Question about timing of Upgrade to Win XP SP2

  • Thread starter Thread starter Brian K
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Brian K

My existing system is a Pentium III 450, 320 m ram, 80 g hdd. My new
system will have an AMD 64 3400+, 1g ram with the same 80 g hdd for
starters. I've upgraded before, to avoid wiping my drive and
reinstalling everything, I take a short cut. Just before shutting down
the old system, I delete all the motherboard and machine related stuff
from the device manager that won't be in the new system. That way plug
'n play insures that the right stuff is installed.

I will be working with a bare bones system that has the video, sound,
and Ethernet onboard. My question is this. Would it be better to
install the Win XP SP 2 upgrade over the 98SE on the old machine and do
my shortcut? Or, should I do my shortcut transfer the drive and then
upgrade the OS? It should be noted on the new system the 1g ram is dual
channel. Which is more efficient of the two? Or should I bite the bullet
and install everything from scratch?

--
________
To email me, Edit "blog" from my email address.
Brian M. Kochera
"Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once!"
View My Web Page: http://home.earthlink.net/~brian1951
 
Brian K said:
My existing system is a Pentium III 450, 320 m ram, 80 g hdd. My new
system will have an AMD 64 3400+, 1g ram with the same 80 g hdd for
starters. I've upgraded before, to avoid wiping my drive and reinstalling
everything, I take a short cut. Just before shutting down the old system,
I delete all the motherboard and machine related stuff from the device
manager that won't be in the new system. That way plug 'n play insures
that the right stuff is installed.

I will be working with a bare bones system that has the video, sound, and
Ethernet onboard. My question is this. Would it be better to install
the Win XP SP 2 upgrade over the 98SE on the old machine and do my
shortcut? Or, should I do my shortcut transfer the drive and then upgrade
the OS? It should be noted on the new system the 1g ram is dual channel.
Which is more efficient of the two? Or should I bite the bullet and
install everything from scratch?
Click to expand...

Install everything from scratch, alas. It used to be that one could just
slap the OS on top of what you had, but I found it saved a lot of time later
on if one just installed it all from scratch. Like it or not there's still
not a substitute for post-it notes with login information etc. I frankly
doubt that the Settings and Migration Wizard was set up to assimilate 98se
settings etc. I'm about to try out the Wizard on my new PCs and will so
report.

--
Stephen Goodman

* Cartoons about DVDs and Stuff
* http://www.earthlight.net/HiddenTrack
* The Loop Of The Week since 1996!
* http://www.earthlight.net/Studios
 
My existing system is a Pentium III 450, 320 m ram, 80 g hdd. My new
system will have an AMD 64 3400+, 1g ram with the same 80 g hdd for
starters. I've upgraded before, to avoid wiping my drive and
reinstalling everything, I take a short cut. Just before shutting down
the old system, I delete all the motherboard and machine related stuff
from the device manager that won't be in the new system. That way plug
'n play insures that the right stuff is installed.

I will be working with a bare bones system that has the video, sound,
and Ethernet onboard. My question is this. Would it be better to
install the Win XP SP 2 upgrade over the 98SE on the old machine and do
my shortcut? Or, should I do my shortcut transfer the drive and then
upgrade the OS? It should be noted on the new system the 1g ram is dual
channel. Which is more efficient of the two? Or should I bite the bullet
and install everything from scratch?
Click to expand...


I'd do it all from scratch. You might get it to boot ok, but I
guarantee that you won't be getting the best performance that you
could.
 
Brian K said:
My existing system is a Pentium III 450, 320 m ram, 80 g hdd. My new
system will have an AMD 64 3400+, 1g ram with the same 80 g hdd for
starters. I've upgraded before, to avoid wiping my drive and
reinstalling everything, I take a short cut. Just before shutting down
the old system, I delete all the motherboard and machine related stuff
from the device manager that won't be in the new system. That way plug
'n play insures that the right stuff is installed.

I will be working with a bare bones system that has the video, sound,
and Ethernet onboard. My question is this. Would it be better to
install the Win XP SP 2 upgrade over the 98SE on the old machine and do
my shortcut? Or, should I do my shortcut transfer the drive and then
upgrade the OS? It should be noted on the new system the 1g ram is dual
channel. Which is more efficient of the two? Or should I bite the bullet
and install everything from scratch?
Click to expand...

I would try moving to WinXP SP2, before changing motherboards.

