XP, Vista or 7

[Kevin...]

I run W7, Server 2008R2, XP, Ubuntu, and Red Hat. Gotta say I like using XP the most. Its not a matter of it being better than anything or running smoother...I love it because I have been using it for 10 years now. Win7 has been great. I run it on one of my laptops and my other desktop. No software problems...ever.

 

My only complaint is that when I a part dies on me and I end up scavenging parts from other/older computers, I run into Win7 compatibility issues. I had one recently when my sound card died and I threw in an old Creative 5.1 card but Win7 and Creative basically said f*ck you to all of the drivers.

[Chimpso]

Personally, I love, and have, XP. It works with the vast majority of games (which is the main thing I use my PC for) and is smooth and reliable. I've used 7, and I must say on the whole I liked it. It worked as efficiently as XP, but I'd rather prefer XP, as I am much more familiar with is and it is easy to navigate.

 

I've heard terrible things about Vista. My school's computers use Vista and for working with documents (MS Office), it works fine. But for video games...

 

 

I've heard otherwise.

[valensim]

1st place - XP

2nd place - 7

3rd place Win 98

4th place Vista

[Miro]

I'm using XP since forever and never had any trouble with that. Windows 7 is also quite good but I can't afford it.

I've got a friend who used to own Vista and he didn't like it, that's why he switched to XP.

[One-time]

All three sucks, but if I had to choose the best between the worst I'd choose Windows 7. I have it installed on my second partition, but it's there only for running apps whose replacement I can't find for my Ubuntu.

 

OPEN SOURCE WORLD FTW.

[Suction Testicle Man]

I only use Windows if I'm forced to, and when I do it'll be whichever is easiest/quickest to pirate - so XP.

 

Amongst the many things that make Windows hard to work with, the biggest factor for me is portability. Since using an OS where I'm able to switch a storage device between any machine, and expect it to boot (as long as the hardware is supported), I can't ever go back. Installation has to be a one-off process - none of this automated 'repair' nonsense. If an OS was shutdown appropriately, switching it to different hardware might need optimisation, but not repairing - unless the OS has deliberately broken itself in order to prevent piracy, and to protect their cashflow. I'm not willing to sacrifice my time (sitting through 'repair' processes) to secure their cashflow, unless they pay me.

 

So in a professional or personal environment Windows is too inflexible to work with quickly and efficiently - since it will either cost me money or my spare time respectively.

[SyphonPayne]

7 > Vista > XP >> * .

[StonedVillain]

I've been using Windows 7 since I discovered that my sh*t laptop doesn't have an additional CD for XP drivers. Furthermore, 7 works very nice and I recommend it, although I know XP might be better if you are looking at performances. But hey, I'm loving the Aero features, so I go for 7.

[Wolf68k]

XP is being phased out. In 2014 MS will stop all support of XP completely. They have already stopped making and selling it.

More and more games are coming out requiring Vista/7, and the only reason they are still supporting Vista besides the fact that Vista is a rush job of 7 is because MS still supports.

 

I hate change to a point. It's the reason I keep my system clean to begin with is because I hate reinstalling the OS. So I run the same install of an OS for 2+ years while most people are talking about reinstalling every 6 months or so.

I didn't think I would like 7 that much and thought I'd have a lot of issues with it. In the 1 year I've been using it on my laptop and now about 6 months on my desktop, I love it and have had only 1 gaming issue so far and that's with BF1942 and that was easily fixed.

 

Vista is to 7, what ME was to XP. A) crap and B) a rush job which resulted in pure crap.

 

If you have XP already and like it then stick with it for now. If you want a faster, more reliable, some what easier to use (once you get use to it), and that you won't be wishing you can play the latest games but can't then get 7.

 

If you're in college and in the US, or know someone who is that you trust, you get Windows 7 Pro Upgrade in either 32-bit or 64-bit for $30.

[leik oh em jeez!]

The perfect OS would be Windows 7 with XP's control panel and networking interface.

[Wolf68k]

7 has the same Control Panels that XP does. Only a few are renamed, which is some what confusing at first, and there are some new ones.

Not sure what you mean about the networking interface since I've never used it.

[leik oh em jeez!]

7 has the same Control Panels that XP does. Only a few are renamed, which is some what confusing at first, and there are some new ones.

Not sure what you mean about the networking interface since I've never used it.

