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Win 98 vs. Win XP

Win 98 or XP

  • I like the older, safer, better 98

    Votes: 6 4.6%

  • Get with the future man!! XP for me!

    Votes: 109 83.2%

  • dont give a shit.

    Votes: 16 12.2%
  • Total voters
    131
This reminds me of those other polls... You know, "the american revolution flintlock vs the AK-47" and "crude mud huts vs. skyscrapers". Oh, and "civil war surgery vs modern day surgeons." This mentality makes me think that maybe DOS is more stable and safe then Win98? Or better yet, not having a computer is safer then using DOS? Its asking a question that has no bearing or point of reference to today. Therefore, whats the point of gathering the information? 98 has been left behind, and its "goals", "reasons for continued existance", "hardware support", etc, are totally different then XPs. No comparison.
 
:rolleyes: i've yet to crash my tandy trs-80 series iii color computer... 4mhz processor, laughable ram, no onboard prog storage *at all*... and you have to program it in qbasic. those were the good old days, weren't they...

:p but it never crashed. good for a 1988 comp.
 
starhawk said:
(1) the shell is very different. look at the title bar at the top of your screen. that is part of the shell. i do not recall the x button being red in any previous version of windows.
Click to expand...
OMG hahahah they changed the color its totally different!!!!
MUAHAHAHHAHAHAAA

(2) qbasic will always be useful as long as text adventure games exist and people still get excited about 80s early pcs. that's what you used back then. i am very proud of my tandy trs-80 series iii color computer... it may not outperform a modern computer (by far) but i would not trade it for anything. except perhaps my life.
Click to expand...

I can't even respond to that.
I think we are being trolled.
 
:confused: what does trolled mean? i am only a n00b to forums, not comps...

and i should think that there are many more changes to winxp than just bar colors, lol. that was just an example...

god but some folks here are nuts... me included :p but not *that* much... geez.
 
i wonder if this guy is in a timewarp or something, he is in 1985 playin with his TRS-80 and listening to Bengals "walk like the eygptian" while his posts are magically appearing in 2004 on the [H]

ROFL

or, we are being trolled
 
Naw its not trolling, just misinformation and a friendly debate. The truth is that the cores are mostly the same (NT5.0 for Win2k and NT5.1 for WinXP), but as you move up towards the "user level" you begin to see the differences. Tightened security, extra features, hot-hot-hot sexy themes, etc. Hence my rant in an older thread about why there's no reason to ever use Win2k over XP (except in wanting to maintain an original all Win2k environment). At the core they are so similar enough to say Win2k does nothing better then XP, and at the higher level XP gives you many easier ways to do things, newer hardware support built-in, higher security standars now with SP2, etc. So the statement really isn't so much focused on "XP is better then 2K", its more like "If you are still using 2K and don't have money to move to XP yet, you aren't screwed or anything." Remember, sometimes theres more then one right answer and sometimes you are really just splitting hairs. Just because something is better overall doesnt mean that the "loser" sucks. Does 98 suck? Not really. Is there any legit and sound reason to use it over WinXP (unless you require it for apps)? Negatory good buddy.
 
:rolleyes: actually my comp is a toshiba sattelite 1415-s173... only 2 years old. 1.8ghz celeron proc, 512mb ddr sdram (had it upgraded from 256mb), 30gb hard drive.

:p and i am listening to sci fi music right now but i am about to change it to linkin park.

only thing this needs is a proc upgrade and i'd be happy... :confused: can you do that w/ a laptop?

:rolleyes: and the trs-80 i have didn't come out till 1988...
 
Stability is one of the biggest difference between the two. As someone who has supported both platforms as a tech, I will note that XP boxes are waaay more stable. Even when a system gets corrupted from who-knows-what, I have had to do a LOT less complete system rebuilds as a result than when working with 98. In fact, my rule of thumb was to wipe and rebuild a 98 box at least once a year on systems that were getting a lot of usage -if they were going to stay stable.

From a performance standpoint...Yes, 98 would run on weaker hardware, but it can't address RAM that well (or manage it, considering it's still just a DOS foundation with a pretty face). While XP can not only address massive amounts of RAM, it actually runs faster with it. Early benchmarks showed this to be the case -and surprised a lot of us that weren't expecting it.

