Is it worth upgrading to XP Pro ?

"FACE" wrote in message
...
I looked on the disk root directory. I opened "Readme.htm" and there were
text files options to read.
My CD is not autorun, so do I activate d:\setup and find "Upgrade Advisor"
there? And it will deep scan the system for compatibilities?

As to peripherals, should I disconnect the speakers?

Presumably it will let me cancel out without changing anything after i run
the Upgrade Advisor?

FACE


On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 10:00:50 -0700, "Colin Barnhorst"
in microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics
wrote:

Besides the system and user resources issues and stability, Win98 is not
as
secure as XP Pro. If you run the Upgrade Advisor (insert the XP cd while
in
Windows and choose from the splash screen) you can see if you need to take
any actions before starting an upgrade. Disconnect all peripherals
except,
of course, keyboard, mouse, and monitor. Update your motherboard drivers,
NIC driver, and video driver from the manufacturer's website. Check for
viruses and spyware. Then upgrade. You will be pleased with the result.
Setup under XP Pro is straight forward and nothing to be feared. Be sure
to
defragment the hard drive after the upgrade. It will be pretty well
fragmented by the installer. Convert to NTFS when you are satisfied that
the upgrade is OK and then download Diskeeper 9 Professional trial version
and run the boot time defragmenter to defragment the directory structure.

"FACE" wrote in message
. ..
On Fri, 12 Nov 2004 12:42:50 +0000 (UTC), "Kevin Lawton"
in microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics
wrote:

I've been using Windows 2000 Pro for almost four years now and it is
'okay'.
Not perfect, by any means, but quite okay for general use.
My applications are just 'general use' - internet & e-mail, office apps
like
word & excel, SQL server 2000 database, photo editing, CD burning, etc.
Nothing very esoteric, just 'bread and butter' work.
Reliability and efficiency are what I like to see, fancy 'eye candy'
like
animated icons and screen savers are of no interest and for the sake of
efficiency I'd rather be without them.
So, the question is: is it worth paying the cost and going to the
trouble
of
upgrading to Windows XP Pro or should I just stick with Windows 2000 ?
What
do I stand to gain - or lose ?
TIA
Kevin.

I have a not dissimilar situation.

I am currently running WIN 98 SE, which is just fine for needs except
for
one thing.

That one thing is a ^&%$. I seem to run out of system resources daily.

My understanding is that Windows product up until XP allocated two 64K
segments for User/GDI resources. I am of the opinion that the glitzy,
flashy, internet of today eats the SR ravenously and the result is a
machine
lockup on GDI failure. My further understanding is that XP dynamically
allocates further resource segments on an "as needed" basis.

Of course I could run fewer programs at once and "shepherd" SR, but that
seems to be an unnecessary move. A monitor shows my CPU basically
idling
at
88-92% free but I am limited by the SR. I have the CDs for XP Pro --
and
SP2 -- but honestly am a little loathe to install it. Computer "set-up"
has
become a lot less fun and a lot more dreaded over the years.


FACE





A search on microsoft .com for Upgrade Advisor got at least 40 hits
try this one:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/p...g/advisor.mspx

gls858

Instead of Setup, right click on the cd icon in My Computer and use Explore.

"gls858" wrote in message
...

"FACE" wrote in message
...
I looked on the disk root directory. I opened "Readme.htm" and there were
text files options to read.
My CD is not autorun, so do I activate d:\setup and find "Upgrade
Advisor"
there? And it will deep scan the system for compatibilities?

As to peripherals, should I disconnect the speakers?

Presumably it will let me cancel out without changing anything after i
run
the Upgrade Advisor?

