WinXP or Win7 with SSD?

C

colore

Limp Gawd
Joined
Sep 18, 2010
Messages
393
hello!

I read that Win7 offers better SSD support than WinXP

is this really true and there is no way to make WinXP have the same SSD support as Win7?

because I want to buy an SSD, but I prefer WinXP (64bit)

thanks
 
Windows 7 offers native TRIM support. On XP, you can still get garbage collection--but not the same as TRIM.
 
Xaijin said:
Windows 7 offers native TRIM support. On XP, you can still get garbage collection--but not the same as TRIM.
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it seems that quite a few manufacturers have TRIM alternatives, claiming they are better, arent they?
 
Curious why you still prefer winXP? Windows 7 is a surprisingly good operating system.
 
I would suggest moving to Win7. Windows XP was a great OS with a solid run but it's now long in the tooth in regards to modern hardware like SSD's, plus Win7's reliability and compatibility is every bit as good as XP is.
 
Ampsonic said:
Curious why you still prefer winXP? Windows 7 is a surprisingly good operating system.
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because new Windows OS are more and more bloated (as new Microsoft's software in general) and because it has no apparent feature that is useful and cannot have it in XP
 
colore said:
because new Windows OS are more and more bloated (as new Microsoft's software in general) and because it has no apparent feature that is useful and cannot have it in XP
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The reasons like this are not really a technical, yes you maybe still don't want to upgrade, because like the win xp and so on. But as the technology advances, software also does. It's been since XP 2 major versions released already. It's time to upgrade I guess, time to give up on greatly old OS and get the W7. I believe you get used to it just everyone else before.
 
Windows 7 generally runs as fast or faster than XP on similar hardware, has quicker boot times, is more stable, and has vastly better driver support. The only reason to continue using XP is if you have a crucial piece of software that just plain will not work on 7.

Support for XP is dying fast, and if you're looking at doing a new OS install at this point, it doesn't make sense to limit yourself to a decade-old OS. The fact that you're on XP 64-bit means that you know the pains of trying to find drivers for hardware already. It's only going to get worse, because the bulk of the driver support for XP right now is driven by the corporate world, where a lot of IT departments refuse to upgrade until Microsoft pulls the plug on XP entirely.
 
Crazy is a person who actually thinks xp 64 bit was ever good. The first real good 64bit OS micrsoft came out with is Vista x64. Driver support for xp 64bit is the worst of all Microsoft OS's and even microsoft doesn't support it. Windows live essentials never had a version for xp 64 bit. Move on to windows 7, its much better with ssd's and offers more tweaks than just trim support to take proper advantage of an ssd. When I see companies deploying xp 64 bit because it has the word xp in it I roll my eyes. They go on thinking that because it says XP everything that worked on xp will work with it but chances are if it doesn't work on xp 64bit it probably does work on vista/7 64 bit. So many long issues of windows were solved in Vista such as moving most of the drivers from kernel mode out into user mode space therefore allowing drivers to update without a restart and when they crash they can restart without affecting the system. The most common cause of BSOD's in XP is video drivers which has been solved in newer versions of windows. Simply put. Install windows 7 on your ssd and you'll never think of going back. I have several system with ssd's running windows 7 as well as systems without them.
 
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Or you could tweak it for a few days for it to be closer to XP (I recommend Classic Shell).

Still, the new explorer is even more buggy than the old one.
 
Win7 for sure.

XP is not only a decade old, but no longer supports many newer technology standards and does not support TRIM.

I agree with Aesma, you can adjust and alter Win7 to look very similar to XP.
 
McTurkey said:
Windows 7 generally runs as fast or faster than XP on similar hardware, has quicker boot times, is more stable, and has vastly better driver support. The only reason to continue using XP is if you have a crucial piece of software that just plain will not work on 7.