Also, the GUI for XP is more customizable as it us XML-based. This means that a lot more features can be modified than just adding custom "themes" to your GUI. The entire look and feel can be controlled. Also the GUI can be customized to be full of "eye candy" or paired down for the best performance possible from your system. Can't do that with 98.

By having user accounts activated by default -and forcing the user to name their account -other than Administrator- you also can start limiting the access to core systems within the OS. Properly setup, even if a worm or virus get in, due to the limited access of the account, the damage is greatly restricted.

In this past year, I think I have replaced at least a dozen 98 boxes that were totally screwed up due to being connected to broadband internet lines without any protection. Their security was compromised probably within the first few hours online and a total meltdown followed. In many cases, I was able to wipe the drives and just install XP in it's place and run fine -of course I'm usually trimming a lot of the bloat out of XP upon system setup. You'd probably be surprised at just how fast you can get XP to run when a lot of the unnecessary frils are disabled. Server 2003 is a good example of this. It is still just built on the foundation of an XP setup but there is absolutely no unnecessary features installed. That platform flys like an eagle -even on fairly old hardware.
 
i agree very strongly w/ jmroberts70. my friend, you certainly know what you are talking about.

many others here do not always have this knowledge. thank you for having the patience to explain it to them. :)
 
jmroberts70 said:
Stability is one of the biggest difference between the two. As someone who has supported both platforms as a tech, I will note that XP boxes are waaay more stable. Even when a system gets corrupted from who-knows-what, I have had to do a LOT less complete system rebuilds as a result than when working with 98. In fact, my rule of thumb was to wipe and rebuild a 98 box at least once a year on systems that were getting a lot of usage -if they were going to stay stable.

From a performance standpoint...Yes, 98 would run on weaker hardware, but it can't address RAM that well (or manage it, considering it's still just a DOS foundation with a pretty face). While XP can not only address massive amounts of RAM, it actually runs faster with it. Early benchmarks showed this to be the case -and surprised a lot of us that weren't expecting it.

Also, the GUI for XP is more customizable as it us XML-based. This means that a lot more features can be modified than just adding custom "themes" to your GUI. The entire look and feel can be controlled. Also the GUI can be customized to be full of "eye candy" or paired down for the best performance possible from your system. Can't do that with 98.

By having user accounts activated by default -and forcing the user to name their account -other than Administrator- you also can start limiting the access to core systems within the OS. Properly setup, even if a worm or virus get in, due to the limited access of the account, the damage is greatly restricted.

In this past year, I think I have replaced at least a dozen 98 boxes that were totally screwed up due to being connected to broadband internet lines without any protection. Their security was compromised probably within the first few hours online and a total meltdown followed. In many cases, I was able to wipe the drives and just install XP in it's place and run fine -of course I'm usually trimming a lot of the bloat out of XP upon system setup. You'd probably be surprised at just how fast you can get XP to run when a lot of the unnecessary frils are disabled. Server 2003 is a good example of this. It is still just built on the foundation of an XP setup but there is absolutely no unnecessary features installed. That platform flys like an eagle -even on fairly old hardware.
Click to expand...

That is of course until you use Win2k3 Server as it was intended to be used. DNS server, Active Directory, FTP, IIS, whatever. Both can be burdened down by services, and both can be "tweaked". I see the concept you are talking about, but come on... its a server OS. Do you really think its faster then XP when XP is in classic mode, extra junk is turned off, etc? Any links comparing them?

Edit: Nevermind, I see with a second read that I misread you. You weren't another "win2k3 is faster then XP" moron. I'll leave my answer up anyway though in case they come around...:p
 
Alright guys, i finally got the link for the thing my friend and i were having...it started with just the 2 of us and then i went out to one of his friends named Chozo4......i'm solland27 on that quote...but its a really long dialogue and to save time from formatting my stuff(i'm lazy, i know it ) i just caped everything in the first one. now i know i came off as a "elite highhorse" but that was just because i tend to get very, erm....excited about my positions. chozo spent time editing his stuff, i didnt, forgive my negligence...but he had good points, and i think i did too....

http://s4.invisionfree.com/ZealForum/index.php?showtopic=74

please read the whole thing (tis i lot tho) and i want to hear ur responses.

