Windows 98/ME support for hardware and software

[azagahl]

Technology moves so fast and for people to be using Win98 in the year 2005 = 7 years old OS.

Actually there was no OS released in 1998. SE is about 6 years old and ME is about 5 years old. Slightly older than XP.

ME is the crappiest OS ever made. It was basically an incomplete state of XP driven onto the market due to high consumer complaints so M$ had to give in whether or not their OS was ready.

MS release a not-ready product? *Gasp*

Was XP complete? Remember Blaster?

Will Shorthorn be complete when it is released later this decade..?

Anyway, I hate XP only because of all the bloat on it.

It is bloated; that's why I prefer SE. Cheap, no activation stupidity, does everything including remote desktop, and runs like a charm with 3 GHz processor and 1 GB RAM.

[Jeremy]

Technology moves so fast and for people to be using Win98 in the year 2005 = 7 years old OS.

Actually there was no OS released in 1998. SE is about 6 years old and ME is about 5 years old. Slightly older than XP.

ME is the crappiest OS ever made. It was basically an incomplete state of XP driven onto the market due to high consumer complaints so M$ had to give in whether or not their OS was ready.

MS release a not-ready product? *Gasp*

Was XP complete? Remember Blaster?

Will Shorthorn be complete when it is released later this decade..?

Anyway, I hate XP only because of all the bloat on it.

It is bloated; that's why I prefer SE. Cheap, no activation stupidity, does everything including remote desktop, and runs like a charm with 3 GHz processor and 1 GB RAM.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

6 years, 7 years, no matter, still very old and progressively becoming obsolete.

Of course no OS is finished when it's released. That's why Windows Updates exist. That's obvious, but ME really emphasized the word "unfinished". Yes, XP is bloated and that's why I use nLite. I'm very proud to use nLite. That way I trim the fat off an OS that has updated files on it and seems like Windows 98 because of the less files on it.

[Link21]

Technology moves so fast and for people to be using Win98 in the year 2005 = 7 years old OS.

Actually there was no OS released in 1998. SE is about 6 years old and ME is about 5 years old. Slightly older than XP.

ME is the crappiest OS ever made. It was basically an incomplete state of XP driven onto the market due to high consumer complaints so M$ had to give in whether or not their OS was ready.

MS release a not-ready product? *Gasp*

Was XP complete? Remember Blaster?

Will Shorthorn be complete when it is released later this decade..?

Anyway, I hate XP only because of all the bloat on it.

It is bloated; that's why I prefer SE. Cheap, no activation stupidity, does everything including remote desktop, and runs like a charm with 3 GHz processor and 1 GB RAM.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It's the kernel of the OS that makes the difference. Every software package out there that's released is probably incomplete in one way or another. Windows 98/ME suck becaus ethey use a crappy kernel. Windows 2000/XP/2003 use a quality kernel. Don't just choose your OS based on the interface and fetaures it loads by default. If you hate XP so much and don't want to deal with stripping out the bloated junk, use Windows 2000. Windows 2000 isn't bloated and still uses a a quality robust kernel.

[Jito463]

Actually, there was an OS released in 1998. It was called Windows 98. 98SE was the Second Edition which was released in '99, but the core OS was released in '98. I can understand the points back and forth here. I've ran almost every Microsoft OS from MS-DOS 6.22 up through Windows XP x64 except for WinNT 3.5/4 (used it, just never ran it). But in general I would have to agree with the original poster of this thread. I just shake my head in disgust when someone buys a $1000 computer from us (a small OEM I work for) then decides to get it without an OS (which saves them like $50) and run 98SE or ME on it. If the industry made a move to no longer support those operating systems, it would force the rest of the market to upgrade. I'm sorry, but the fact is those OS's were never truly stable when they came out. It was recommended that 98/98SE be formatted and reloaded about every 6months - 1year for stability. And don't even get me started on ME. I worked for CompUSA at the time it came out and MS gave all us employees a free, unlicensed copy of ME at one of their roadshows. It lasted about 1 week on my computer and started crashing left and right. I think when I started using 2000 I ran 98SE in a dual-boot for about 3-months or so while waiting for compatibility with some devices. After that, I never went back. Face it, in spite of all the changes you guys are making, it should be put out to pasture. That's my opinion on the matter.

[jpless]

Hehe another round of mud throwing

Personally I like Win9x cause it runs my old games that wont run on XP. But for anything else I use XP.

But support for Win9x? no, I don't think so. I just run it on an older machine. Use the money for better support in the new OS's instead!

If there should be support for all the old OS's then I think it would look crappy for the new. I don't think any company could support all!

Take the new OS's on a new system and use the old on a supported system

[Link21]

But support for Win9x? no, I don't think so. I just run it on an older machine. Use the money for better support in the new OS's instead!

AMEN!! That's really what bothers me about continued support for POS Windows 98/ME. Application and game performance probably suffers a lot because of continued support for POS Windows 98/ME which are a completely different OS under the hood than Windows 2000/XP. If they were Windows 2000/XP only, performance and stability would be much better!!

Edited August 6, 2005 by Link21

[Link21]

Ya know, the more I think about it, I don't understand why someone would argue over this. This compatibility isn't making your software and hardware any more expensive than it already is. Nor is it making your system unstable. So how exactly does this directly affect you?

That is simply not true. Windows 98/ME are completely different operating systems under the hood than Windows 2000/XP and as such, it probably does result in worse performance and stability than we'd otherwise have in the PC industry if it were Windows 2000/XP only!! Just like I said above. That is more than enough reason for someone to argue over this. Just because there system is stable and performance is good, doesn't mean it wouldn't be better if POS Windows 98/ME were trashed all together. It's the fact that developers have to continue and provide support for two distinctly different operating systems made by the same company (Microsoft) for the last 5 years where as they only had to support one base OS prior to Windows 2K. Stick to one common OS which is the better of the two completely different OS based platforms being 2K/XP.

