XP Home should I keep it?

[madmax]

I don't use our desktop very often since I bought a laptop 6 years ago. It came with XP installed, with the option to upgrade to Vista free. Needing something portable I bought a Tosiba laptop which came with Vista installed. After two crashes I bought Win7. That too crashed and is acting up. Doesn't seem to be any better than Vista. I don't use the computer for anything fancy. Email, DU surfing the web and photos at the present time.

I have a brand new legal XP Home disk with keycode. I'd like the desktop and the laptop to both run the same program. I'm now using both machines for different reasons. Rumor has it that Win8 will be coming out in Beta in about a month. I may or may not wait to buy a new laptop for that reason.

Everyone says XP is the best Microsoft program and I like it - but, with all the newer OS systems that have come out since XP will it be compatible with newer versions of the programs I use or may want to use in the future. Will there come a time, in the 'near' future that XP will be obsolete? It's been around for a long time. Longer than any of the other ones I've used.

Hope I'm making sense here but, I doubt it Bottom line - install XP on the new laptop I plan to buy or install Win7 on the desktop.

Thanks for any suggestions.

[pokerfan]

1. You have a couple of years assuming you're on Service Pack 3

On April 8, 2014, all Windows XP support, including security updates and security-related hotfixes, will be terminated. Users are recommended to upgrade to Windows 7.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_XP#Support_lifecycle

XP was a pretty solid release. Vista was a giant step backwards and Win 7 is actually pretty good if your hardware can support it. Push come to shove, you can always give Linux a try. It has light system requirements (unlike Windows 7) and tends to run well on older machines.

Linux Mint minimum requirements:
Processor: 600 MHz
Memory: 256 MB
Hard Drive free space: 5 GB

Windows 7 minimum requirements:
Processor 1 GHz
Memory (RAM) 1 GB
Hard Drive free space: 16 GB

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_Mint

[madmax]

2. The Wiki link

made the decision for me. Thank you pokerfan. I will buy a decent new laptop. It should be able to support Win7 since it's factory installed or am I assuming too much

Thank you again. Knowing that the XP support will end in 2 years makes it a no brainer - even for me as to what route to take.

Copied the system requirements and will take that with me when buying the new one.

[pokerfan]

5. Before you abandon the old hardware

you might want to give Linux a try. You might be surprised at the new life it gives your old machine. And it will be supported indefinitely with free updates and upgrades. Wherever it winds up, that six-year-old box is going to need something once XP support ends.

I just don't like to see people spend money when they really don't need to. Linux is free and doesn't suffer from the malware that Windows seems to attract. If you can find your way around various Windows desktops (XP, Vista and 7) then Linux really shouldn't be any challenge.

[madmax]

6. I'll do some research re: Linux

but, I sceeered of it. As I'm fond of saying 'they hide information in books' and now the internet. Will check it out, can't hurt.

I'm getting email and can do pretty much everything now on these two oldies so I'm not under the gun to run out and get something right away. Have the luxury of a little more time.

Electronics today change so fast - who can afford to keep up with this stuff!?

[totodeinhere]

11. No need to be scared of it. Many of the mainstream Linux distros are very easy to learn.

You might want to try the Live CD version of Mint to see how you like it and if it works on your hardware. Just remember that Live CDs tend to be a lot slower and if you install it to your hard drive it will probably be a lot faster and probably faster than your current XP OS.

If you are not sure if you are up to downloading it and burning it's image to a CD you can order a Mint CD from Distrowatch.com for $2.35.

[hobbit709]

8. Just because XP support will end doesn't mean it will magically stop working.

I have a neighbor that still has Win95 on her old Compaq laptop. It does what she wants it to do and sees no reason to upgrade. she can check her emails and do word processing and print out letters to her printer.
you don't always need bleeding edge on applications-if the old one is working fine, why fix it.
I have a program that i use that was originally written for 98. It works fine on windows 7 X64.

One of the reasons I hate MS Office is that it is deliberately made non backwards compatible with older version documents. My WordPerfect X5 opens documents in WordPerfect 5.0 for DOS without a hitch and will open older Word and many other document formats and save them in the same format if I want.

[BlueJazz]

3. I'll add to what Pokerfan said: Go to the manufacturer's site of the computers and do a search....

....for XP drivers (for each computer).

Sometimes you might have trouble finding a certain driver for a specific unit....depending on the age.
Some newer machines CAN be a pain-in-the-ass finding a driver for stuff like a wireless card.

Be sure to save the drivers for each unit on a flash drive or disk. Makes installation a little easier.

As far as putting XP on 2 machines...PM me if you have trouble.

[madmax]

4. Yes, been through the 'can't find the drivers' routine.

Love flash drives - I save everything on them now. Relieves a lot of stress - don't need to ask the control freak son to help me.

No one yells at me here and tells me I'm stupid. Should have raised Yorkshire Terriers instead.

I'm thinking of using the upgrade to Vista on the Desktop. Will check how much RAM, etc. I use that one for photo editing, I have 8k worth of photos. Also, canning important documents to the hard drive and back them up on flash drive. Went through hell trying to get Birth Certificates and other doc's I needed at one time that were lost. Now I'm OCD when it comes to things like that.

I really need a new laptop, not going to cheap out on that this time. Losing all my data from the first Vista crash taught me to 'back up everything'!!

Thanks BlueJazz

[HopeHoops]

7. XP is a lot leaner than Vista and has fewer problems.

I've been happy with Win7 so far, but it requires a wee bit more power than Vista. My Win7 box is a screamer, so it is hard for me to judge how it would run on an older box. If XP is still serving your needs, stick with that. Make the jump to Win7 when you buy a new machine.

[Mnpaul]

9. You can run XP virtually on 7 Pro and Ultimate

I haven't tried it but it is supposed to be super secure because they can't take control of your memory.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/virtual-pc/default.aspx

[canetoad]

13. It's not really a virtual version of XP

It's Win7s version of program compatibility.

[ohheckyeah]

10. Interesting -

my laptop and Vista didn't get along so well but since I put Windows 7 on it I have had no problems. I live XP a lot but I'm liking Windows 7 about as much as XP. Vista - a dog that should have been put down at birth.

[canetoad]

12. If it works OK, does what you want

Keep it.

Your third para; Will XP be compatible with programs you want to use in the future? LOL, how do you know what programs you want to use in the future?

Main thing is, does it work with what you use now, does it work OK with all the stuff you have hanging off your computer - printers, ext. drives, other peripherals?

Don't buy into that 'cutting edge' shit about support for an OS. MS support is vague to say the best, non existent at the worst. Once you have an XP installation tuned, with the crucial patches applied, there's no reason it won't last as long as your computer does.