Support for XP is dying fast, and if you're looking at doing a new OS install at this point, it doesn't make sense to limit yourself to a decade-old OS. The fact that you're on XP 64-bit means that you know the pains of trying to find drivers for hardware already. It's only going to get worse, because the bulk of the driver support for XP right now is driven by the corporate world, where a lot of IT departments refuse to upgrade until Microsoft pulls the plug on XP entirely.
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This. Really no reason not to move to Win 7 at this point, unless you just can't afford a new license.
 
colore said:
because new Windows OS are more and more bloated (as new Microsoft's software in general) and because it has no apparent feature that is useful and cannot have it in XP
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Anyone who says this can't be using modern hardware since much of the technology doesn't even work on XP.
 
FragMagnet said:
Hey Heatless, any examples ? The only one I can think of is DX11 ?
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Well how about TRIM support? Then there's better support for multi-CPU systems, better memory management, better support for multi-GPU, much better gaming support beyond DX 11 with better support for multi-monitor (Eyefinify and Surround don't work with XP) and multi-GPU setups. Then there's much better touch support in Windows 7. Even though the UI and 3rd party apps aren't optimized for touch underneath Windows 7 has an fairly complete touch API and there are a number of things that work pretty well with touch that simply don't in XP.

There's many more things that I could list. Anyone who thinks that 7 lacks useful features over XP is simply living in the past and not dealing with the latest hardware and software.
 
This might be helpful to those that think XP can be resuscitated enough to perform well with modern hardware. It isn't just DX11 that isn't available in XP, its a host of other software packages and mostly vastly improved integration with hardware devices and lots of improved reliability mechanisms that make it far better than XP. I understand the love for XP, I was a beta tester for it myself before it was released, but trying to keep it going with lots of hacks and hope simply isn't realistic anymore.
 
XP doesn't handle Direct X 11 or 11.1. It doesn't support TRIM or multi-monitor display technologies as far as gaming is concerned. You can of course run multiple monitors, but not game with them as Eyefinity and NV Surround aren't supported. As others have said, memory and CPU thread management and scheduling are vastly improved. No sense having a 6 core CPU with Hyperthreading on a 10 year old OS which was never designed to use that many cores / threads. Much of the software designed for it wasn't either and all the things that "are", really are applications made for Windows 7 with backward compatibility as an after thought. Furthermore, Windows XP Professional x64 Edition was kind of the red headed step child of the Windows XP world. Support now and then for drivers is a bit hit and miss. Fine for most mainstream hardware, but if you've got TV tuners and some other odd devices you are often SOL.The 32bit version obviously has limitations where memory is concerned as the 4GB address limitations pretty much apply. You can use PAE to work around some of that but you take a performance hit doing so and the application has to support this function as well or it won't take advantage of more than 2GB of RAM as that's all Windows allocates for user programs in a 32bit environment.

Windows XP is also ugly and old. It's a pain in the ass to setup and tweak. Installing RAID drivers without creating a slipstreamed disc is also a massive headache. After 10 years or more of looking at it, I'd think most people would be ready for and welcome change. I know I did. At first it's hard to get used to Windows Vista / 7's interface but give it a week and you won't want to go back. There are some features like the window management hot keys which I find tremendously valuable. With multiple monitors I consider it a must. Windows XP can not and never will provide that functionality without a third party application. You want bloat? Try reskinning Windows XP and adding all the third party applications which do what Windows 7 does natively. You'll have a bunch of random crap running all the time increasing XP's foot print. Compared to Windows 95, Windows 98/98SE, etc. Windows XP looks bloated on disk as well. Would you consider Windows XP to be just bloated crap compared to Windows ME? Windows ME is smaller, but not more efficient and not the better OS.

And yes, Windows 7 takes up more drive space than Windows XP does. Hard drives are cheap. Get over it. It's a larger OS because it's more complex and it can do more. And for people who whine about it's memory foot print, it's not any worse in reality than XP. It just happens to utilize idle memory for somethng else and releases it instantly when needed. Windows XP just sits there idle. And offloading the interface to my GTX 580's or any video card makes it more responsive as well. Once superfetch organizes your programs, you'd be amazed how fast Windows 7 can actually be. Windows open much faster and programs can in fact launch much faster than they'd ever be capable of in Windows XP.