[wizardofwindows]

B) win98se is the most user friendly os plus it was problably on more computers at its peak then xp is today .everyone used tryed it curse it and fell in love with the old grey classic look despite its bugs.today we have vista comming xp is turning 4 and and 2 service packs later still bugs.as far as backwards compatabitiy someone brought up a valiant point that most appz games started version 1 on the 9x format sold millions og games and you upgraded on top of 9x so to drop 9x for nt only would affend alot of trusted longtime customers but i sort of agree that dvd driven games like gta sa etc might be better off dropping 9x due to the hardware demand that many old 98 boxes cant do anyway ... your turn to rant...

[gamehead200]

IMO, hardware and software manufacturers should support old operating systems as long as there is a demand for their hardware/software on the old OSes. They shouldn't just abandon them!

Look at how many people still use Windows 98!

[Link21]

IMO, hardware and software manufacturers should support old operating systems as long as there is a demand for their hardware/software on the old OSes.  They shouldn't just abandon them!

Look at how many people still use Windows 98!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

So, let performance suffer just because they are afraid of losing a few sales. Almost all people using Windows 98 have systems with CPUs 1GHz or less in speed. That is a fact!!

[Fredledingue]

"Application and game performance probably suffers a lot because of continued support for POS Windows 98/ME "

Why? If they issue two versions of the same sofftware/driver, one for XP one for 98, there is no interaction.

And in the case of a single version, I think there is still enough compatibility netween both OS to have no loss of performance.

Well many drivers and almost every softwares are XP and 98 compatible in a same version, so I think it's not difficult to support 98 a few years more.

Maybe it's a bit more dificult with drivers.

the reasons why I prefer w98 over XP has been explained on three multipage threads now blocked. (looks like this topic is taboo here)

But in a few words: I hate XP for its slowliness, its interface, and for the sake of the art of computering: its bloat.

w98 was crappy 7 years ago, but after the SE version and today with uSP2.02 and other tweaks, it's realy a great OS.

TBS,

The next time I'll buy a computer, I'll choose only hardware with w98 support.

[Link21]

"Application and game performance probably suffers a lot because of continued support for POS Windows 98/ME "

Why? If they issue two versions of the same sofftware/driver, one for XP one for 98, there is no interaction.

And in the case of a single version, I think there is still enough compatibility netween both OS to have no loss of performance.

Well many drivers and almost every softwares are XP and 98 compatible in a same version, so I think it's not difficult to support 98 a few years more.

Maybe it's a bit more dificult with drivers.

the reasons why I prefer w98 over XP has been explained on three multipage threads now blocked. (looks like this topic is taboo here)

But in a few words: I hate XP for its slowliness, its interface, and for the sake of the art of computering: its bloat.

w98 was crappy 7 years ago, but after the SE version and today with uSP2.02 and other tweaks, it's realy a great OS.

TBS,

The next time I'll buy a computer, I'll choose only hardware with w98 support.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Drivers don't use the same version for both operating systems. Just look at ATI's and NVIDIA's website. They have a separate version to download for Windows 98/ME than for Windows 2000/XP. Applications use the same versions probably because they are just written for Windows 98/ME and they rely on the fact that Windows 2000/XP have backwards compatibility for Windows 9X applications. So almost all applications written today and for the past few years aren't even native to Windows 2000/XP, and are really native to Windows 98/ME, but just run on Windows 2000/XP because of what I said above, which is FRIGGIN SAD. That's how application performance is suffering. Windows 98 has always been a POS OS. It's called the kernel. Use an OS based on NT that at least has a quality kernel!!

[Fredledingue]

link21,

Drivers are or should small programs, possible simple that sould be easily translatable for various OSes.

I assume softwares are now written by developers using XP machines and are first testing on XP for obvious reasons so it's rather the w98 users who may suffer from low performance because the software is designed for XP.

I also never heard of XP offering better performance for programs AFAIK. I mean I don't think a program designed especialy for XP and for higest performance on XP will work faster than a program designed for higher performance on w98.

I even don't think it's possble to make programs that work faster on XP than on w98.

I think it depends on the programing language and programmer skill.

Good softwares must be small and should never crash even on w95.

Once you have that, it should rock on XP as well.

But I'm not an expert in programing. Just my 2ct.

[RJARRRPCGP]

I have a hard time believing your running Windows 9X stable on an Athlon 3200 with 1GB of RAM.  Windows 9X can't even address more than 512MB of RAM.  So how in the heck are you running Windows 9X on a system with more than 512MB of RAM.  And Windows XP may be bloated, but use Windows 2000 if you hate XP and think it's bloated.  Windows 2000 is still a qaulity OS as it is based on real 32-bit code, and not some piece of junk emulating 32-bit GUI on top of a DOS shell.

First off, Windows 9x isn't "emulating" 32-bit code, it has real 32-bit code, but it's hybrided with 16-bit code, thus causes confusions.

Also, it's not just a "GUI shell" on DOS!

Otherwise, many games wouldn't run on that OS!

[Link21]

First off, Windows 9x isn't "emulating" 32-bit code, it has real 32-bit code, but it's hybrided with 16-bit code, thus causes confusions.

Also, it's not just a "GUI shell" on DOS!

Otherwise, many games wouldn't run on that OS!

It may have true 32-bit code, but it depends on legacy 16-bit code to function. It is essentially real 32-bit code extensions on top of a 16-bit subsystem.

Edited August 17, 2005 by Link21