FACE


On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 10:00:50 -0700, "Colin Barnhorst"
in microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics
wrote:

Besides the system and user resources issues and stability, Win98 is not
as
secure as XP Pro. If you run the Upgrade Advisor (insert the XP cd while
in
Windows and choose from the splash screen) you can see if you need to
take
any actions before starting an upgrade. Disconnect all peripherals
except,
of course, keyboard, mouse, and monitor. Update your motherboard
drivers,
NIC driver, and video driver from the manufacturer's website. Check for
viruses and spyware. Then upgrade. You will be pleased with the result.
Setup under XP Pro is straight forward and nothing to be feared. Be sure
to
defragment the hard drive after the upgrade. It will be pretty well
fragmented by the installer. Convert to NTFS when you are satisfied that
the upgrade is OK and then download Diskeeper 9 Professional trial
version
and run the boot time defragmenter to defragment the directory structure.

"FACE" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 12 Nov 2004 12:42:50 +0000 (UTC), "Kevin Lawton"
in microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics
wrote:

I've been using Windows 2000 Pro for almost four years now and it is
'okay'.
Not perfect, by any means, but quite okay for general use.
My applications are just 'general use' - internet & e-mail, office apps
like
word & excel, SQL server 2000 database, photo editing, CD burning, etc.
Nothing very esoteric, just 'bread and butter' work.
Reliability and efficiency are what I like to see, fancy 'eye candy'
like
animated icons and screen savers are of no interest and for the sake of
efficiency I'd rather be without them.
So, the question is: is it worth paying the cost and going to the
trouble
of
upgrading to Windows XP Pro or should I just stick with Windows 2000 ?
What
do I stand to gain - or lose ?
TIA
Kevin.

I have a not dissimilar situation.

I am currently running WIN 98 SE, which is just fine for needs except
for
one thing.

That one thing is a ^&%$. I seem to run out of system resources daily.

My understanding is that Windows product up until XP allocated two 64K
segments for User/GDI resources. I am of the opinion that the glitzy,
flashy, internet of today eats the SR ravenously and the result is a
machine
lockup on GDI failure. My further understanding is that XP dynamically
allocates further resource segments on an "as needed" basis.

Of course I could run fewer programs at once and "shepherd" SR, but
that
seems to be an unnecessary move. A monitor shows my CPU basically
idling
at
88-92% free but I am limited by the SR. I have the CDs for XP Pro --
and
SP2 -- but honestly am a little loathe to install it. Computer
"set-up"
has
become a lot less fun and a lot more dreaded over the years.


FACE





A search on microsoft .com for Upgrade Advisor got at least 40 hits
try this one:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/p...g/advisor.mspx

gls858

Okay - thanks for sending that info. Now I understand 'why' the question
becomes 'what can we do to get around the problem ?'.
If, as it seems, many programmers are too lazy to include the code to
release the User/GDI pool resources they have used after they are needed,
then I'm thinking that maybe there is some sort of system utility program
available which performs a kind of 'garbage collection' function so that
resources no longer required are released ?
Does anyone know of the existence of such a utility or whether it is even
possible ?
Kevin.