There's like half a page of icons on XP's control panel, vs two pages of icons on 7. Add that with stuff being renamed and moved, and it's damn near impossible to find anything. Plus the updates to system properties.

 

And I was refering to 7's "network and sharing center." If no router or modem is detected on a network, Windows 7 automatically sets it to "unidentified network," sets it to public, and then doesn't let you change it to a home or work network, meaning that sharing a single file takes about 15 minutes to configure instead of 5 seconds on XP. Also won't allow Network maps, and network discovery is turned off. Which that too takes time to find out where to turn it on.

 

"Troubleshoot problems" in 7 is basically the same as "repair" in XP. But in Windows 7, it doesn't tell you what the problem is until it's finished. This is fine if it works, but 90% of the time it fails, and then doesn't tell you anything. Where as in XP, it told you what it was doing when it was doing it, so if the repair box locked up at "renewing IP address," you knew there was probably a DHCP problem or the adapter's settings needed to be set manually.

 

Basically most administrative or configuration/custimization controls were better in XP than 7. There were some new things added that were nice, but there was also a lot removed or changed for the worse.

[SyphonPayne]

 

Vista is to 7, what ME was to XP. A) crap and B) a rush job which resulted in pure crap.

Not for me. For me the only time I genuinely hated Vista was during the beta. After RTM, I didn't have many issues other than drivers for certain devices. Post-SP1 Vista caused me no troubles at all. I'll even go as far as saying that 7 is just Vista SP3 + Superbar. Not that that's a bad thing. I use 7 and Vista both everyday. XP is still great as well for older machines.

[nightwalker83]

Windows 7

[Wolf68k]

 

There's like half a page of icons on XP's control panel, vs two pages of icons on 7. Add that with stuff being renamed and moved, and it's damn near impossible to find anything. Plus the updates to system properties.

If you got by pure numbers then yes there are more control panels. But like I said there are a number of new ones. New complex features means new and more control panels.

If you go back and look at Win98 and compare it to XP you'll see that 98 had 30 while XP has close to 40, and yes 7 has around 40-50.

 

 

And I was refering to 7's "network and sharing center." If no router or modem is detected on a network, Windows 7 automatically sets it to "unidentified network," sets it to public, and then doesn't let you change it to a home or work network, meaning that sharing a single file takes about 15 minutes to configure instead of 5 seconds on XP. Also won't allow Network maps, and network discovery is turned off. Which that too takes time to find out where to turn it on.

I knew what you were referring to but I don't use network sharing for anything.

When I want to share files on my computers in my house I use Filezilla server and client (or some other FTP client). I have a few times used Remote Desktop on my desktop XP Pro to let my 7 Home Premium connect to which was very easy, once I looked how to do it. And I do on both my laptop and desktop now running 7 Pro use media share to stream videos from them to my DLAN enabled HDTV. But for the most part I keep file sharing off and anything else relating to it I turn off or disable.

 

 

"Troubleshoot problems" in 7 is basically the same as "repair" in XP. But in Windows 7, it doesn't tell you what the problem is until it's finished. This is fine if it works, but 90% of the time it fails, and then doesn't tell you anything. Where as in XP, it told you what it was doing when it was doing it, so if the repair box locked up at "renewing IP address," you knew there was probably a DHCP problem or the adapter's settings needed to be set manually.

I have yet to use this in 7 so I can't say either way what is going on. For XP I have had problems while working on someone else's system and the control panel didn't give me anything other than it didn't get an IP address but when I want to command line it did give me more details, none of which explained why it wasn't working. And after even downloading the network drivers on a different system, uninstalling the current drivers and cleaning them out then installing newer driver still got nothing and in the end had to reinstall the OS.

So like I say to everyone about these sorts of things; your mileage my vary.

 

 

Basically most administrative or configuration/custimization controls were better in XP than 7. There were some new things added that were nice, but there was also a lot removed or changed for the worse.

I wouldn't say they are better or worse in 7. Most are the exact same, some of the customize controls are a bit more buried in 7 than XP or simply worded differently.

 

Going from 98 to XP was a bit of work for a lot of people in many areas and now it's second hand. XP to 7 is no different of an experience. By the time the next Win OS comes out most people will well in the groove of 7 and get confused and have to start learning again for the new OS.

[leik oh em jeez!]

