Os Woes
<div class="IPBDescription">Damn MS (and Eidos)</div> So, Thief III only works on XP. (Thanks, Eidos.) So it looks like we'll have to upgrade to XP. I've put it off for this long due to time and expense. Also, I hate messing around with OSs. Bleh.
I have a few questions:
1) I know with some MS stuff, you get one-use-per-CD. Is that the case with XP? I need it for both my mother's PC (Win 98) and mine (Win ME). We need to thief, badly! But two XPs are going to be expensive.
2) What's it like with backwards compatability nowadays for games?
3) Is it better to format first, or will it be OK with its own install procedure?
Thanks in advance.
I have a few questions:
1) I know with some MS stuff, you get one-use-per-CD. Is that the case with XP? I need it for both my mother's PC (Win 98) and mine (Win ME). We need to thief, badly! But two XPs are going to be expensive.
2) What's it like with backwards compatability nowadays for games?
3) Is it better to format first, or will it be OK with its own install procedure?
Thanks in advance.
Comments
1) In the agreement you are suppose to have it installed on one computer per copy
but there is really nothing stop you <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo-->
2) supports all old windows games and progs but old dos well is a pretty much a hit and miss on what will run
3) yes format is recommended in general NTFS > FAT32
On my mum's Office XP, it makes you register when you install it on a new computer, and if you try to, it tells you it's already authorised. It gives you 25 uses (or so) before it shuts down. I was wondering if the same thing applied to XP OS.
System requirements should be ok.
Mum's PC:
Win 98 (for now)
512 MB RAM
Athlon AMD 2.2 GHz
80 gig HD
Radeon 9800 PRO
My PC:
Win ME (for now, good riddance)
512 MB RAM (might get another 512 soon for good measure)
Athlon AMD 3.0 GHz
80 gig HD
NVidia GeForce 4800 Ti
Gonna set me up a LAN between them, too. Serious Sam co-op, here we come. (:
The downs? It uses lots of memory. If installed incorrectly it can be severly unstable, and can eventually require reformats. It seems to be senstivie to your computer's hardware and that may affect it's performance. It has a built in firewall that does absolutly nothing. Turn it off if you want to use bittorrent, for example. It's defintly more complex then 98 or ME.
However, compaired to the comedy of errors that ME is, XP should be no problem for you at all.
I registered this copy so many times same comp for it is the only XP worthy machine granted it is XP pro not to sure the same with XP home
i don't think you would miss WINME to much <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->
Redford - that was a very helpful synopsis you gave me. Thanks. (: My mum's computer has a hideous time with memory leaks - after an hour or so, there's only around 42MB free. This is when everything else has been shut off, too.
I'll be happy to wave goodbye to Mistake Edition, too.
1.) Yes you can only have one copy of Win XP for each PC, however Microsoft will also make sure you are only using one version through some online doo-dah so I'd watch out as far as that goes. And anyway as long as you have all the old installation CD's for your old OS's why don't you just by the XP Home/Pro Upgrade That should allow you to get 2 legal copys of XP for about the same as 1 "full" copy.
2.) Backwards compatibility is fine, Although DOS games are a little iffy as a general rule of thumb if it was meant to play in a Windows environment it'll play on XP.
3.) Formatting first would probably be better although you can just do a straight-forward upgrade over your old OS.
Venmoch I find windows upgrades are very dodgy in my opinion
<!--QuoteBegin-Coby+--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Coby)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> I can't really say anything else except that yes you can have one copy installed on two or more computers. I've experienced that at home when I installed the copy on my computer, then updated it (sp1 and so on), then installed it to the other computer hooked up to this, and updated just fine. Both are running perfectly without any problems. <!--emo&:)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/smile.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='smile.gif' /><!--endemo--><!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Now I don't know what to believe. ): Some people can, some people can't. Anyone got an authorative answer?
The trouble is that I didn't get a Win ME installation disc for my PC. It just came pre-installed. I'm still annoyed by that. I've got the CD-Key, but I assume I'd need the physical CD...or would I?