FACE wrote:
| On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 23:02:18 +0000 (UTC), "Kevin Lawton"
| in
| microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics wrote:
|
|| FACE wrote:
|| snip
||| My understanding is that Windows product up until XP allocated two
||| 64K segments for User/GDI resources. I am of the opinion that the
||| glitzy, flashy, internet of today eats the SR ravenously and the
||| result is a machine lockup on GDI failure. My further understanding
||| is that XP dynamically allocates further resource segments on an
||| "as needed"
||| basis.
|| snip
|| I would have expected that the allocations to User/DGI resources were
|| specified by values in the registry - let's face, just about
|| everything else is !
|| Could anyone possibly confirm this and, it is so, suggest what those
|| registry values might be ?
|| I tend to run my systems with lots of RAM - 512 Mb minimum, and up
|| to 1 Gb - so 64Kb is a pathetic amount to allocate to something
|| which is easily filled to the point of causing a problem.
|| Kevin.
||
||
| Kevin,
| Yes, it is surprising.
| I can relay the in-depth answer that I got on
| microsoft.public.win98.performance, back in August. The thread name
| was "Increase USER and GDI resources?" and it may shed light on this
| holdover from the halcyon days of no viruses and no spywa
|
|
| ~~~~
|
| Not to worry, I'm only rude in response to ill manners. :-)
|
| The resource pools and their 64k limit are a gift of the
| compatibility gods. Windows 3.1 was a 16-bit operating system, so if
| you do the math (2^16) you get 65,536 (or 64kb) as the maximum size
| that a memory pool can be. When Windows 95 came out it used a 32-bit
| memory model but it needed to support those older 16-bit programs, so
| it maintained the User and GDI pool sizes so they'd run correctly.
|
| At about the same time as Windows 95 came Windows NT. The NT kernel
| attempted to handle these older 16-bit programs by running them in a
| virtual session - carve out a chunk of memory and make it look like a
| 16-bit system, then load and run the program in that chunk of memory.
| The problem was (and still is!) that this breaks as many programs
| under Windows NT as it fixes.
|
| The sad part is that _only_ the User and GDI pools are limited in
| Win9x - there are other 32-bit pools that can be used. And you can
| dynamically destroy items you've placed in the User and GDI pools
| when you're done with them, freeing up that memory for other uses.
| So, why don't they? I don't know. Maybe programmers are
| fundamentally lazy and use the User and GDI pools the way they do
| because it's easier.
|
| (n.b. - I am a programmer and I am lazy, as are many of my
| programmer-friends, but I don't assume this tendency transfers to all
| other programmers.G)
|
| But to get back on point ... if you could change the size of the User
| and GDI pools you would break all sorts of interesting things when a
| program assumes they'll be the correct size and dips into them to
| pull out a resource. So you'd also have to modify programs to expect
| a larger than expected pool. Neither of these are trivial tasks and
| would run the risk of breaking operating system functions that expect
| the User and GDI pools to be 64kb in size. So you'd have to modify
| Windows as well.

It seems to me that with memory being so cheap at the moment, it is one of
the most cost-effective upgrades you can make to a windows machine - unless,
of course, you already have plenty.
Kevin.

