Hate to say it but Windows 7 sucks in my experience

2000, XP, Vista and 7 are all built on the NT platform. This is to say that they are not DOS based OSes. 2000 Pro was always intended to be the business workstation portion of the 2000 series. There was a Home version, Beta named Neptune, though it was never released. Microsoft instead opted to go with ME instead, for home users. This was sort of a DOS and NT hybrid, for that it did have a native DOS mode option. Also I belive it would not run on top of DOS. Needless to say it was not very accepted and had many many problem. XP was the first fully NT based OS with a home user solution. XP Home was a stripped down version of Pro, and some people say that Pro is a striped down version of Server 2003. I don't go for that idea, considering that Server 2003 has an upgraded kernel. Untill the release of SP2, there was not alot of difference between 2000 and XP, as far as the user is conserned. XP was released with a built in firewall, though previously to SP2 it was not enabled by default. Also with SP2 came a crude version of System and Security, now used by Vista and 7. It had some abilities and there are some softwares like Spybot S&D that would intergrate with XPs version very well.

Also Cat, it is not so much the age of the computer that will allow you to run older windows, it has to do with the drivers. As long as you have drivers for all the devices on a brand new computer, you can still run DOS or Windows 3.11.

I will say that over the years the myths, hearsay, media hype & software & hardware changes make being in IT very challenging. That said and knowing truth from fiction, accuracy from skewed perceptions, it has just been VERY refreshing to see what a couple of you have written.

One grows so accustomed to & weary of 'bashing' & how it clouds reality. It is VERY refreshing to see something said of a positive nature & that actually reflects reality.

Indeed, there are many, including myself, who have 1st hand knowledge & use of a few Windows Operating Systems. And the experience not plagued w/ problems. Many, me too, who realise, that even though there may have been positives, OSs have improved as things have evolved.

Certainly we turned a page DOS to NT. The change in platform, @ the kernel level, from XP to Vista, turned another major corner, following that things have been made 'lighter' & more secure out of the box. Thoretically, performance, abilities & security will continue to flourish & grow.

Anyway, it's really nice to see something said on the plus side w/ such joy & enthusiasm. Not cus it's the voice of a rare minority but, just cus the negative always gets more coverage, notice & attention.

On a personal note, I empathise 100%!!
I was happy to go from 98 to XP... liked XP, had very few problems of my own w/ it.
I touched 2000 only a bit... true, was mostly biz apps.
Vista I knew from the inside (Beta Tested), had an appreciation for some things about it, got to like Vista & had no problems w/ it.
Win7 I knew from the inside (Beta Tested) & was bloody well impressed from the onset. Have come to like it more than anything prior, to use and have not had any problems w/ it.

All through this, seeing problems my clients or ppl in forums were having; 9 times out of 10, 'driver' error & or 'driver' ignorance. But, it does make one aware & really opens your eyes to what is floating about out there... what it is like for some End Users and what it can and IS like for others. Others who see the progression (of OSs), generally, as upward and that the experience can be pleasant.

Recapping, I concure & it is a breath of fresh air to see folks say, "It's better, I enjoy it (better) and it's been largely problem-free, where earlier OSs weren't"

Regards,
Drew

Originally Posted by catilley1092

To Andrea: It's is simpler than XP, XP was built on the foundation of Windows 2000. Windows 2000 wasn't meant to be a consumer OS, although many users of the OS were home users. And it's far more secure than some reports have claimed, but not as secure as Windows 7 by a long shot. I can say that it's as good as an OS as XP, because for 6 years, it met my needs, and not once did I get a virus or malware on the OS. Only when I began dual booting with XP Pro did I begin to have these kind of issues.

To run it, you will need an older machine, like a Dell Latitude or IBM ThinkPad, anything produced before SATA hard drives became the norm. I have a Windows 2000 Pro install on a ThinkPad T42 that I bought a month ago for $99 on eBay. For it's age, it was in pristine (like new) condition. The only thing that I needed was a battery, which I found the exact OEM one for $30.

It's happily dual booting with XP Media Center, not my main computer, just something to use when moving about the house, or outside. And resides only on 12GB (the actual OS only uses 6GB) on my hard drive.

Cat

I would love to have Windows 2000 Professional on my HP Mini 210 Windows 7 netbook.That has 250GB of Ram with about 200GB hard disk space on C drive. D drive is the recovery partition, so I cannot install on there.