Is it perfect? Of course not. Not everything done with the interface is an improvement. Some things are harder to get to because of additional layers or steps needed to reach them. Still I wouldn't never be able to go back to Windows XP on my home machine. I'm forced to use it every day still on my work computer. In fact I use Windows 7 and Windows XP side by side. You can only guess which I prefer I'm sure. :D
 
^ I couldn't have said it better myself, thanks for posting that Dan_D. :cool:
Hopefully this will put the XP > 7 debate to rest once and for all.
 
Red Falcon said:
^ I couldn't have said it better myself, thanks for posting that Dan_D. :cool:
Hopefully this will put the XP > 7 debate to rest once and for all.
Click to expand...

I don't know about that. On technical merrits I don't think there should be a debate. Windows 7 is better for new hardware. Period, end of story. I think the issue is that people have become comfortable with Windows XP after so many years of using it and they are afraid of adjusting to a new interface and a new way of doing things. People who spend 5 minutes or an hour on Vista or Windows 7 sit there and say that it sucks. The reality is that they've not given it a chance. A mere day or two won't really let you learn the OS inside and out.

No matter if you were using a computer for the first time or you've been doing it since CPM and Unix times, you had to learn Windows XP at some point too. Granted it wasn't as big a change coming from Windows 2000 or Windows 9x as DOS / Windows 3.1 to Windows 95 was, or even as big a change as Windows XP to Vista was. Still given time I don't think you'd want to go back. And if after a week you do want to go back, you really can make Windows Vista / 7 look a lot like Windows XP does. Though why you'd want to load all the GUI rendering back on your CPU, is beyond me. I've used Windows 7 in basic mode and I've used Windows Server 2008 R2 daily since it's release. Up until recently I ran that with the default interface rather than enabling the Aero theme. Once I enabled Aero the desktop felt much quicker and more responsive. I've got a GeForce 9500GT in that machine so it's nice like my GTX 580 SLI setup is to blame for that.

I went over to my girlfriend's parents house to work on her mother's computer. She made some crack about hating Vista and it being a piece of shit. I asked her what made her think that and she really couldn't give me a good reason. It's really just something she heard other people say. Probably from people who may or may not have known what they were talking about and could have simply learned it from someone else. The point is she had no reason for thinking that and at the end of all of it, she said; "I'm used to Windows XP and I like it better. There are things I haven't figured out how to do with Vista I could with XP." Again case in point. She hadn't used Windows Vista without the predjudiced attitude towards it. She based her opinion off nonsense she read or heard without knowing anything beyond what she saw on the surface and without thinking about anything other than the learning curve she faced learning a new OS.

This is not a technical problem but rather a problem with the people using it. It's their thinking that's the issue and nothing more. Going beyond that I find it interesting that so many people are always itching to put the latest hardware into their machines to play games or whatever. Then some of those same people with super short upgrade cycles keep going back to loading Windows XP on their shiny new PC's, hard drives, etc. So you want the latest hardware, and you'll buy 5 different versions of the same processor only to find out which OC's best, but you want to stick with a 10 year old OS? WTF? It's almost as ridiculous as buying a Core i7 3960X with 4 GTX 580 3GB cards in SLI, 4 SSD's in RAID0, etc. and sticking DOS or Windows 98SE on it. You've got the latest hardware, but without the latest software, it's kind of useless or at least, not as useful as it could be.

People tend to get caught up in certain comfort zones which cause them to make less than sensible decisions. When it comes to technology and it's advancement one shouldn't limit themselves to what they know from the past because it's comfortable. My grandfather used to sit there and bitch about computers, bitch about plastic ice cube trays, etc. I thought to myself, "how miserable it must be to live in a world you absolutely refuse to understand?" I think in a way he was trying to use what little influence he had to try and change people to think like he did to make the planet more comfortable for him. He couldn't do anything else because he just didn't understand the world and knew no other way to cope with it and fit into it. The world will grow, change and advance whether you want it to or not. Either get with that or become obsolete yourself.
 
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XP is a triumph in computing history, make no mistakes about it. No one will give a fuck about Ubuntu 11, OS X Lion, iOS 5 or ICS in ten years. For that matter people already don't give a fuck about Vista and may not give a rats ass about Windows 8 in 2022 though I have a feeling Windows 7 has a VERY long life ahead of it. XP is the Methuselah of computer OSes and we may never see anything like it again in our lifetime if ever again.

