbage.

 

[TGS]

Check this out

 

[drag]

You guys need to check the specs out on his machine.

He said 'old computer'.. For mythtv to realy work you need to have at least a 1.5ghz machine for basic functionality.

You can use a much slower machine if you want, but that is only for the frontend of the device... The server 'mythtv backend' would then take most of the load of transcoding tv content and ripping dvds and such, which requires very fast disks and a powerfull CPU..
(at least 120gig 7200rpm 8meg cache drive with a 2.0ghz AMD cpu for a pleasent experiance)

So Linux-based Mythtv wouldn't work out to well if all he has to work with is a old like 400mhz machine or so.

And he already said that he would use GeekBox, which is a linux based distro specificly designed for multimedia stuff.

See: http://geexbox.org/en/requirements.html

This thing won't give you the TiVO like functionality but it will work with older machines just fine provided you have a halfway decent video card and enough ram.

So he was already going to use Linux. But he wants windows, too.. so the obvious answer between WinME and Win98 SE is Win98 SE, although Win2k may work out better in a pinch... it's much more stable and has more intellegent memory handling capabilities.

 

[TGS]

He isn't specific in the usage. Also based on the use of hardware cards you won't really need anything more than a 500Mhz machine for the minimum specs. This is all based on the assumption that he is going to pay for either 98 or ME. Which for a simple PVR/"Media box" than linux would be the obvious choice and the UI on some of the PVR type apps are fantasically easy.

He mentioned this being for the gamily so I can almost with a certainty rule out HDTV transcoding.

All you really need is linux box, that is setup to play DVDs, MPGs, WMVs, etc. Now a benefit of windows would be on an ATI setup, IE ATI AIW with remote. Or you could just set up an IR remote to work just as well.

IIRC I was able to play everything under mplayer though I had to use dvdcss for DVDs. Everything else worked like a champ. I had to change some ALSA configuration an some xfree settings to get DVD output to my second screen.

To top it all off, it passed the wife test. I didn't do any TV recording though, as I used the AIW under Win2k. Unfortunately at the time AIW support was pretty horrid under linux, though it may still be. Yet another reason I'll never buy another AIW card. :|