Do you like Win XP over Win 7?

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 6:08 pm

I bought 3 used Dell PCs cheap, and one of them has Win 7 on it and I'm on that right now, my first day on it. I kind of miss Win XP to tell you the truth.

Would it make sense if I kept the PC with XP Pro on it instead of this one? I don't know but I feel XP Pro was better for me. I feel like I'm wanting to shut this down and sell it and get back on a Win XP PCs. I've used XP for several years now and I don't really think I want to change to Win 7. Do any of you also feel that way?

CableDude · Post by **CableDude** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 6:59 pm

7 > All

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 7:26 pm

You mean all of you feel that way?

Mark · Post by **Mark** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 7:31 pm

i stayed with windows XP64 for years, until i got SSD drives and went to 7pro, i really love it, it is so very stable and a much more modern OS, really uses memory the way a OS should too.

i still boot up a VM of my old XP64 sometimes just to play around though, in fact i still have it installed on a SCSI disc that is just unplugged, in case i ever really want to go retro LOL

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 7:46 pm

Love Windows 7....esp on laptops, the standby/hibernation runs great.
With 8 gigs of RAM, Windows 7 flies like a raped ape. Sorta sluggish with 4 or less gigs....so with a low RAM rig I'd prefer XP if under 4 gigs of RAM.

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 8:25 pm

I miss XP and Win 7 takes some getting used to, but offhand I don't think Win 7 seems sluggish on this dual core Pentium D with 3 GB of RAM. I haven't tried XP Pro on the 3 GB RAM machine yet. I may like it and keep that one if it's much faster tan this one with Win 7.
The PC I was going to keep is Win XP with 2 BG of RAM, then I was offered 2 PCs with 3 GB of RAM each. I have 5 Dells now and I plan to sell 2 or 3 of them.

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 8:27 pm

How does hibernation work on Win XP? I've sen that it works on this Win 7 PC. I'm not very familiar with it. I'd like to use hibernate to keep the heat output low in hot weather.

CableDude · Post by **CableDude** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 8:31 pm

I only have a few XP machines in existence at this point and have pretty much abandoned them...lol.

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 8:55 pm

CableDude wrote:I only have a few XP machines in existence at this point and have pretty much abandoned them...lol.

Why did you do that, and what does "7 > All" mean?

CableDude · Post by **CableDude** » Thu Aug 30, 2012 9:00 pm

Lurch wrote:Why did you do that,

I don't have time to manage 100+ machines 8 hours a day by myself. My priorities are the many 7 machines and the few servers I have.

Lurch wrote:and what does "7 > All" mean?

Windows 7 is better than all the other Windows OS', imo

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Fri Aug 31, 2012 7:54 am

Lurch wrote:How does hibernation work on Win XP? I've sen that it works on this Win 7 PC. I'm not very familiar with it. I'd like to use hibernate to keep the heat output low in hot weather.

I forget the differences between hibernate and standby....but basically the way I use my laptop...it's open/closed/open/closed/open/closed dozens of times per day, when I'm home, toss it in the bag, throw in the truck or on the Harley...go to office, go to client, go to office, go to another client, go to yet another client, go home.

So basically my laptop is never "powered down/shut off". It's always just suspended in standby. Reboots like..once every month or two.
XP and prior OS's would have issues with that.....I'd often open the laptop lid..have it freeze..and have to hold down the power button to fully power cycle it. Win7 has been reliable with this (as is OpenSUSE which is my alternate boot OS)

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Fri Aug 31, 2012 8:10 am

Hi,

I do see what you mean about Win 7 being a little bit sluggish with 3 GB of RAM. It takes a minute or so to start up whereas XP starts faster with the same amount of RAM. Other than that tho, Win 7 seems to run quite good on this PC with 3 GB of RAM. Now I have to decide which I like the best and which PC to keep for my own.
I was starting to get used to Win 7 and was liking it but I'm on the XP Pro 3 GB RAM PC now. I don't notice it being much faster than the Win XP 2 GB of RAM PC. I changed Win 7 settings so it performs the fastest it can.

CableDude · Post by **CableDude** » Fri Aug 31, 2012 7:38 pm

I have had Win 7 run quite nicely on PC's (3GB of Ram) that once had Vista installed on them

RaisinCain · Post by **RaisinCain** » Fri Aug 31, 2012 8:01 pm

Windows 8 with a Start8 installation. Works very well.

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Sat Sep 01, 2012 4:46 am

Love windows 7, XP was great during its time, but 7 is tops now. I had a rig with 2 gigs of RAM running windows 7 and it wasnt sluggish as well, but now this PC has 8 gigs.

