WinXP for me?

[TruculentTucan]

After reading some posts on anandtech i was thinking about not buying WinXP. I am running ME right now, and it seems pretty stable, but I have to change HDDs soon and I thought I might as well make the jump to XP, after all I had heard about it. However, I wanted to know how much of a memory hog it is, can I play games on it ok (games like UT, Counter-Strike, Homeworld, Max Payne, etc).

My system:


epox 8k7a
1.2 @ 1.3 ghzAthlon Thunderbird
256 megs Crucial PC 2100 DDR RAM
40 gig Maxtor HDD
Radeon LE graphics card.

Thanks guys!

 

[CZroe]

You shouldn't have a problem with XP, once you get past the whole interface factor.
You can even roll back to the Win2k style interface.
Memory is the main issue probably, and I think 256MB should be enough, in fact, I wouldn't recommend 128MB at all.

 

[xtreme2k]

Anyone who runs 9x/ME really SHOULD upgrade to XP Home Edition. The 9x/ME kernel is way too unstable and limiting compared to the NT kernel XP uses. If you are using Win2000, there isnt 'much' point of upgrading seriously.

 

[MorpheusMan]

Judging by your specs, you've got more than enough fire power for XP. 256 MB of Ram should be plenty.

Inspite of your hardware, you might see a performance hit going from ME to XP. For me, the performance penalty has averaged about 7%, which is hardly noticable. In some situations where the difference was noticable, I was able to use the compatability mode feature in XP to improve performance to more acceptable levels.

There are a lot of things I like about XP. In general, I think XP is probably Microsoft's best OS yet. However, if your a heavy gamer, who plays a lot of different games, you still might be better off staying with ME. Don't loose your ME CD. Just in case.

 

[TruculentTucan]

so I should be able to run all my games? sweet! Thanks guys, that's exactly what I wanted to hear

 

[userpete]

You'll be a happy camper with XP and 256 ram.....as long as you feel ok with MS looking into your computer.

Later

 

[TruculentTucan]

i really hate microsoft. They are already unbearable! Gah, imagine in ten yrs.

 

[FuManStan]

Good thing microsoft doesnt give a damn whats in your computer