Windows XP Home

[Timber Loftis]

Oh, someone mentioned XP Pro. Unless you are networking computers, I would be hard-pressed to identify what you get with Pro that you don't get with Home.

[Arledrian]

I hear XP Pro has better built-in security as well, though I guess that's only an issue when you plan on networking (wirelessly) - your average Joe isn't overly concerned with data encryption.

And do you seriously get the 5+ hour battery life? Or is that a manufacturer's claim? I take my laptop on the road all the time and would do anything to throw out all these extra batteries I've had to buy for it.

[ 10-27-2003, 03:06 PM: Message edited by: Arledrian ]

[Rokenn]

Originally posted by Zero Alpha: Win XP Pro is much much better than home. even home is better than 98 though, but it does depend on your system specs. i wouldnt reccommend running XP on anything less than a 1GHz machine with 256mb of ram. even then you cannot expect a whole lot, so i suggest you turn off all the graphical options. you can do this in control panel > display properties> apprearance tab. its under advanced. also if you click on the themes tab in display properties, you can choose the windows classic theme (non tellie tubbie style). this may also speed it up.

The only difference between XP Home and Pro is that Pro can join a Domain (a corporate style network) and supports dual processors. Other then that they are the same product.

XP does like a lot of head room though. When I upgraded from 512mb to 1GB Ram I saw a huge boost.

[Timber Loftis]

Originally posted by Arledrian: I hear XP Pro has better built-in security as well, though I guess that's only an issue when you plan on networking (wirelessly) - your average Joe isn't overly concerned with data encryption. And do you seriously get the 5+ hour battery life? Or is that a manufacturer's claim? I take my laptop on the road all the time and would do anything to throw out all these extra batteries I've had to buy for it.

Yeah, I had it out for 3 hours when playing PnP yesterday (I had the SpellBook .pdf on it from TOGC) and it was at about 50% battery, so I plugged it in. But, at that point my battery is normally toast. Remember, the whole point of the P4-M is conserving battery life, and the Centrino is further conservation by combining the P4-M with a more efficient laptop-designed chipset.

I'm also battery-smart now. With my first laptop I left the battery in all the time and after 2 or 3 years it would only last an hour. With my VAIO I only put the battery in when I needed it (as they are hot-swappable) and now 2 years later it still has juice for almost 3 hrs.

[ 10-27-2003, 03:42 PM: Message edited by: Timber Loftis ]

[Sir Taliesin]

Wow TL, I'll have to remember about the leaving the battery out when I'm just running my laptop on AC. I really don't move it around a lot, so there is really no need in leaving it in. I like the fact that Centrino batterys last a twice as long as regular P4s. I have a P4 and my battery life is only about 2.5 hours.

I also have a SXGA screen and I think they are amazing! I have better res. on my laptop than I do on my big TV! It's also great for CADD work, if you can get away with one monitor.

As far as XP goes, I also run XP Home and I've yet to have a hiccup with it. I am concerned about all the programs that run on startup. I must startup at least 20 or 30 programs and I'm not at all familiar with what all they do. Is there a site you can go to that tells you what all these programs do and which ones you TRUELY need running? I love to cut out a lot of those.

[ 10-27-2003, 04:06 PM: Message edited by: Sir Taliesin ]

[Rokenn]

Originally posted by Sir Taliesin: As far as XP goes, I also run XP Home and I've yet to have a hiccup with it. I am concerned about all the programs that run on startup. I must startup at least 20 or 30 programs and I'm not at all familiar with what all they do. Is there a site you can go to that tells you what all these programs do and which ones you TRUELY need running? I love to cut out a lot of those. [/QB]

try this site:
http://www.blkviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm

[Aelia Jusa]

You can change the layout. We hate the big green and blue bubble-boxes too, so we've gone back to 98 layout, so we get the best of both worlds . Just right-click anywhere on the screen and go to properties and change it. Anyway we've never ever had a problem with XP - it's a fantastic OS. Certainly a lot better than the bug-ridden crap-pool that was Win 98. Most of the time when we'd shutdown 98 we'd get the BSOD. I've never ever got it with XP, nor freezes. We also used to run it with 128mb ram - I can't really tell the difference in speed to now when we have 256mb - fast and sleek and fantastic .

I don't really get people who say XP Home is crap, but XP Pro is great. Anyone knowledgeable I've spoken to says they're pretty much identical, except for the networking capabilities. And considering home was about $200 cheaper than pro you'd be out of your mind to buy pro when you don't need it.

[Bahamut]

i am proud to say that i haven't had any problem with ANY windows whatsoever.

I agree though with the comparison of XP home and pro.. the only other difference besides the networking capabilities is the loading screen... instead of green it's blue. [img]smile.gif[/img]

I love the bubble boxes... LOL BTW, i know a lot about old windows but win XP really stumps me... now what is this reg cleaner i have been hearing TL? [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Skunk]

The difference between the two XP versions is that WinXP Pro has the following additional features:

Backup and Automated Recovery
Dynamic Hard Disk Support
Default File System = NTFS
Encrypting File System Support
Faxing Capabilities
Internet Information Services (IIS 5)
Multiple Language Support
Multiple Monitor Support (DualView)
Duel Processor Support
Remote Desktop Connection
Remote OS Installation
Task Manager Network Monitor
Group Policies admin

[ 10-28-2003, 05:33 AM: Message edited by: Skunk ]

[Sir Taliesin]

Thanks Rokenn! I'll check it out tonight and figure out what I can turn off!