At0mic Posted September 4, 2005 Share Posted September 4, 2005 I have an old laptop I want to use occasionally. What would be the best OS to put on it? Win98 would probably be the easiest but can win2000 be stripped down enough to run at a reasonable speed? What about NT4.0? I know Microsoft say 16Mb or 32Mb recommended but does it really run ok with this little ram? What would be the fastest for an old machine like this; a very stripped down Win2k or an out of the box NT4.0? Unless anybody knows of a way to strip down NT4.0? I know that NT4.0 doesn’t natively support USB but I could live with a PS2 Mouse.I know you win9x purists will tell me to use 95 or 98 but I prefer to have a proper 32-bit OS. Although, I welcome to hear the arguments from both sides of the fence.Requirements I need:Web browsingMPEG playbackemailPCMCIA support is essential for my network cardUSB would be nice but not essentialLaptop SpecsToshiba 320CTIntel Pentium 266 MMX (not PII)32Mb EDO RAM2Mb C&T 65555 VideoYamaha OPL3-SAx WDM Sound4Gb Hard drivePCMCIAUSB Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atomizer Posted September 4, 2005 Share Posted September 4, 2005 as far as i know, you can get any MS OS to run on it, but it may take some tweaking/stripping to do it. have you looked at nLite? this can make the job of stripping down WIN 2k/XP a very easy task and you could (depending on how much you remove) end up with an installation that is very small and uses fewer resources. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coconut Posted September 4, 2005 Share Posted September 4, 2005 any nt earlier than 2k is pretty troublesome, id say youll have no problems with 2k - as atomizer said use nlite to strip out stuff you dont need. check out http://www.blackviper.com to read about different services you can turn off to save memory Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iWindoze Posted September 5, 2005 Share Posted September 5, 2005 I have an old laptop I want to use occasionally. What would be the best OS to put on it? Win98 would probably be the easiest but can win2000 be stripped down enough to run at a reasonable speed? What about NT4.0? I know Microsoft say 16Mb or 32Mb recommended but does it really run ok with this little ram? What would be the fastest for an old machine like this; a very stripped down Win2k or an out of the box NT4.0? Unless anybody knows of a way to strip down NT4.0? I know that NT4.0 doesn’t natively support USB but I could live with a PS2 Mouse.I know you win9x purists will tell me to use 95 or 98 but I prefer to have a proper 32-bit OS. Although, I welcome to hear the arguments from both sides of the fence.Requirements I need:Web browsingMPEG playbackemailPCMCIA support is essential for my network cardUSB would be nice but not essentialLaptop SpecsToshiba 320CTIntel Pentium 266 MMX (not PII)32Mb EDO RAM2Mb C&T 65555 VideoYamaha OPL3-SAx WDM Sound4Gb Hard drivePCMCIAUSB<{POST_SNAPBACK}>While obviously you're not going to be going quite this extreme...http://home.hccnet.nl/pr.nienhuis/Lib110CT.htmlhttp://home.hccnet.nl/pr.nienhuis/Windows.html#Win2Kservices...these will give you an idea of what's possible! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fdv Posted September 5, 2005 Share Posted September 5, 2005 (edited) Mr. Nienhuis used my files to slim Win2k down, as you'll note fromhttp://home.hccnet.nl/pr.nienhuis/Windows.html#VORCKI'd recommend that. My files will allow win2k to be installed on, well, anything; the minimum memory requirement's been removed.Without any digital signature checking on NT 4, you can also edit the heck out of TXTSETUP, LAYOUT, etc., especially SYSSETUP and try that OS too. Mozilla or FF for browsing in any case, of course, but you know these things Edited September 5, 2005 by fdv Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted September 5, 2005 Share Posted September 5, 2005 I am all for tweaking the last bit out of MS Operating Systems, but actually the real problem is the 32 Mb of memory.In my experience, the only thing that will be able to run on a 32 Mb system with acceptable speed will be a "lited" version of WIN98.The same Mr. Nienhuis, in the page linked above says as much:To be able to work a bit efficiently, I got myself some upgrades and extensions. Where applicable I'll describe how I got them up and running: 32 MB is too small even for Windows 98. The maximum allowable 64 MB is just enough to run e.g. Windows 2000.This is even more true in your case as laptop harddisks (swap memory) are, generally speaking, slower than desktop ones.My personal rule of thumb:standard Win95/lited 98 min 32 Mb, with 64 fliesstandard win 98 min 64 mb, with 128 rocks, anything more isn't really usefulstandard NT4.00 min 64 mb, with 128 rocks, anything more is welcomelited Win2k has same requirements of NT4.00standard Win2k min 128, 256 is MUCH better, anything more