But even Methuselah died, time marches on and waits for no man or OS, XP is well past its prime and its best days are long behind it. One reason out of many as to why XP has survived so long is this era of good enough computing were in that has particularly manifested itself in mobile OS phones and tablets. While highly mobile and fun to use for many their overarching philosophy is to not push the boundaries as much as to redefine them and deliver a computing experience that is fundamentally simpler and less complex than a Windows desktop OS experience, which is why Microsoft is creating Windows 8 the way it is.

Windows 7 has pushed some technical boundaries in the Windows OS space that most do not even know exist. The coolest piece of technology I obtained this year was the Samsung Series 7 Slate. This device is incredible and while niche redefines what tablets are about and can do. It is expensive and at 11 ounces heavier than an iPad 2 with only about half the battery life which I understand does undercut much of what people want in a tablet. But being to pick it up, web browse via touch with the full power of desktop browser with plug-ins and all, copy true HD media over to the device without transcoding to my 32 GB microSD card and write on it like just as naturally and easily as pen and paper and be able to search that handwriting as if I had typed it from a keyboard, just wonderful stuff without having to deal with flashing ROMs, transcoding files or coming up with cleaver ways to install programs. And while the S7S could run XP, it would be so neutered as to be pointless.

XP is in its last throws and Windows 8 will send it to its last rites. While I'm sure XP will be around for years to come it will be nothing but a shell of its former self, receiving no new updates, no development focus and an ever declining market share. These are the facts and there's nothing that will change this.
 
What even more concerns me about it is why they still don't want to use win 7 even when it works well on pretty old computers from deep XP era. Seems any computer with at least 1GB ram and 1.5GHz will run Win 7 better than Win XP.
 
Acer_Sheep said:
What even more concerns me about it is why they still don't want to use win 7 even when it works well on pretty old computers from deep XP era. Seems any computer with at least 1GB ram and 1.5GHz will run Win 7 better than Win XP.
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I've never tried that. However my girlfriend's rig had an E6600 and 2GB of DDR2 RAM forever. I ran Windows 7 on it and it ran better than it did with Windows XP. That's for sure. It also ran better on my ancient laptop which only has 2GB of RAM.
 
Dan_D said:
I've never tried that. However my girlfriend's rig had an E6600 and 2GB of DDR2 RAM forever. I ran Windows 7 on it and it ran better than it did with Windows XP. That's for sure. It also ran better on my ancient laptop which only has 2GB of RAM.
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I tried that on Athlon XP Barton computer(Bartons were featured in 2003). And it runs Win 7 pretty well, no lagging or swapping. Instant boot.

I 3 days ago upgraded my current computer from Vista to 7 as well.And the performance increase is drastical, It was slow and lagging in everything that I really thought I have to replace it, no need yet. Seems it's time to give up on XP, Vista and everything pre W7(and I am also a person who is sensitive to such a changes, but without wanting doing something for improvement, there wont be any).
 
Acer_Sheep said:
I tried that on Athlon XP Barton computer(Bartons were featured in 2003). And it runs Win 7 pretty well, no lagging or swapping. Instant boot.

I 3 days ago upgraded my current computer from Vista to 7 as well.And the performance increase is drastical, It was slow and lagging in everything that I really thought I have to replace it, no need yet. Seems it's time to give up on XP, Vista and everything pre W7(and I am also a person who is sensitive to such a changes, but without wanting doing something for improvement, there wont be any).
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The key to Windows 7 performance isn't CPU speed, it's RAM. With 2GB of RAM 7 will run fine on most x86 CPUs or the last decade. Windows 8 will use no more resources than Windows 7, in fact 8's resource requirements will probably be practically a bit lower than 7's and then there's ARM devices, whose resource constraints push Windows 8 ARM requirements even lower thought that mainly applies to Metro.