Colin Barnhorst wrote:
| You don't need 512MB for Pro, but it will run nicely with 512MB.
| What will happen with 256MB is that the hard drive will run more
| because you will be using the page file more, so you can improve
| performance with more memory. You can always add memory at your
| leisure. Pro will run on your machine, though.
|
| "FACE" wrote in message
| ...
|| On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 11:01:52 -0600, "Harry Ohrn"
|| in microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics wrote:
||
|||
||| "FACE" wrote in message
||| ...
|||| On Fri, 12 Nov 2004 12:42:50 +0000 (UTC), "Kevin Lawton"
|||| in
|||| microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics wrote:
||||
||||| I've been using Windows 2000 Pro for almost four years now and it
||||| is 'okay'. Not perfect, by any means, but quite okay for general
||||| use.
||||| My applications are just 'general use' - internet & e-mail,
||||| office apps like word & excel, SQL server 2000 database, photo
||||| editing, CD burning, etc. Nothing very esoteric, just 'bread and
||||| butter' work.
||||| Reliability and efficiency are what I like to see, fancy 'eye
||||| candy' like animated icons and screen savers are of no interest
||||| and for the sake of efficiency I'd rather be without them.
||||| So, the question is: is it worth paying the cost and going to the
||| trouble
||| of
||||| upgrading to Windows XP Pro or should I just stick with Windows
||||| 2000 ? What do I stand to gain - or lose ?
||||| TIA
||||| Kevin.
|||||
|||| I have a not dissimilar situation.
||||
|||| I am currently running WIN 98 SE, which is just fine for needs
|||| except for one thing.
||||
|||| That one thing is a ^&%$. I seem to run out of system resources
|||| daily.
||||
|||| My understanding is that Windows product up until XP allocated two
|||| 64K segments for User/GDI resources. I am of the opinion that the
|||| glitzy, flashy, internet of today eats the SR ravenously and the
|||| result is a machine lockup on GDI failure. My further
|||| understanding is that XP dynamically allocates further resource
|||| segments on an "as needed" basis.
||||
|||| Of course I could run fewer programs at once and "shepherd" SR,
|||| but that seems to be an unnecessary move. A monitor shows my CPU
|||| basically
||| idling
||| at
|||| 88-92% free but I am limited by the SR. I have the CDs for XP Pro
|||| -- and SP2 -- but honestly am a little loathe to install it.
|||| Computer "set-up" has become a lot less fun and a lot more dreaded
|||| over the years.
||||
||||
|||| FACE
||||
||||
|||
||| Have you thought of upgrading RAM on your Win98 setup. Personally
||| I've found
||| 256MB of RAM to be the sweet spot. Also limiting the size of the
||| Internet Cache and clearing out caches helps a lot. There are free
||| programs that can
||| automate the process. Empty TempFolders is one
||| http://www.danish-shareware.dk/soft/emptemp/index.html If you have
||| any third
||| party apps installed that claim to free up RAM you may wish to get
||| rid of them as generally they are more problematic than they are
||| useful.
|||
||| Harry Ohrn MS-MVP [Shell/User]
||| www.webtree.ca/windowsxp
|||
||
|| I have 256mb of RAM.
|| 16M is taken for on-board video.
|| I see a lot of messages posted saying that I need 512m for XP Pro.
||
|| On the temp files, I cut the temp IE cache from 2G (windows' install
|| choice)
|| to 300m last summer.
||
|| RAM free-er uppers? I have been known to use TASKINFO 2003 to slow
|| flush RAM on occasion. Not often, since that sure does put an end
|| to current streaming.
||
|| FACE

On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 23:06:13 -0600, "gls858" in
microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics wrote:

A search on microsoft .com for Upgrade Advisor got at least 40 hits
try this one:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/p...g/advisor.mspx

gls858

Thank you. Good information. I was on that page earlier this morning.

I am looking for something approx 50 meg?
I have actually had these disks a good while, but hating change, I have
never installed them.

Sorted by size, descending, this is the top of the manifest and it seems
that the upgrade advisor should fall between the first file (76 meg) and the
second file (13 meg), even allowing for a possible CAB compression:


DRIVER .CAB 76699621 r... 8-23-01 12:00:0
OEMBIOS .BI_ 13113765 r... 8-23-01 12:00:0
IMJPST .DI_ 8614,079 r... 8-23-01 12:00:0
HWXJPN .DL_ 8422,595 r... 8-23-01 12:00:0
PINTLGS .IM_ 7007,742 r... 8-23-01 12:00:0
HWXCHT .DL_ 6691,525 r... 8-23-01 12:00:0


FACE



On Tue, 16 Nov 2004 23:39:40 -0700, "Colin Barnhorst"
in microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics wrote:

Instead of Setup, right click on the cd icon in My Computer and use Explore.

"gls858" wrote in message
...

"FACE" wrote in message
...

From empirical evidence (not what *should* work, theoretically, but what I
seen to work) I have found that a drastic measure that i can take if i catch
it prior to machine lockup on GDI failure is to slow flush RAM (that is,
writing info as necessary, but flushing the thing in any event)

From an observational standpoint, and since the failure on user resources
occurs after about 12-14 hours of fairly intense use, this says to me that
you are correct in that certain functions do NOT release used resources when
they go away. In an unofficial way, i call it "dirty memory".