P.S. this is the thing that started it all off http://zealnet.myvnc.com/shared/xpsucks.html
 
WillowHawk said:
Alright guys, i finally got the link for the thing my friend and i were having...it started with just the 2 of us and then i went out to one of his friends named Chozo4......i'm solland27 on that quote...but its a really long dialogue and to save time from formatting my stuff(i'm lazy, i know it ) i just caped everything in the first one. now i know i came off as a "elite highhorse" but that was just because i tend to get very, erm....excited about my positions. chozo spent time editing his stuff, i didnt, forgive my negligence...but he had good points, and i think i did too....
Click to expand...


Wow, I read that entire thread; and all I can say is that they seem to be getting way too upset over something that really comes down to personal opinion. In my personal experiance, I provide staff/faculty support on a university network. In that environment, there is no comparison between 98 and XP. After XP is joined to a domain it is infinitely more secure than 98. The thing that comes to mind is group policies. All the users are power users. This simple fact cuts down problems with spyware(about 25% of all calls it seems) by a huge margin. Only about 20% of machines are still using 98, but they account for over 95% of virus/spyware calls.


On the gaming front; for any modern game how can 98 be better? As all of us know, 98 has problems addressing large amount of ram (over 256mb, if my memory is correct) I don't want to even think about running doom3 with that little ram. The vast majority of the games I owned worked when I upgraded to XP; as I think any properly coded program should. Any old dos games I need to run I just use DOSbox (which I recommend) If the program still doesn't run, then I drag out a old machine that has 98 still installed and play them there.


OK, I am going to stop there, 'cause now I am starting to get mad myself and I don't want to start sounding like some of the people on that other forum.
 
simple answer: 95/98 can run games that xp cannot.

i can play a game called space bucks on a 95 comp
it will not even open in 98 or anything later

i can play a game called lightbringer on 98
after a certain point it is unplayable in xp, you click on this one particular thing and it closes for no reason w/ no explanation or anything

i can play a game called beyond time on 98
after you click on the first thing when you run it in xp the cursor dissapears and the game stops responding to user input. you can still get to menus and stuff but it does nothing in the actual game.
 
starhawk said:
simple answer: 95/98 can run games that xp cannot.

i can play a game called space bucks on a 95 comp
it will not even open in 98 or anything later

i can play a game called lightbringer on 98
after a certain point it is unplayable in xp, you click on this one particular thing and it closes for no reason w/ no explanation or anything

i can play a game called beyond time on 98
after you click on the first thing when you run it in xp the cursor dissapears and the game stops responding to user input. you can still get to menus and stuff but it does nothing in the actual game.
Click to expand...

Yeah but the same argument could be had for all other operating systems. Doom3 doesnt run on 9x (im talking legitly here, not hacks), many DOS games dont run in 98 (dont fool yourself, many of them are actually running in DOS, not 98), MacOSX games dont run in Windows, those damn accelerated penguin games dont run on Macs or Windows, NES games dont run on PS2, yadda, yadda, yadda. They all cancel each other out. :)
 
Don't go knocking the Tandy TRS-80. A lot of people still use them today, including students and even reporters. Why? Because they are incredibly rugged, small, easy to use and the perfect note taker.
 
The main benefit to Windows 98 is compatibility. But that's for an older box, my main comp runs XP, which is much more stable. 98 would crash much more often, and with XP many problems are recoverable without rebooting....However, 98 does have an edge on XP in the security department solely because a lot of features that XP has that can be exploited simply do not exist on Windows 98. I'm still sticking with XP, of course!
 
starhawk said:
call me a noob, call me nutty as a squirrel's winter stash, but i actually prefer win 95/98. why? i like some of those old legacy games. try this list:

tyrian (dos 7.0) (c) epic megagames
lightbringer/cydonia (released under both titles) (win95/98) (c) dreamcatcher interactive
space bucks (win95 only, won't work in win98 for some reason :confused: ) (c) sierra
museum madness (dos somethingorother) (c) mecc
beyond time (win95/98) (c) dreamcatcher interactive

i like all of those games but my emachines winxp computer won't run them right. space bucks won't even open in anything other than win95, beyond time the cursor won't appear, lightbringer/cydonia quits for no reason at one point. :(
Click to expand...