Obligatory OS-tan reference:
<img src='http://mywebpage.netscape.com/twtranslations/en/tw-95_XP_memory-en.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image' />
As far as I know, there will be no problems with installing XP on either of those computers. It'll actually be BETTER for them, all things considered.
The trouble is that I didn't get a Win ME installation disc for my PC. It just came pre-installed. I'm still annoyed by that. I've got the CD-Key, but I assume I'd need the physical CD...or would I? <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Well its all a case of Microsoft getting XP to call home which it should do to prevent two copys of the same thing being used.
And you probably will need the CD rather than the CD Key as thats what it asked when we attempted to upgrade.
Goddamn money-grabbing monkeys.
Then, I remember a year back I had trouble with this compaq keyboard of mine, couldn't find XP drivers for it (which are now some 3rd party ones that work perfectly) so I went through some registrations and authentications to get into a live chat with this guy from tech support! Yay! And when I said
"I can't find XP drivers.."
he replied "XP drivers? You mean you don't have ME installed on your computer? Reinstall WinME immediatly if you want your computer to stay functional!"
"Uhm, what? You're saying that I should install some old crappy OS indtead of XP which supposedly is hundred times better than ME... so your compaq software will work"
"That's what I mean, yes."
"Then f___ compaq man, i'll trust 3rd party in this case"
*technical support has been ended by supporter*
... go compaq go <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif' /><!--endemo--> Sorry for offtopic rambling but I just got angry >_<
1.) Yes you can only have one copy of Win XP for each PC, however Microsoft will also make sure you are only using one version through some online doo-dah so I'd watch out as far as that goes. And anyway as long as you have all the old installation CD's for your old OS's why don't you just by the XP Home/Pro Upgrade That should allow you to get 2 legal copys of XP for about the same as 1 "full" copy. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
That is completely unbreakable, yes sir, you watch those EEEVVVIL hackers get through that, oh yes siree... [/microsoft]
It takes a good thirty or forty seconds in some cases.
N.B Yes, I have a legitimate reason for needing to, too. GG Dell pre-installs.
Yes I'm weird....
Actually it only uses about 25MB more than Win2000.
And its compatibility w/ software and hardware is a LOT better than Win2k. Unless you have a really really old system that can't handle Thief3 anyway I think you'll like WinXP. I love it, best MS operating system since DOS 6.22.
*In comparison to their normal prices.
<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
i tried to install might and magic: the clouds of xeen, made in 1992. for more of an idea, it was on 5 floppy disks. it installed fine but when i tried to run the game it said i didnt have enough memory.
*In comparison to their normal prices. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Nope. Not true. Pro just has more features for corporate settings, but the same activation BS. Corporations buy volume licensed copies, which do not have the activation, and can be installed on infinite computers. That's what my copy is, got it from my dad's work (it's 99.9% legal too). XP Pro is INFINTELY better than Home, as in home many of the advanced features are unavailable.
Anyways, the activation is keyed to your hardware. Therefore nope, you can't install it on more than one comp AFAIK. It won't activate, then it won't work after 30 days or some ridiculously short amount of time. You can't even reinstall it a bajillion times either. I had to call M$ to use my old copy of Home after my comp kept getting screwed up by a crappy defective video card (it would kill power too early on shutdown and not finish writing the registry, hence it got all screwed up).
You can use the upgrade version to upgrade from any physical Win98 and above disc. You only need one and can use it forever to do a fresh install with the upgrade. And yes, do a fresh install. XP over 98/ME tends to create major problems (I couldn't even upgrade, it would shut down randomly during the upgrade installation).
Venmoch I find windows upgrades are very dodgy in my opinion <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
You dont need to install ME again to use an upgrade disk.
Basically you go into your BIOS, select boot from CD, then when you restart have the WinXP upgrade disk in the computer. Somewhere in the install it will ask for your Win98 /ME disk for verification that you are upgrading, and everything else is fine from there. If you dont have a regular 98 disk or ME go to a flee market or something and get one cheap.