Having been a systems programmer managing application programmers in another
lifetime, I will take up for the "lazy" statements which I took as somewhat
self-deprecatory on Richard's part. When something works, and appears
sufficient, then when faced with deadlines and limited time, human nature
takes over in a 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' kind of way. If you have
ever attempted to fix a program with an "all I have to do is..." approach
and found yourself 3 hours later wishing that you could back to where you
were before you started the "simple" change, you will know what I
mean.....and what Richard meant. After a person does that a few times they
get real skittish about fixing what isn't broke. :-)

But.....what happened here is that "old" machine technology continued
without change until application technology outran it. (Consider as an
analogy the Y2K teck-no non-disaster which would have been a disaster if
many 1000s of $100+ man hours had not been put in. It was a possible
disaster because machine technology from the fifties -- yes, fifties -- had
been carried forward without change, migrated from mainframe to PC.)

Anyway, i'll stop here since all of this will be in my book "why I hate
change and we gotta have it".

Looks like I need to download that "Upgrade Advisor". Maybe I'll find a
neighbor with a DSL/Broadband account or maybe i could start it about
midnight here and have it in the morning........

FACE


On Wed, 17 Nov 2004 13:33:05 +0000 (UTC), "Kevin Lawton"
in microsoft.public.windowsxp.basics
wrote:

Okay - thanks for sending that info. Now I understand 'why' the question
becomes 'what can we do to get around the problem ?'.
If, as it seems, many programmers are too lazy to include the code to
release the User/GDI pool resources they have used after they are needed,
then I'm thinking that maybe there is some sort of system utility program
available which performs a kind of 'garbage collection' function so that
resources no longer required are released ?
Does anyone know of the existence of such a utility or whether it is even
possible ?
Kevin.

In ,
Kevin Lawton typed:

It seems to me that with memory being so cheap at the moment,
it is
one of the most cost-effective upgrades you can make to a
windows
machine - unless, of course, you already have plenty.


As long as you include your caveat "unless, of course, you
already have plenty," I don't disagree, but I just wanted to
caution people that adding memory won't improve performance for
everyone. Many people add memory, expecting a performance boost,
but are then surprised when they don't get one. The reason, of
course, is that they already have "plenty."

How much is "plenty"? How much memory you need depends on what
apps you run, but almost everyone needs at least 256MB for decent
performance. For some people, for example those who edit large
photographic images, more than 256MB--even much more--can be
required for good performance.

If you are currently using the page file significantly, more
memory will decrease or eliminate that usage, and improve your
performance. If you are not using the page file significantly,
more memory will do nothing for you.

Go to http://billsway.com/notes%5Fpublic/winxp%5Ftweaks/ and
download WinXP-2K_Pagefile.zip and monitor your pagefile usage.
That should give you a good idea of whether more memory can help,
and if so, how much more.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

Usually, the reason they don't get a performance increase is because they
don't change settings for things like the icon cache, etc.

"Ken Blake" wrote in message
...
In ,
Kevin Lawton typed:

It seems to me that with memory being so cheap at the moment, it is
one of the most cost-effective upgrades you can make to a windows
machine - unless, of course, you already have plenty.


As long as you include your caveat "unless, of course, you already have
plenty," I don't disagree, but I just wanted to caution people that adding
memory won't improve performance for everyone. Many people add memory,
expecting a performance boost, but are then surprised when they don't get
one. The reason, of course, is that they already have "plenty."

How much is "plenty"? How much memory you need depends on what apps you
run, but almost everyone needs at least 256MB for decent performance. For
some people, for example those who edit large photographic images, more
than 256MB--even much more--can be required for good performance.

If you are currently using the page file significantly, more memory will
decrease or eliminate that usage, and improve your performance. If you are
not using the page file significantly, more memory will do nothing for
you.

Go to http://billsway.com/notes%5Fpublic/winxp%5Ftweaks/ and download
WinXP-2K_Pagefile.zip and monitor your pagefile usage. That should give
you a good idea of whether more memory can help, and if so, how much more.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

In ,
Colin Barnhorst typed:

Usually, the reason they don't get a performance increase is
because
they don't change settings for things like the icon cache, etc.