I agree with that because I have a few games that won't run on NT based oses, My rule of thumb is run the correct MS os for it's age/ speed.


It's can't get much worse than my school, there's running PII 350mhz 128mb IBM 300GL's on win95C and Northwood 2.6C 512mb ddr netvistas on win98se :rolleyes:
 
Synful Serenity said:
However, 98 does have an edge on XP in the security department solely because a lot of features that XP has that can be exploited simply do not exist on Windows 98.
Click to expand...
utter nonsense. there are zero restrictions on execution in 9x. "exploitable features" aren't needed because the whole mess is wide open.
 
odoe said:
Don't go knocking the Tandy TRS-80. A lot of people still use them today, including students and even reporters. Why? Because they are incredibly rugged, small, easy to use and the perfect note taker.
Click to expand...

? TRS-80? Small?

I when I was in high school many moons ago back in the late 80's we had TRS-80's. Those things were *monsters* hardly small...are we talking about the same thing?

http://images.google.com/images?q=trs-80&hl=en

And, they were absolute garbage, which is why we called them TRaSh-80's...always crashing, doing weird crap. When we got them replaced with IBM's, we (and the teachers) were much happier.
 
mine is a trs-80 series iii color computer
came out in 1988.

looking for pics...
 
Why not just put on a multiple boot system like on mine I have winxp pro, linux, win98, win95, and dos 7 for cool old programs.
 
How to dual-boot:

1) Install Windows98
2) Install Windows2K/XP. It asks you if you want to upgrade your current install or create a new one.

My personal rig has Windows98SE and Windows2K. This is because some stuff can be fixed on the very rare occasion that W2K dies, by going into Win98SE and fiddling with some stuff (copying original copies of files back and so on). Actually using 98 to DO anything? The last non-fix thing I used to do in 98 was rip CDs. That stopped once I got a new ASPI layer. I stay away from NTFS simply because of it's fixability is lower than FAT32. I haven't actually reformatted my machine for 3 years. Even when I upgraded my hard disks (a pair of RAIDed 20G Maxtors to a pair of 80G Maxtors) all I did was Ghost them from one pair to the next. The annual wipe that I used to do is a thing of the past.

The only downside to XP is it's such a prevalent OS that it's the hacker's choice of target. Example: I built an XP machine (this was a while ago), and started getting the first Service Pack (really should have downloaded the network version on a protected machine, but it was a rush-job). Even before it had finished getting it, Blaster got the machine and started rebooting it. Took about 3 reboots to get the protection it needed.

The security on an XP machine simply embarasses a 98 one. You're presented with the password input screen on 98. How do you get past it? Guessing the password won't help..........but pressing "Escape" will!!!!!!! Wtf is that all about? :D
 
Well, i was hoping that more of u would read the forum link that i put on here before, but dosnt really matter that much. i'm was just trying to see how many of u guys were with me. so far i got 98 votes on the poll, and 84 votes (methinks) for XP, granted it is the main OS, and i wanted to know if pple went for it just because it was the newest thing to come out or if they honestly liked it better than the previous versions.
Well, heres the link again for any new comers, but i personally think that the topic shouldnt even come up anymore as XP clearly is the winner...

http://s4.invisionfree.com/ZealForu...hp?showtopic=74

Any counter arguments are welcome
 
ColinR said:
The security on an XP machine simply embarasses a 98 one. You're presented with the password input screen on 98. How do you get past it? Guessing the password won't help..........but pressing "Escape" will!!!!!!! Wtf is that all about? :D
Click to expand...

It was designed as a customized desktop/network authentication login, not a secure workstation login.
 
xp is good for some things... but 98 is a clear winner in my book, at least on technical points.

(1) xp is not always stable but 95/98 is very much so.

(2) xp service pack 2 makes it impossible for your comp to tell whether your norton is working. 95/98 *never* had that problem.

(3) xp takes up about a gigabyte of space. 95/98 is much smaller. no reason to gunk up a drive if you dont have to.

(4) most older dos/windows games will not run properly on xp. most will on 95/98. i can provide a list of the ones i dealt with and whether or not they work in xp or 95/98.

