Windows 98 spared from the MS guillotine for now

[Big Booger]

Microsoft Grants 2nd Stay Of Execution To Win98!

As recently as about two months ago, Microsoft pegged June 30 2003 as
the shutdown date for Win98 support. The basic plan was that, as of
that
date, two weeks from now, Win98 would no longer be patched, updated, or
bug-fixed. (See
http://www.informationweek.com/story...icleID=8700301
)

But sometime in the last few weeks, Microsoft quietly extended the
date.
This will affect tens of millions of users worldwide!

Now, the "'nonsupport" date for Win98 has been rolled back 6 months to
Jan 16 2004, and the new "end of life" date has been pushed back to Jan
16 2005.

This is the second time Microsoft has pushed these dates back, which---
on the plus side--- suggests MS is being receptive to its customers'
needs: The company probably was getting tons of negative feedback on
ceasing support for so enormously popular an OS. On the other hand it
also suggests that MS may not be seeing the rate of XP upgrades it
hoped
for; and/or may be fearing that users will defect to Linux instead of
moving to XP. Keeping Win98 alive at least keeps those users in the
Microsoft fold for now.

In any case, this buys a little time for those still using Win98. At
some point, the OS will cease to be supported--- eventually, there
won't
be any more patches, updates, and such--- so if you're still using
Win98, you still need to make concrete plans for the future. Sooner or
later, the lights will go out on this venerable OS. But at least
there's
a little more breathing room, now!

The latest word from MS is in the section titled "Product Life-Cycle
Road Map" towards the bottom of the page at
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/lifecycleconsumer.mspx .

Source: The Langa List

[Conan]

I don't know why the "rest of the world" still insists on using such an unstable OS. Price maybe?

[Big Booger]

I know what you are saying Conan. BUt you gotta remember how many of those 98 machines were OEM.. quite a few. And to drop 200 US (now cheaper) on an OS is not a slim investment. Even 100 US is quite a bit of money for an operating system.

Plus there are some out there that have no idea how to do it. How to pop the disk in, run the executable, set it up etc..

Others are too lazy to do it. They are satisfied with 98 or 98se. WIth all the updates 98 is a lot more stable than 95. 95 would blue screen at random.

But with XP, I have never, and I repeat never blue screened. i have had apps lock up the OS temporarily, but with in a few seconds I could ctrl alt del and kill the application.

I am glad all my machines are up to XP with SP1. It really is, IMHO, the best OS Microsoft has ever released as of yet.

[FastGame]

Originally posted by Big Booger
But with XP, I have never, and I repeat never blue screened.

BB, an NF2 board & cheap ram can show ya what you been missing.....hehe

98 is old....XP forever

[cash_site]

dont forget there a LARGE number of P2 and PIII systems out there which are just not powerful enough for XP.

SOme people just want a PC to check emails and surf the net. So they have cheap HD, CPU, RAM etc.

Thats why Linux and other free os are getting popular, M$ charge too much for os. Linux hasnt got too far to go before Normal people can use it.

M$ should have an amnesty where they give free upgrade to XP if you're going from 95/98. A small cost compared to the user who has to spend several thousand for new comp.

[Big Booger]

FG: Glad I don't have NF2 and cheap ram
Really I have never had a BSOD. Never even had to reboot because of an OS issue. The only time I've had to reboot was when a third party software screwed up MS.

Now the longhorn pre-alpha, that is another story


cash site you bring up some very valid and interesting points. A lot of people are still with PIII and PII machines, small HDDs, 128Mb of ram, etc...

All of my work PCs except the network server are windows 98. They just upgraded to windows 98 about 2 months ago

We were on windows 95 LOL

Most of the work machines are PII and PIII..

I loaded XP on a P2 266mhz, 64MB ram, 2 GIG hdd, just to prove that it would work to my coworkers... they were shocked.. but it ran wretchedly. So back to 98 they went.


I think initially XP was overpriced. I mean $199 for the pro version is too much. It should have been 99 for pro and 49 for home. I think that is fair considering they just upgraded 2000.. and called it XP

But it is a great OS. No doubt about that.

[SupaStar]

Originally posted by Big Booger
I loaded XP on a P2 266mhz, 64MB ram, 2 GIG hdd, just to prove that it would work to my coworkers...

I put XP on a Pentium 200 MMX - no joke - but it had 128MB of RAM...the board was old but support EDO and SDRAM so a RAM upgrade was cheap and easy

True, it ran like a dog, even with the eye-candy off but it was far more stable than 98SE was on that machine!

I give XP two thumbs up!

[Conan]

Originally posted by SupaStar
I put XP on a Pentium 200 MMX - no joke - but it had 128MB of RAM...the board was old but support EDO and SDRAM so a RAM upgrade was cheap and easy

True, it ran like a dog, even with the eye-candy off but it was far more stable than 98SE was on that machine!

I give XP two thumbs up!

When we first started at Peppy's board, I was running a Celeron 333 mhz and 128 mb ram on XP Pro! Spot on comment SupaStar, slow but stable!

[cash_site]

so do you think I am pushing it trying to load XP Pro on 486DX 150 with a whole 16mb 72pin sim :biggrin:

That comp still works, my Mum uses it for typing recipes and checking emails. LOL

I was looking at putting Linux on it and making it an Internet gateway/firewall for my LAN PM with ideas how to, thx.

[Dehcbad25]

The 486 will slow down your Internet connection and LAN speeds if you use it as a gateway. Maybe a router will be better. I sell you mine for 15$ But it doens't work very well
Back to the main topic. I still use dual boot. XP could be more stable. YEAHH, but, 98 is extremely light in resources compared to XP. I don't want a gloating OS while gaming. And I had seen 60 fps difference in UT2003 at 1024x768, so 98 is a gaming keeper for me. IT crash, yes, it is more, I haven't been able to use it for a month because it had such a crash that the video drivers won't load, even after re-installing them, and I am not sure how I am going to re-install 98 considering I use dual boot. And haven't had time to figure it out yet either.
I had set up a PC for my brother and he is using 98. He just want to play games, with good quality. I think dual boot is the best for me, though I hate to restart. It takes too long for this mobo to pass the post