Need Freeper Input on Computer OPerating Systems

[Maceman]

OK. I've held off as long as I could, but now I REALLY need to upgrade from my 1997 Dell Dimension Desktop with Windows 95. I have decided on a desktop over a laptop, but am unsure about which WINDOWS operating system to get.

I have a home-based consulting business to Fortune-1000 type clients, which requires heavy use of the Internet and MS Office apps (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Outlook, and some basic Access). I'm sure that before I buy the next system after this new one, I'll be heavy into video meetings and such (since I don't plan to upgrade again for at least 3-4 years).

I don't need to have any local networking, as I am a one-person shop.

Question: What are your thoughts about Windows 98 vs. Windows 2000 vs. Windows ME vs. Windows XP?

Also, what is the best thing to use for back-ups? Is it a CD-RW? Zip drive? Or is there something better? (The tape drive on my current system just died, so I don't have an easy way to make back-ups at the moment).

I really need the input, and appreciate your help. Thanks.

[shadowman99]

There are numerous office productivity suites available from IMB, Ximian and Sun Microsystems.

Darn it. Maybe there's a IMB out there somewhere. But I mean to say IBM.

IBM
IBM
IBM
IBM
IBM

[athiestwithagun]

If I were in your position (thankfully I am not) I would go with 2000. Server if you can afford it but even if you go with Professional be prepared to shell out quite a bit for the software.

[Myrddin]

I have to write lots of win32 software in C++ for my current customer. It runs much better on Windows 2000 using a 733 MHz laptop (Dell) than Windows 98 runs on a 1 GHz PIII (Dell 420). I really prefer Windows 2000.

Windows Me was never stable on the one machine where it was loaded at home. I replaced it with Windows 2000. My is pleased and has no complaints. My other two machines run Windows NT 4.0 Server and Workstation respectively. My youngest son (14) prefers the stability of NT 4.0 Workstation for his needs.

XP is just hitting the streets now. I would give that one a few months to mature. There will be security and functionality patches coming after a wide spread adoption. Hold until at least SP1 is ready.

[Texaggie79]

I have, so far downgraded over 10 of my friends computers, because their system would not stop locking up. 3 computers at my office that we bought WITH ME on were immediately put on 2000 because we could not get them to function properly on our network. ME is a mess.

[ggraziano]

Windows 2000 Professional is definitely the best way to go, as it is based on the far more stable & reliable NT code. We've had it for a couple of months now, and it is considerably better than its predecessors. It is still capable of screwing up, but it seems much more resilient, and doesn't corrupt other programs. The other big plus is that it isn't as vulnerable to virus attacks.

[shadowman99]

"And since it's free, I can't enlist my non-existent sales rep to harass the developers into fixing a bug. Money is a much better incentive than professional pride."

Who needs to harass anyone? Windows software is dreamed up by marketing guys and pushed to the end user. Linux software is written by the people WHO USE IT. That gives them the incentive to fix any problems in the software.

"Frequent updates are not a good thing. I want to spend my time working, not fixing or improving or patching my OS and software."

My computer ran without interuptions or crashes for 4 months. I got alot of work done during all of that time I wasn't rebooting due to a blue screen of death.

Maybe RH 7 is better....

Redhat is on 7.1. You should upgrade that 6.0 box.

Linux is a good OS for geeks and for serving web pages. It's not a good OS for Maceman.

You know Maceman?

My point is there are alternatives. Linux is good. Don't like Redhat. Fine. Debian. TurboLinux. Suse.

Or even one of the BSDs.

Maceman, if you read this, don't buy into the whole "it's not friendly enough for most users" line. Somewhere near you is a Linux user group that would be eager to help you make the switch.

[ArcLight]

Actually, it's running on an old pre-Athlon 400 megahertz AMD chip, with 384 megs of memory...on this machine, it works fine.

[Justa]

"I have 256M on a 300 Mhz PII and when surfing am always locking up because of memory overload."

That's unacceptable Ernest.

Try this: Tweaking your System Memory (W98).

If those don't work I know some nifty extras which will. FReepmail me and give me your system stats and I'll give you some advice on what to set Windows memory and system parameters to in order avoid such slowdowns and lockups.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

I think once people have a chance to really try out a Mac - it will be a no-brainer. Don't know why people fight it.....

I have been a Mac user since the first classic but my business activities were always in the PC and mainframe world. Mac was poo pooed as a toy, and this was before windows, and I used to grin at all the contortions those folks went through to do the things that were so simple on a Mac, like their backspacing to an error and retyping the rest because of no mouse. I eventually decided it was a macho thing, even with females. They seemed to think if you couldn't program, or at least be comfortable with DOS that you shouldn't even be using a computer. Despite all the evolutions of windows, and the fits and starts Mac has experienced, I still think Mac is far ahead of the game.

[for-q-clinton]

If you are a bit more advanced user, it's likely that you will thrash your system at least once every six months, more if you are like me, and need to reinstall.

That's why XP is so great. The system restore in it actually works extremely well. I tested it by installing Novell Client32 on it (a program that is really hard to remove--even using novell's uninstall leaves traces of it). I simple system restore removes the program files. I never have to reload again. Also the files settings and transfer wizard allows me to copy my settings to wherevere I want so that I can easily reapply them to any machine I work on. That saves me several hours whenever I build a new machine.

[The Duke]

Are you familiar with 2000 Advanced Server? Ever use it (and it's features)?

In fact I have two commercial servers, one running 2000 Advanced Server and one running Solaris. One hosts three websites and requires rebooting once every two weeks, the other hosts 100+ websites and requires rebooting about once every six months.

I'll let you figure out which is which...*G*

[peabers]

P$=P4

You were right the first time.

[Tumbleweed_Connection]

Sorry to stray from the OS, but I have ex5.5 v2 which is constantly crashing on me so I attempted to upgrade to the ieak6? I set it up successfully only to find my browser is still the 5.5. Any ideas?

[Texaggie79]

Do a complete uninstall and then install IE6