(5) 95/98 can boot from both floppy and cd-rom but this was made cd-rom only for xp. in these days where floppy drives are becoming less and less common it may not seem like an advantage, but in older comps and budget models a floppy bootup can be a good thing. this is also true of most if not all 1u servers.

(6) 95/98 is about 10 years old now, which means that, having lasted so long, it must be very good. its kernel actually dates back to the original form of dos... missing how? ms collaborated w/ apple to make the 1st mac os... to test the mac gui they basically refitted dos and dumped the gui code on it. they were unable -legally- to make their own os because of this, so they simply changed a few shapes and colors and marketed it as windows 1.0... this became windows 3.1 after a few years. but the kernel stayed the same. so, when they released win95 they tacked on 32 bit capability to the dos kernel and used the NT gui... so its the same!

(7) xp cannot deal properly with *any* 16bit code. i cannot tell you how many legacy programs will hang like a fish from a pole when ran under xp because of this. it drives me up the wall cuz i still like that old stuff.
 
starhawk said:
(1) xp is not always stable but 95/98 is very much so.
Click to expand...

[chuckles to self] 95/98? ... stable?

starhawk said:
(2) xp service pack 2 makes it impossible for your comp to tell whether your norton is working. 95/98 *never* had that problem.
Click to expand...

That's because 95/98 didn't care if you were running an antivirus program at all.

starhawk said:
(3) xp takes up about a gigabyte of space. 95/98 is much smaller. no reason to gunk up a drive if you dont have to.
Click to expand...

Well I just guess I have to. I have to to run all my modern apps and games. I have to so I can get all the features XP brings me that 98 doesn't. Can I complain about the massive installation footprint? Sure. But with storage costing as low as $0.50/gig, who cares?

starhawk said:
(4) most older dos/windows games will not run properly on xp. most will on 95/98. i can provide a list of the ones i dealt with and whether or not they work in xp or 95/98.
Click to expand...

That's because 95/98 IS DOS! 2K/XP is not -it only emulates DOS. If you need to run pure DOS software (meaning: games), then you're one of the lucky few that will never need to upgrade your hardware. ever.

Expecting legacy DOS-based software to run on the lastest OS is asking a but too much.

starhawk said:
(5) 95/98 can boot from both floppy and cd-rom but this was made cd-rom only for xp. in these days where floppy drives are becoming less and less common it may not seem like an advantage, but in older comps and budget models a floppy bootup can be a good thing. this is also true of most if not all 1u servers.
Click to expand...

What are you talking about? I've loaded XP from floppy before. Didn't like it but it worked just as easily as you can load Win2K from floppy. 1U servers? What, they will have a floppy drive and not a CD-ROM? I don't think so.

starhawk said:
(6) 95/98 is about 10 years old now, which means that, having lasted so long, it must be very good. its kernel actually dates back to the original form of dos... missing how? ms collaborated w/ apple to make the 1st mac os... to test the mac gui they basically refitted dos and dumped the gui code on it. they were unable -legally- to make their own os because of this, so they simply changed a few shapes and colors and marketed it as windows 1.0... this became windows 3.1 after a few years. but the kernel stayed the same. so, when they released win95 they tacked on 32 bit capability to the dos kernel and used the NT gui... so its the same!
Click to expand...

Being old and lasting so long doesn't necessarily mean that it must be very good. It simply means that it is old and long-lasting. Also, your historical facts are a bit off. Saying that the kernel is the same from 98 on down to 1.0 is a bit of a stretch. The fact of the matter is that DOS was a compromise from the very beginning. It wasn't what they wanted to use as their foundational platform but it happened to be what they could legally use. So while DOS was being developed and improved through the years, Microsoft decided to start working at the same time on a "New Technology" that would eventually replace their DOS-based OS, hence, the term "NT". At about the point of 98, there was a divided userbase Microsoft was marketing for: The home user running 98 and the commercial user running NT. NT4 and 98 looked pretty much the same from a GUI standpoint but their underlying architecture was totally different. 98 had multi-monitor, PnP, and USB support but NT4 had support for software RAID, SMP, larger RAM addressing, Hardware Abstraction Layer, ect. It became obvious that there needed to be a merger of the two platforms. The ease of use and ammenities of 98, with the stability and power capabilites of NT. Win2K was the result. It was hoped that 2000 would mean the end of DOS-based OS'es for MS but they were wrong as most manufacturers were slow to adopt it and the bastard-child ME was born to fill the gap. In the time after 2000, many complained about the slow boot times of 2000 and XP greatly improved that issue (along with many other improvements)... [ok now i'm starting to ramble]