No, it's because they already have enough memory to keep them
from using the page file, and adding more than that does nothing
for them. It is *not* true that more memory always provides a
speed increase.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup


"Ken Blake" wrote in message
...
In ,
Kevin Lawton typed:

It seems to me that with memory being so cheap at the moment,
it is
one of the most cost-effective upgrades you can make to a
windows
machine - unless, of course, you already have plenty.


As long as you include your caveat "unless, of course, you
already
have plenty," I don't disagree, but I just wanted to caution
people
that adding memory won't improve performance for everyone.
Many
people add memory, expecting a performance boost, but are then
surprised when they don't get one. The reason, of course, is
that
they already have "plenty."
How much is "plenty"? How much memory you need depends on what
apps
you run, but almost everyone needs at least 256MB for decent
performance. For some people, for example those who edit large
photographic images, more than 256MB--even much more--can be
required for good performance.
If you are currently using the page file significantly, more
memory
will decrease or eliminate that usage, and improve your
performance.
If you are not using the page file significantly, more memory
will
do nothing for you.

Go to http://billsway.com/notes%5Fpublic/winxp%5Ftweaks/ and
download
WinXP-2K_Pagefile.zip and monitor your pagefile usage. That
should
give you a good idea of whether more memory can help, and if
so, how
much more.
--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

André Gulliksen wrote:
| "Kevin Lawton" skrev i melding
| ...
|| I've been using Windows 2000 Pro for almost four years now and it is
|| 'okay'.
|| Not perfect, by any means, but quite okay for general use.
|| My applications are just 'general use' - internet & e-mail, office
|| apps like
|| word & excel, SQL server 2000 database, photo editing, CD burning,
|| etc. Nothing very esoteric, just 'bread and butter' work.
|| Reliability and efficiency are what I like to see, fancy 'eye candy'
|| like animated icons and screen savers are of no interest and for the
|| sake of efficiency I'd rather be without them.
|| So, the question is: is it worth paying the cost and going to the
|| trouble of
|| upgrading to Windows XP Pro or should I just stick with Windows 2000
|| ? What
|| do I stand to gain - or lose ?
|
| If you're happy with 2K Pro then I suggest you stick to 2K Pro, at
| least until it reaches end of life and you no longer get security
| fixes for it, or until you clearly identify a feature in XP (or any
| other OS) that you would really like.
|
| I chose the upgrade path, but I'd might as well have left it alone. XP
| introduces a whole bunch of new fancy bells and whistles, but I have
| turned of most of them. The only things I have found in XP Pro that
| is better than 2K Pro is handling of multi-monitor setups, better
| application compatibility (particularly games and demos) and faster
| boot time. On the downside is tons of annoying bells and whistles,
| higher hardware requirements and lower stability.

Thanks, André - lower stability ?
This is the first I've heard anyone mention XP Pro being less stable than
Win 2K and would most definitely make a difference to me. Can you give more
details, please ?
Kevin.

Kevin Lawton wrote:
Thanks, André - lower stability ?
This is the first I've heard anyone mention XP Pro being less stable
than Win 2K and would most definitely make a difference to me. Can
you give more details, please ?

I can't give you any hard and fast numbers on claiming that one is more
stable than the other. This is just my experience, so your mileage may vary.
But my Windows 2000 Pro-setup was rock solid for years running, and wouldn't
go belly-up if you hit it with a truck. And multitasking was super smooth.

Since going to XP Pro I have experienced minor instabilities, mostly in
connection with logoff and hibernation. There is also a general feeling of
sluggishness that was not present under 2K Pro, with slow responses, periods
where the system would freeze to a full halt and sluggish multitasking under
heavy CPU load. SP2 seems to have improved this somewhat, but not totally.

Fast user switching also seems to introduce some stability issues, but this
feature can be turned off and/or not used. In the beginning I also had
problems getting all my hardware working properly (such as activating DMA
for my Plextor burner), but this has been resolved.