But even if I could install Windows 2000,which I cannot as I don't have a Windows 2000 CD and you cannot buy them now in England. What I was thinking might be a problem is that I might not have the drivers for Windows 2000.Or it won't recognise my drivers on my laptop,which are Windows 7 drivers.

So I may have problems connecting by wireless broadband or other things may not work.

Another disadvantage is that the highest version of Internet Explorer you can run on Windows 2000 is IE6. I read that Windows 2000 comes with IE5 but you cannot view web pages properly in IE5 or IE5.5. That is many web pages don't display right.So you would probably need to upgrade to IE6.

I had IE6 on my Windows XP because IE6 comes with Windows XP.Until yesterday when I found that my IE6 kept closing on opening.Or I got this annoying message saying "Internet Explorer has encountered a problem and has had to close. Sorry for any inconvenience."

And so I tried my other IE engine based browsers,Ace Explorer,and Advanced browser. Unfortunently Ace Explorer,Advanced browser and other IE engine based browser like Green browser and Avant browser run off of what ever version of internet Explorer you happen to have installed. In my case IE6,so if IE is not working properly then your other IE engine based browsers,Green browser and Advanced browser and others like it,will have the same problems.

I tried everything but could not fix IE6, so I had to upgrade to IE8 and I no longer have this problem. That is IE8 is working and so are my other IE engine based browsers,Advanced browser and Ace Explorer.

I chose IE8 over IE7 because I have used IE7 before on Windows XP and Windows Vista. And IE7 is actually worse than IE6 or IE8 or 9.

I have IE8 on Windows 7 of course as IE8 comes with Windows 7. I never upgraded to IE9 because I don't see the need. IE8 is just as good and some software does not work with IE9.And I won't be installing IE9 or IE10 on my Windows 7.When they bring IE10 out that is.

But maybe IE6 could be a problem on Windows 2000 as well as on Windows XP. The problem is that some websites don't support IE6. And IE6 and IE7 is not compatible with some modern websites. And I think my problem with IE6 was caused by visiting a site that was not compatible with IE6. And it crashed my browser.

With IE7 this sometimes happens but not with IE8. I don't know why that is.

Okay, you don't have 250 GB of RAM on your computer. There is not any comsumer desinged desktop or notebook little alone a netbook that will run that much RAM. With a netbook the most you will might get is 4 GB maybe, and I stress maybe, 8 GB. The normal for a netbook is 2 GB though.

Not only would you have a harder time running software on 2000 Pro, you will have to find a firewall and all protection software. There is no security software at all in 2000 Pro, and ontop of that there are very few wizards to help anything. That means you will have to do almost everything manualy.

2000 is very different from XP.

Originally Posted by NaiyaShamiso

Okay, you don't have 250 GB of RAM on your computer. There is not any comsumer desinged desktop or notebook little alone a netbook that will run that much RAM. With a netbook the most you will might get is 4 GB maybe, and I stress maybe, 8 GB. The normal for a netbook is 2 GB though.

Not only would you have a harder time running software on 2000 Pro, you will have to find a firewall and all protection software. There is no security software at all in 2000 Pro, and ontop of that there are very few wizards to help anything. That means you will have to do almost everything manualy.

2000 is very different from XP.

But I don't understand. On Windows XP they have Control Panel with a Windows search,in which you can search for help topic. It is not as good as Windows 7's Windows search as that finds everything. But but it works.

But what do you mean you have to do everything manually? I know on windows XP you can either install updates by going onto a web browser or in the Control Panel. Maybe you can only do this through a web browser on Windows 2000.

And what if they don't have a Windows Firewall in Windows 2000 which surprises me. Does it matter? Can you install Windows Firewall from the Microsoft website,just like I installed Windows Defender on my Windows XP?

It says in my Windows Defender help guide on my Windows XP that Windows Defender is for Windows XP and Windows 2000. Windows Defender is already installed on Windows Vista and Windows 7.They also have Malicious Software Removal Tool-MRT on Windows 2000.

And what about when you uninstall programs. On Windows XP and 7 you uninstall them from uninstall a program in Control Panel. Is it the same on Windows 2000?

Yes there is control panel, there is a search, but it is really primitive. Then the help is worse. Better information can be found with google just by using vague searches like "windows" and "computer".