starhawk said:
(7) xp cannot deal properly with *any* 16bit code. i cannot tell you how many legacy programs will hang like a fish from a pole when ran under xp because of this. it drives me up the wall cuz i still like that old stuff.
Click to expand...

I know of quite a few 16-bit software platforms that still run like a champ in XP -and without any tweaking. If you're having problems, then stay on 98 but don't try and say that 98 is better than XP because it won't support your legacy apps.
 
Starhawk, ever hear the phrase "You can't argue with a madman?" That last post was so far offbase that there's really no way to refute it. Logic does not exist on that level. The only thing that has kept 98 useable for so long is business/money, not "how excellently it is programmed." No offense bro. :) Have a read Starhawk: http://www.winsupersite.com/reviews/winserver2k3_gold1.asp
 
Given your own rule, OldPueblo, I will not argue with you.

However, I will address some points that were laid down by jmroberts70:
(1) It's harder to crash 95/98 than it is XP, as legacy programs do not crash 95/98.
(2) Why should XP care about antivirus, either?
(3) I will still need to upgrade my hardware eventually... unless you *really* think my TRS-80 can run games like Tyrian (MS-DOS 7.0) or Lightbringer (Windows 95/98/Me)
(4) XP really loads from a floppy? I thought it took like 6 floppies to make XP boot from your A: drive.
(5) I type corrected on the issue of the kernel being the same since DOS. But 2k and XP actually use kernel32.dll, which I think is from NT 4.0. 95/98 used kernel386.dll.
(6) Yes, you can run *some* 16-bit apps in XP... because there is DOS installed on there! Look in the System32 folder if you do not believe me. However, I am told that I am *very* lucky to make my QBASIC editor work... most 16bit apps will not.

By the way... one good thing about 95/98: have you ever had the portalsearching spyware? Guess what? 95/98 do not have svchost.exe, therefore they are immune to it. Having had that particular bug on my system, I can tell you that I am very glad that some OS's are immune... and I had thought seriously of reverting to 95/98 because of this.
 
Boot an OS from a floppy, worried about security and viruses, here you go! http://www.toastytech.com/guis/qnxdemo.html

FYI, I did phone-line tech support for MS for Win95/98. I was on their escalation team. I know exactly what it takes to crash 95/98 and exactly how stable they are. Two words for ya... NT executive. Check your gas lines my friend... :p Sorry to sound like a smartass, but do the research and realize that personal opnions have a hard time trumping industry recognized and documented facts.
 
Well I guess the apps must be getting better if many of you are saying that somehow 95/98 is more stable than XP. It seems that my experience with supporting users under both palatforms have been quite the opposite. In fact, the BSOD has nearly become something of "legend" considering how rarely I see it now. In my own personal network, I haven't experienced a single OS crash in the past 4 years -and I normally pound the snot out of my systems. From a tech support standpoint, I have had FAR less stability issues with 2K/XP than 95/98. There's no comparison. My current userbase is around 200 clients in a variety of conditions ranging from grandma in her mobile home to high-end AutoCAD users in architectural firms in LA. Maybe I'm just the exception to the rule but I doubt it.
 
OldPueblo said:
It was designed as a customized desktop/network authentication login, not a secure workstation login.
Click to expand...

That can be corrected with a small registry tweak which will remove the cancel button and Escape functionality on the Login screen. This tweak would cause the PC to require a successful validation from the Domain Name Server before it can log-in.

http://www.winguides.com/registry/display.php/130/
 
It empirically proven that Win98 is less secure, and less stable than WinXP. XP is also faster in some cases, and should never be significantly slower unless you are low on RAM.

There is no question. Go with XP.

Besides, how can Win98 be safer, when there are relatively few patches coming out for it anymore? Is it even on MS' supported list anymore???
 
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