is welcomelited winXP has same requirements of Win2kstandard WinXP min 256, 512 is MUCH better, anything more is welcomePLEASE, don't flame me for this with posts like"HA!, I am running Server 2003 on a Pentium 133 with 16 Mb of memory, I just needed to make a few hacks!"I know that the above listed are NOT the minimum requirements, they are just what I found the minimum requirements for "acceptable speed".jaclaz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fdv Posted September 5, 2005 Share Posted September 5, 2005 I am running Server 2003 on a Pentium 133 with 16 Mb of memory, I just needed to make a few hacks!ha ha!! i liked that... i don't think i could even bear 98 on that system.really, the best thing you can do is throw another memory module into it. as jaclaz indicates, there's a big difference between what's theoretically possible to use and what's actually useable. RAM really is everything.from personal experience using windows 2000, ie ripped out:pentium one 233 MHz, 32 MB RAM, swap is C drive - too slow to use at allpentium one 266 MHz, 196 MB RAM, swap is on its own drive - works just fine for email, browsing, etc (specs At0mic lists). even works fine for office and many other progs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bledd Posted September 5, 2005 Share Posted September 5, 2005 i'd say use a really nlited windows 2000 install, use winamp lite, use some really light browser, use mpc for video with ffdshow and buy some more ram for the laptop, 64 or 128 would make the world of difference Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asin Posted September 5, 2005 Share Posted September 5, 2005 For the record, Windows XP requires 64 MB of RAM just to install.Anyways, this guide might help you to speed up a 2000 installation:http://www.nexle.dk/daniel/win2000-32mb/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
At0mic Posted September 5, 2005 Author Share Posted September 5, 2005 (edited) Thanks very much for the info and the links everyone. I've decided to completely strip down Win2k right down to the bare essentials and see how well it runs. I'll try some experiments on my main computer using virtual pc to see how low I can get the memory usage down to. Edited September 5, 2005 by At0mic Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
os2fan2 Posted September 5, 2005 Share Posted September 5, 2005 I suppose you could go 32-bit, and use OS/2. It has pretty good plug and play, and the version i use picked up all the drivers, video etc without hassle.--------------------------------------------------------OS/2, because a 586 is a terrible thing to waste Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iWindoze Posted September 6, 2005 Share Posted September 6, 2005 For the record, Windows XP requires 64 MB of RAM just to install.Anyways, this guide might help you to speed up a 2000 installation:http://www.nexle.dk/daniel/win2000-32mb/<{POST_SNAPBACK}>I saw that on OSNews.com when it first come out...Unfortunately I can't believe his suggestions include not installingthe latest service pack when, as many of us all know, nLite allowsyou to slipstream and then strip out most of the above referenced'bloat' on the system...Also I seem to recall there being a tweak in nLite allowing for a patchmade to the installation eliminating the memory check (allowing youto by pass the minimum required memory) add that to the option toinstall using the Windows 2000 setup routine and I imagine you'll dojust fine.--iWindoze Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
At0mic Posted September 11, 2005 Author Share Posted September 11, 2005 I've been messing around with Windows 2000 and I’ve managed to get the memory usage down to only 29,780Kb which is lower than I thought possible. My WINNT folder is only 166Mb. I haven’t even started with this yet. I’m going to see how low I can get this. I plan to somehow knock a few more Mb’s off my memory usage as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jlo555 Posted September 11, 2005 Share Posted September 11, 2005 29 megs, wow I'm impressed. I think I should try out nLite, when I was using 2000pro, memory usage was at least 90mb at startup. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gamehead200 Posted September 11, 2005 Share Posted September 11, 2005 I've been messing around with Windows 2000 and I’ve managed to get the memory usage down to only 29,780Kb which is lower than I thought possible. My WINNT folder is only 166Mb. I haven’t even started with this yet. I’m going to see how low I can get this. I plan to somehow knock a few more Mb’s off my memory usage as well.<{POST_SNAPBACK}>You think you can post how you did this? I'm stuck at 47,344KB... And over a gig for the Windows folder (which used to be about 200MB... ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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