Yes updates are run through IE, but it is out of production, so no more updates.

Dose it matter if you dont have a firewall? YES YES IT DOSE. That is to stop nasty crap from getting on and out of your computer. It is a very important part. Defender is better than nothing, but is still just one part. You still need an AV.

On 2000 and XP it is add and remove programs. That would be how you uninstall software.

Originally Posted by NaiyaShamiso

Yes there is control panel, there is a search, but it is really primitive. Then the help is worse. Better information can be found with google just by using vague searches like "windows" and "computer".

Yes updates are run through IE, but it is out of production, so no more updates.

Dose it matter if you dont have a firewall? YES YES IT DOSE. That is to stop nasty crap from getting on and out of your computer. It is a very important part. Defender is better than nothing, but is still just one part. You still need an AV.

On 2000 and XP it is add and remove programs. That would be how you uninstall software.

So Windows 2000 is similar to Windows XP? But according to what I read on Wikipedia,when Windows XP came out with no service packs. It came with IE5.5 and WMP 8 and Windows Movie Maker 1.1. And a lot of the features like Security Center or Action Center did not come in until service pack 2.

Although if you have service pack 1 IE5.5 gets upgraded to IE6 and WMP 8 gets upgraded to WMP 9.

And when you install service pack 2,you get the full features that you have in service pack 3,Security Center was added in service pack 2.And Windows Movie Maker 1.1 gets upgraded to 2.1.

But Windows Firewall came with Windows XP before the service packs were installed.

I have got Windows XP Home Edition service pack 3. And service pack 3 came pre installed with the Windows XP netbook.

But it is strange that Windows XP originally came with IE5.5. But once you install service pack 1 you cannot downgrade from IE6 to IE 5.5. Not that you would want to. As IE5 and IE5.5 does not display web pages correctly.

IE6 does. But of course if you have Windows 2000 it comes with IE5. So you will probably want to upgrade to IE6. And you must have IE5.5 or above to get updates.So if you kept the IE5 that Windows 2000 comes with, you would not get updates. So you would have to upgrade to IE5.5 or IE6.

You are really close on that. SP3 is only technical stuff. Server interaction and Active Directory stuff. SP2 was the big change to consumer stuff. 2000 dosent get updates any more. It is just too old. Microsoft just dosen't put out any updates any more.

Old, as in obsolete. In IT terms, old, as in antique. Passe. Done (& gone)

Sounds like a Monty Python bit, LOL!

Originally Posted by NaiyaShamiso

You are really close on that. SP3 is only technical stuff. Server interaction and Active Directory stuff. SP2 was the big change to consumer stuff. 2000 dosent get updates any more. It is just too old. Microsoft just dosen't put out any updates any more.

Yes that's right.Microsoft stopped supporting Windows 2000 in June 2010. You can still use that operating system and install service pack 4. But you won't get any more updates from Windows update.

They are going to do the same with Windows XP in 2014.Or so they say. Which means that you will still be able to use Windows XP and install software like web browsers,media players and chat messengers. But you will no longer get updates from Windows update. And it is possible that Windows Live Essentials,such as Windows Live Mail,Windows Live Messenger and Windows Live Photo Gallery may no longer work in Windows XP.But we don't know for sure yet.

Although there are some old versions of Windows Live Messenger such as 8.5 that still work on both Windows 7 and Windows XP. It's just they are no longer supported with updates.

So even after 2014,I am going to carry on using Windows XP for the next 20 years if my computer lasts that long. And even when they eventually drop support for Windows 7,I am going to carry on using Windows 7 for the next 20 years and long after the support stops.

After all, the Windows updates are not for the web browsers and other software I have on my computer. They are for Windows and Microsoft software. But I don't even get updates for that. As I have got Windows Movie Maker 6, 2.6 and 2.1 on Windows 7 and Windows Live Essentials for Windows XP,Microsoft Shared View. And most of the Windows Vista software.And Windows never gives me updates for any of those.Or the other Microsoft software I mentioned.

And on Windows XP I don't get any updates for Outlook Express,Windows Movie Maker 2.1 or Windows Live Essentials either.

Which makes you wonder if we really need all of those Windows updates anyway.

So if they did stop supporting Windows 7 and Windows XP.I am sure we can run it without Windows Update. If we have the latest service packs installed.