Re: Designing a useful and safe Linux + Windows box

From: Michael Vondung (mvondung_at_gmx.net)
Date: 08/21/03 

Date: Thu, 21 Aug 2003 09:14:07 +0200

On Wed, 20 Aug 2003 14:09:22 +0000 (UTC), nobody@nowhere.com wrote:

>Why in the world would anyone recommend a consumer-grade OS
>like 98 unless you really want to set this person up for failure?
>He specs a 500MHz processor with 196MB RAM - which is completely
>adequate for XP Pro - and then you have modern stable OS instead
>of an ancient hack like 98.

Because he -also- wants to run resource-hungry applications like MS
Word, and possibly other Office products, all of which will run
extremely sluggish after XP has taken its share of the available
memory. Plus, Florian doesn't *have* XP yet, and he doesn't want to
shell out $100+. He can get Win98 for very little money, or even free
from friends who have upgraded to XP. He can't go with Win95 because
he stated he'd like USB support.

I had XP on a P3-700 with 256MB of RAM, and its performance wasn't
very impressive. It runs smoothly and stable on a P4-2.5Ghz and 512MB
of RAM, but that's not exactly surprising. :) KDE3 under FreeBSD
(native port) runs as fast on the old machine as XP on the newer
workstation. Win98 also ran fine on the old machine. Provided he
downloads some security patches and installs a software firewall, he
should be fine. I never had much trouble with 98SE. That's better than
shelling out more money for something he won't be using very often.
(And I don't advocate pirate copies of software.)

-M.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: I want to migrate to Linux
    ... RAM you will want to be looking at a lighter weight distro, ... but it's probably better than Win98. ... I don't usually have more than about six apps open simultaneously. ... can easily up both machines to 1GB each if this will improve Linux ...
    (comp.os.linux.hardware)
  • Re: I cant open my database
    ... >firewall, Norton Internet Security, ... Might be time to start saving your money for one of those new intel based ... > Security in Win98 is very, ... > Tom's advice to run AdAware in safe mode is good. ...
    (comp.databases.paradox)
  • Re: Speeding up XP
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    (microsoft.public.windowsxp.general)
  • Re: Available RAM - Lying sack of SHIT
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    (microsoft.public.windows.vista.general)
  • Re: Available RAM - Lying sack of SHIT
    ... 4GB RAM installed but I am told Vista can only manage 3GB RAM. ... If you use Linux then your programs won't ... Your WINDOWS programs, slick. ... Last week you said that you knew how I spent my money. ...
    (microsoft.public.windows.vista.general)