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On October 25th, Microsoft unleashed it latest incantation of the Windows operating system which was followed
by various incantations of another kind… Almost a month to the day later, on November 24th, WindowsXP became the
dominant operating system on my primary home system followed by my Desktop system at work. It is, in my opinion,
Microsoft’s “best” operating system to-date. Things I really like are its speed, its speed and its speed. After
6 years of waiting on Windows9x, I am in awe as it boots up fast, it connects fast to the Internet, and applications
are fast.
I have found WindowsXP to be a solid operating system, it installed cleanly as an update on both systems, no hardware
challenges, which is something I couldn’t say about WindowsMe at home or Windows2000 on the desktop at work. WindowsXP
seems to run on autopilot with events like making hardware changes and additions totally transparent; where I am
used to reaching for the Windows9x CD everytime I change something and even sometimes when I make a change in a
system setting, I have not had to reach for the WindowsXP CD once since installing, which has included changing
out the video board for a completely different type in one system. Latest example: I went to use my HP Digital
Camera for the first time the other day, plugged in it and everything worked, totally transparent. For the record,
this upgrade to WindowsXP on my home system is the 4th upgrade to the Windows directory with the date on that directory
from the first upgrade to Windows 95 (the original) being 12/16/1995 and that was an upgrade from Windows 3.1 running
on DOS; In December of 1995, I was running a legacy 486/33 with a little over a gig of hard drive space and now,
four system boards later and numerous other hardware changes, I am running on a Athlon 800 with 40 gigs and through
it all, I have never formatted my hard drive or had to do a clean install. This is a real testament to Windows,
both 9x and now XP.
I am not saying that WindowsXP is a perfect operating system and I am keeping my dual boot with Windows98 SE for
some time to come, primarily so that I can use a couple software packages that are not particularly well behaved
in WindowsXP. As I have written in my other article this month on “Buying a New PC?” there are software issues
with some software programs in WindowsXP, Roxio 5 Platinum, being one of them. Other programs which have problems
with WindowsXP and usually require an update or upgrade are Symantec’s Norton AV 2001, Ghost 2001, System Works
2001, WinFax Pro 10, McAfee Virus 5.21 or earlier, AOL 6.0 and earlier, PowerQwest Partition Magic 7 (even if you
have 7, you will have to reinstall it), Quicktime 5, Java, and I am sure there are other programs that are yet
to be identified. WindowsXP does have an application compatibility setting in program properties that is pretty
neat for running other software that might not like WindowsXP; the compatibility settings allow you to specify
Windows95, Windows98, Windows NT or Windows 2000 as the desired “operating environment” for that program specifically
(Sorry, no DOS or Windows 3.1) as well has have the display settings change automatically to 256 colors and/or
640X480 resolution if required by the application, all on the fly, no reboots/restarts required.
WindowsXP was not a “bug” free release, but then there never has been a bug free release of any operating system.
But WindowsXP has something really wonderful in Windows Update and it works! From the first day I used WindowsXP,
Windows Update has kept my system current and secure, automatically applying updates as needed which included the
“master update” of October 25th which provided a bug fix for all resolved issues that had been identified since
WindowsXP was released to manufacturing, over a month earlier. WindowsXP update has also applied the “critical
updates” to fix the famous IE 6 vulnerabilities as well the USB vulnerability. Updates come in 3 flavors: critical
updates, system updates and driver updates; my system has required all three updates and with the exception of
a network card driver update (inconsequential), all updates have been applied flawlessly.
And now the incantations… When you install WindowsXP, you can have it identify potential hardware and software
issues prior to installing. The report on my home system was 5 pages long and it missed some! However, some of
the items it identified were non-issues and were not a problem. My post installation list of WindowsXP Annoyances
stands at 19 currently but none of them were of sufficient difficulty (other than the 1st one) to cause me to roll
back to Windows98 or “format C” and start over.
The first “annoyance” can be a major problem if you don’t have a backup or a dual boot as I had to recover from.
Installing WindowsXP changes a lot of things, primarily because WindowsXP is a true multi-user operating system
that requires a “user data” be segregated by user so that one user’s settings and data cannot be seen or changed
by another user, other than the master “administrator” user. Incidentally, you are the “Administrator” when you
setup the system and all users are set to default as “Administrator” level users when created. An Administrator
level user “owns” the computer for all purposes which includes directory rights to all directories but I digress.
As a result of this “change” in directory directory, you loose any “Application Data” previously stored in Windows
9x which includes passwords, dialup authentication, IE6 and Netscape 6 user profiles, content and cookies. The
WindowsXP install also identified and deleted some files that it considered “hazardous to WindowsXP” that weren’t
even in the Windows or Program Files directories; ouch! Fortunately, I had most of what “got lost” during installation
on the Windows98 partition and was able to recover just about everything.
Other “Annoyances”: Most of them were software related and have already been addressed. Looking back at the list,
they seem very minor at this point in time, just over a month later but at the time, they were enough of a problem
that I wrote them down. One web site that details many XP gotches is http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,68796,00.asp
and includes many of the issues that I have identified here. At the same address can be found a flaming article
on “WindowsXP, New from the Bug Factory” which is not so much about WindowsXP but an errant HP Printer driver.
Oh yes, you want to have plenty of diskspace to do an upgrade. On my system, there was almost 1/2 a gig of hard
drive space used just for backing up the original OS (WindowsMe). Plan on 3/4 of a gig for installation space.
In conclusion, as I stated at the outset, I am a very satisfied user of WindowsXP. It is a significant upgrade
moving from the quasi-32 bit world of Windows9x to Windows NT, labeled WindowsXP. I have found it to be a very
stable system but I am also sure that it will continue to improve and get even better, er, less bugs. It is not
without it challenges and annoyances. There was one line in the PCWorld article that I really smiled at “Can you
say WindowsXP Second Edition?” (Coming in 2003?).
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