Is W2K to WinXP an upgrade or a hassle?

Happy with Windows 2000, but it's getting obsolete

[MatthewHSE]

I've been running Windows 2000 on a small network (about seven computers) for many years. It's served us well, but I've been noticing that more and more programs won't run properly on anything short of Windows XP. Also, although I've resisted it for a long time, it begins to seem as though XP is simply more secure than W2K. I do have one XP box (my laptop) and, although there are certain things that W2K does that I like better, I'm sure Windows XP will meet our needs.

So my question is, is it actually worth it to "upgrade" from Windows 2000 Pro to XP (Home or Pro)? The main things I'm interested in are performance (speed), reliability, security, and support. I'm skeptical, but willing to be convinced.

My first choice would be to upgrade to Linux, but that's not possible for now due to some software requirements...

[idolw]

i have win2k on my pc. my pc has the slowest CPU in the office.
the rest of PC have faster CPUs and Windows XP (Home and Pro).
my PC is the fastest one in the office.

[celgins]

I believe that the features with XP are a little more robust, but I think the Windows 2000 system is a bit more stable and definitely more fault tolerant. Especially the Windows 2000 Server platform.

I used a Windows 2000 system for years and hardly ever had problems with it.

The reason behind this, I believe, is the fact that Windows XP was built with the average home-based user in mind. It has more features (bells and whistles) than 2000, better networking wizards for average users, the ability to easily share files through the remote desktop connection utility, etc.

In a server environment where you're looking for stability, reliability, performance, and support, I would rely on the Windows 2000 Server system.

If I were at home and wanted 2G-RAM, high-speed internet gaming system, with personal security features, while trying to set it up my own LAN, I would go with XP.

[kaled]

Windows 2000 = NT5.0
Windows XP = NT5.1

Basically, XP looks prettier (though opinions differ on that) and runs slower. It needs vastly more memory to do the same things and in almost every functional way is inferior to Windows 2000.

To be blunt, XP is slowware/bloatware on steroids. It only works at all because hardware is fantastic these days.

I've just ordered a new laptop. I'll partition it and install 2000 beside XP. The only reason I'll be using XP at all is because I write software and I need to test in all environments.

On a technical note, I am surprised that no one has written a replacement DLL for 2000 to provide it with XP visual styles - it would be relatively straightforward (assuming the existing DLL is used to provide functionality).

Kaled.

[celgins]

You can always change your XP to "classic view" so your GUI looks like 2000! :)

Nah...I feel what you're saying, Kaled. I was thinking about that just the other day.

[J_RaD]

If your just using 7 computers in a peer to peer fashion without a server, upgrading each of the computers to XP might be a good idea (XP PRO that is FORGET HOME). As time moves on each latter OS gets less and less support. IF your using 1 computer for a central app's and file storage just leave it windows 2000 using windows 2000 server is an overkill waste for such a small network where all your going to do is share files and you don't any kind of domain security................

XP more secure then 2000? YES? NO?

well BOTH, since XP SP2 windows takes it upon itself to protect stupid users with the built in firewall XP also has (DEP) that helps bad code from running on your system....lots of tiny things that people don't know about but basicly the same shell.

SPEED?

ON A CLEAN INSTALL WINDOWS XP IS FASTER THEN 2000!
I will not make such claims on an upgrade.

If there isn't some driving need to upgrade just take your time and do one and see how you like it....just keep in mind you can't run an old OS forever :-P

[kaled]

ON A CLEAN INSTALL WINDOWS XP IS FASTER THEN 2000!

That certainly is not my experience and I've set up a number of systems that dual boot Win2000 and XP. XP is always massively slower. Some things are at least three times slower under XP. I have an application that loads so fast under 2000 that you could call it instantaneous. Under XP on the same machine it takes about two seconds. The application is one that I wrote and is only ~125KB - it doesn't read anything from the registry during initialization (but it does read a few lines from an .INI file).

Kaled.

[asquithea]

Here's my input.

I originally installed XP on a fairly slow machine. After a while, I went back to 2000, because as others have said, the Win2K shell uses fewer resources, is more stable and is noticably faster.

A few years down the line, I've gone back to XP. Given enough memory (you need roughly 64MB to 128MB more as a baseline), XP is a signficantly faster OS in three areas:

* It boots much more quickly, though shutdown is often slower.

* Prefetching means that disk I/O heavy applications like Firefox start much faster, especially on cold boot.

* Fast user switching means that long-running tasks that are active under my limited-user login can continue to run while I perform some other tasks in the Administrator account.

Collectively, these three points are a massive improvement (for me) over Win2K in general use.

Other features like UPnP, better Wireless support and Firewire debugging might not be of any interest to some people, but they're pretty signficant to me. Support for Hardware DEP on newer processors is also a big plus.

You wanted security and support? You aren't going to get that with Win 2K. Reliability? Which OS do you suppose manufacturers are really testing their drivers on?

If 2K on your existing hardware is doing the job, I don't think there's a compelling reason to switch. But for new hardware, I see no reason at all not to upgrade. Feel free to run a mixed environment.