As is often the case when it comes to tech pundits, their messages often continue long after the issues are resolved. While Windows will continue to grow in size and complexity at the high end, Windows 8 simply scales MUCH better than any prior Windows release. The days of software bloat forcing constant upgrades and ever more computing power are essentially over in the Windows world. Windows 8 at its release should be able to comfortably run on decade old hardware with DX 9 GPU support and 2 GB of RAM, requirements that are very low for x86 hardware these days.
 
heatlesssun said:
The key to Windows 7 performance isn't CPU speed, it's RAM. With 2GB of RAM 7 will run fine on most x86 CPUs or the last decade. Windows 8 will use no more resources than Windows 7, in fact 8's resource requirements will probably be practically a bit lower than 7's and then there's ARM devices, whose resource constraints push Windows 8 ARM requirements even lower thought that mainly applies to Metro.

As is often the case when it comes to tech pundits, their messages often continue long after the issues are resolved. While Windows will continue to grow in size and complexity at the high end, Windows 8 simply scales MUCH better than any prior Windows release. The days of software bloat forcing constant upgrades and ever more computing power are essentially over in the Windows world. Windows 8 at its release should be able to comfortably run on decade old hardware with DX 9 GPU support and 2 GB of RAM, requirements that are very low for x86 hardware these days.
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This is a very valid point - although the minimum requirements for 7 went up from XP, very few people are going to be using a system that could only meet the minimums. If your system ran XP comfortably, it will run 7 just as well or better. In addition, there are a great many things that require configuration and setup on XP that just plain work on 7.
 
McTurkey said:
This is a very valid point - although the minimum requirements for 7 went up from XP, very few people are going to be using a system that could only meet the minimums. If your system ran XP comfortably, it will run 7 just as well or better. In addition, there are a great many things that require configuration and setup on XP that just plain work on 7.
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I remember when XP came out, it could run on a 233MHz CPU and 64MB of RAM. Good times!
 
heatlesssun said:
Yeah, but the world has passed that by, hell even mobile OSes can run under those specs anymore.
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Many of them have more built-in features as well.
Pretty impressive how the technology has improved since XP was released in 2001.
 
Red Falcon said:
Many of them have more built-in features as well.
Pretty impressive how the technology has improved since XP was released in 2001.
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They have a lot more UI complexity but I wouldn't say a lot beyond that though mobile OS are pretty much all about UI.
 
Hi,

As several members on this thread have mentioned, Solid State Drives perform very well within a Windows 7 environment. There is a great MSDN blog post discussing the Support and Q&A for Solid-State Drives that may be useful as you consider your options. Microsoft also has a Microsoft PowerPoint deck detailing the Windows 7 Enhancements for Solid-State Drives that you may also find interesting and beneficial to your decision process.

Microsoft Windows XP is nearing the end of its life. Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 3 Support will be ending April 8th, 2014. More information on why support is ending, what end of support means to customers and how Microsoft will help customers can be found here. It is wisest to begin migrating systems and all used applications over to Microsoft Windows 7.

Jessica
Windows Outreach Team – IT Pro
 
I have never been an upgrade just because it's new kind of person. In fact I am currently typing this on my old work laptop running XP. Of course I am writing this from within the Chrome browser because it works better. The only reason I am on XP on this computer is because of an old application for a laser measuring device that will not run under XP. Ha, in fact it is so old that it runs under Win 98 in Virtual PC. The IT guy could prolly mak it work under 7, but is too busy with other projects to take the time.

Anyways, as of a couple of years ago, I was happily running XP MCE on all of my home PCs. Then MS released the Win 7 family pack, and I took a deep breath and took the plunge.

I was pleasently surprised at how well 7 ran on all of my systems. AT 40 bux a seat, I could actually justify the expense, and I also know I am getting the hundreds of current security patches that may not make it into XP now. Well, I may be exagerating, I think a clean copy of 7 only needs about 95 updates and a service pack to make it current.

It does not appear bloated, although it is bigger. Because of the image based install, it will actually install faster than XP. In fact, I installed it from a SSD to another SSD the other day and it installed in a bit over 10 minutes.

Like I always tell people who are hemming and hawing about whether they should try an SSD, "Just do it and don't look back. You will not be sorry."

Don
 
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