The Dude · Post by **The Dude** » Tue Sep 04, 2012 1:26 pm

I'm running Windows 7 on all my personal PC's, and can't imagine going back to XP. It's a little sluggish on my old Acer Aspire 5920 laptop that only has 3 gigs of RAM. I think its more that laptop than windows 7 though. My main desktop has an AMD Phenom II X4 980 with 8 gigs of RAM, and my spare rig has an AMD Athlon II X4 620 with 4 gigs of RAM. They are all running 64 bit but I'm thinking of switching to 32 bit on the laptop. My main desktop is dual booting with the Windows 8 RP. Nice fast boot times etc. I'll likely go back to Windows 7 when the trial period ends though.

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Wed Sep 05, 2012 8:02 pm

Hi,

The dude I bought these PCs from cleaned out some odds & ends had had hanging around and sold me this for $90 :

4 sticks of 2 GB RAM for Dell
2 good used DVD Burners
a good used Seagate 80 GB SATA HD [to run as slave in the Win 7 PC]

He offered it, and I said OK, so now I'm going to install 8 GB of RAM in my Win 7 Dell desktop PC and increase the XP Pro spare PC from 3 to 4 GB. So, I may have $200 or $300 in this used stuff but it's not like going out and buying a new $700 PC yet I have good performance.

I like to work on Dells. They seem really user friendly.

My first PC was an Acer Aspire desktop. I think the HD in it was only 2 MB. Can you imagine? It came with Win 95 OS and 32 MB of RAM, expandable to 128 MB maximum. WHen I upgraded it to Win 98 SE, it got sluggish and needed more RAM, so I increased it to 64 MB.

The Dude · Post by **The Dude** » Thu Sep 06, 2012 6:39 am

I think most people here will tell you adding RAM is just about you best bang for the buck. Compared to anything else its cheap and gets you a good increase in performance. Assuming of course that your not installing some ridiculously high amount. Just remember that if you have 4 gigs of more your going to want a 64 bit OS to use it all. A 32 bit Windows OS only has a 4 gig address space.

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Thu Sep 06, 2012 7:31 am

Lurch wrote: My first PC was an Acer Aspire desktop. I think the HD in it was only 2 MB. Can you imagine? It came with Win 95 OS and 32 MB of RAM, expandable to 128 MB maximum. WHen I upgraded it to Win 98 SE, it got sluggish and needed more RAM, so I increased it to 64 MB.

HD was probably 2.1 gigs..that was a common size in the Windows 95b days.

As you illustrated with your example...as operating systems progressed...so did memory requirements...or at least, the optimal amount for optimal performance.

Heck..I remember tweaking DOS to squeeze the most out of the 640KB in avail to it.

My first Windows 95 computer had 24 megs of RAM, I eventually added more...esp when Win98 came out.

Regarding your upgrading your XP laptop to 4 gigs..IMO that is a waste. XP 32 bit pretty much flattens out at 2.5 - 3 gigs. You can put 4 gigs in if it's financially smart to purchase a pair of 4 gig sticks. But if your currently at 3 gigs in there and you need to spend money to bring it to 4 gigs...IMO, a waste. XP won't use that extra 1 gig of RAM going from 3 to 4 gigs. Only way I see it performing better is if your current mix match of memory isn't synchronous as a pair, and putting in a pair of matching 2 gig sticks will do that.

My first XP machine ran on 96 megs of RAM.
Back when XP first came out we commonly sold it with 128 megs and 256 megs of RAM in computers. Eventually going to 512 megs of RAM as the standard. Pretty soon (around SP2) moved the standard to 1 gig of RAM..and then more recently...towards the SP3 days, I was doing 2 gigs of RAM for XP systems as our standard for workstation installs.

Windows 7..yeah it runs OK on 2 gigs..heck it does sorta OK on 1 gig. A bit better on 4 gigs...quite acceptable for most average users. Most people moving from Windows XP on 1 or 2 gig systems..to Windows 7 on a 4 gig system, will find it comparable.

But once you sit down at a Win7 64 install on an 8 gig system...WOW! Now you're saying "Jeeze Windows 7 is fast!!!"
Especially if you're someone that has a lot of programs open at once.
8 gigs....quite affordable, RAM is so cheap these days. And you won't get a huge gain in performance going past that..unless you run some very intensive apps like video editing or some heftier CAD programs.

Lurch · Post by **Lurch** » Thu Sep 06, 2012 11:48 am

I bought the four 2 gig sticks, so I had some RAM left over and I thought I'd add 1 GB to the XP Pro PC. I'll probably add two 512 MB sticks to my XP Pro 2 gig PC to give it 3 GB and maybe help it sell. I'll keep one Dell with Win 7 and 8 GB of RAM, and one with XP Pro and 3 or 4 gigs of RAM and part with the other 3 Dells.
Seller told me the PC only recognizes 3.50 GB of RAM but that I will supposedly get the performance of the 4 GB of RAM. I can't say that I notice anything major with it. I can't remember if these are 32 or 64 bit, that's kind of new to me.

The Dude · Post by **The Dude** » Thu Sep 06, 2012 11:59 am

In Windows 7 press the Windows key and the pause/break key to bring up the system screen. It will tell you there if its 64 bit, look for System type.