Windows 7's control panel is horrible. color management, desktop gadgets, display, and personalization are all seperate panels when they should be under one or two panels. backup and restore, action center, recovery, drive encryption, indexing options, and parental controls could also be condensed to one or two panels. Then you've got administrative tools, device manager, performance and information tools, and credential manager. They should all be under one panel.

 

XP had 25 icons in control panel, 7 has 47 icons.

It's all just too much clutter.

 

Migrating from 95 to 98 was easy for me. Anything I already knew how to do was in the same place, and new features were placed where you'd assume they would be. Upgrading from 98 to XP was the same. There was no pointlessly moving, renaming, or burrying any controls. And if you didn't like the way it looked, you could always make it look exactly like your 98 desktop, save for the updated windows logo on the start button.

Edited May 20, 2011 by leik oh em jeez!

[AmyJones]

Well if you look at it as a business sense, it's going to be XP as windows vista and 7 is too unstable for track keeping purposes. This is why you find your huge corporations using outdated software. Wal-Mart for example has relied on windows 2000 for the longest time and some companies still do.

[sivispacem]

Well if you look at it as a business sense, it's going to be XP as windows vista and 7 is too unstable for track keeping purposes. This is why you find your huge corporations using outdated software. Wal-Mart for example has relied on windows 2000 for the longest time and some companies still do.

Which would be great, if XP was anywhere near as reliable as people make out it is, and if Microsoft weren't abandoning support for it in a couple of years.

Companies use XP not because it's more stable, but because it's too expensive and too time consuming to upgrade unless it's absolutely necessary.

[Wolf68k]

No, companies use outdated software because they are too cheap to keep up. Because they spend so little money for their IT dept.

This is why companies get so many viruses and attacks.

Blaster worm for example. Never mind the fact that it could be taking care of with a simple NAT firewall or even turning on the firewall built into XP. MS had put out a patch for it months before the worm made it's release into the wild. But IT depts around the world were too busy testing that patch and other older patches to make sure they wouldn't effect other parts of their already outdated systems and software that by the time they did get around to it it was too late and they were infected.

 

Companies were using 98 for the longest time while XP was well into it's roll out and no longer made or sold.

 

 

This is why you have Gwaker got hit and being revealed that their password encryption scheme was only recording the first 8 characters of a password.

It's most likely the reason Sony PSN was hit....over and over and over ...and over again.

[trip]

No, companies use outdated software because they are too cheap to keep up. Because they spend so little money for their IT dept.

15 years with the same (fairly large) IT house, and I can confirm that statement

We still have some critical stuff running on unsupported NT. Even though our standard desktop is XP, we still see more than a few handfuls of 98/95. We even have an active 3.1 machine running an old piece of needed software in one of our telco switching rooms.

 

I'm currently working on a project that has SQL 6.5 running on NT and Win2000. Once completed we are only taking the database up to 2005. At least the NT and 2000 machine will be gone, but even then it will only be running on Win2003.

[cha2x1447]

I prefer Windows 7. Had problems when using Vista.

[Tornado Rex]

The perfect OS would be Windows 7 with XP's control panel and networking interface.

Oh god yes. Windows 7 ruined networking

[Floro Solo]

People saying "all three sucks" should post a bit more arguments with it

 

Windows 7 is the best, after that XP. Vista was the worst, it had alot of compatibility errors and wouldn't install anything!

[Kirst]

I think with the release of Win7 SP1 there's not much reason to stay with XP...and don't even talk about Vista

[Kimd41]

Either Windows 7 or XP, just stay away from Vista. Although I recommend 7 because of DX11.

[LucaVercetti]

XP- Awesome,but old.

Vista- Younger than XP, but stupid.

7- New and awesome. I using 7!

[Node]

XP for the performance

Vista for the looks!

7 for both

Edited June 7, 2011 by The_Sorrow

[OverTheBelow]

Windows 7, although I really wish they'd cut the bullsh*t about "finding solution to this problem". I don't think it has EVER found a solution for ANY problem it's ever shown up for.

 

 

Oh, and also it has a tendency to ask me if I want to change to Windows 7 Basic (as opposed to Aero) because the game is supposedly running bad.. when it is in fact actually running at 60fps perfectly. Every time it does this it minimizes the game and is really annoying.

[iTRiP]

...

Edited August 18, 2012 by iTRiP