I think the Nforce3 chipset (AGP) would have worked with Win98,
but I don't know what Win98 would do if it ran into some PCI
Express slots. So if this was my experiment, I'd want the
WinXP SP2 on there first. Not that I expect this to be
easy to do, or go well or anything :-)

One of my practices, is to clone the disk as a backup
procedure. If the disk is trashed for some obscure reason
I never considered, all my data is still intact on the
cloned disk. Makes "picking up the pieces after a train
wreck" a lot easier.

Also, it is a good idea to leave the old system intact,
and use a new computer case and power supply for the new
system. It isn't a lot of fun sharing components and having
to reassemble the old hardware, because you forgot one tiny
step in your disk prep for the new system. Ask me why I
know this :-)

Paul
 
Brian K said:
My existing system is a Pentium III 450, 320 m ram, 80 g hdd. My new
system will have an AMD 64 3400+, 1g ram with the same 80 g hdd for
starters. I've upgraded before, to avoid wiping my drive and reinstalling
everything, I take a short cut. Just before shutting down the old system,
I delete all the motherboard and machine related stuff from the device
manager that won't be in the new system. That way plug 'n play insures
that the right stuff is installed.

I will be working with a bare bones system that has the video, sound, and
Ethernet onboard. My question is this. Would it be better to install
the Win XP SP 2 upgrade over the 98SE on the old machine and do my
shortcut? Or, should I do my shortcut transfer the drive and then upgrade
the OS? It should be noted on the new system the 1g ram is dual channel.
Which is more efficient of the two? Or should I bite the bullet and
install everything from scratch?
Click to expand...

I'd go for option 3:

A) Back up all important data files to CDR or some other external device
(flash drive?)
B) After building new system, format hard drive and install Windows 98SE
C) Right after Vista is released, buy another 1Gig stick of RAM so that
you can take advantage of the OEM discount for buying Windows Vista

Screw XP SP2. It's a decent OS, but to buy it now is just downright silly.
However, it is always a good idea to wipe the hard drive clean during a
major hardware upgrade like replacing the mainboard and CPU. -Dave
 
I'd go for option 3:

A) Back up all important data files to CDR or some other external device
(flash drive?)
B) After building new system, format hard drive and install Windows 98SE
C) Right after Vista is released, buy another 1Gig stick of RAM so that
you can take advantage of the OEM discount for buying Windows Vista

Screw XP SP2. It's a decent OS, but to buy it now is just downright silly.
Click to expand...

Nobody knows when Vista will really be out, and how long it'll take
after that before it is stable. XP is here, it works, and it runs
quite fast on just about anything you can buy today.
 
X-No-Archive:yes

You should do a fresh install from scratch onto a new
hard drive .. 160 gig. Slave your old drive to the new
drive and just copy your data files to where you need
them. You might be able to recover your email by
doing an export-import of everything, but that can be
iffy depending on how uptodate your old system was.
Regardless, installing an NTFS system over a Fat32
is a big mistake. You will never clean off the low level
drivers, and your new system will run flakey.

johns
 
Thanks everybody for responding so far. I'm a bit confused. Isn't an
Upgrade copy of XP SP2 designed to work with 98SE converting it's files
and drivers over into the XP format?

--
________
To email me, Edit "blog" from my email address.
Brian M. Kochera
"Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once!"
View My Web Page: http://home.earthlink.net/~brian1951
 
Thanks everybody for responding so far. I'm a bit confused. Isn't an
Click to expand...
Upgrade copy of XP SP2 designed to work with 98SE converting it's files
and drivers over into the XP format?
Click to expand...
Designed, yes. Effective sometimes. Imo better to buy a full version
and get all the cleaning done you've been meaning to do for years at
the same time.
 
Brian K said:
My existing system is a Pentium III 450, 320 m ram, 80 g hdd. My new
system will have an AMD 64 3400+, 1g ram with the same 80 g hdd for
starters. I've upgraded before, to avoid wiping my drive and
reinstalling everything, I take a short cut. Just before shutting down
the old system, I delete all the motherboard and machine related stuff
from the device manager that won't be in the new system. That way plug
'n play insures that the right stuff is installed.

I will be working with a bare bones system that has the video, sound,
and Ethernet onboard. My question is this. Would it be better to
install the Win XP SP 2 upgrade over the 98SE on the old machine and do
my shortcut? Or, should I do my shortcut transfer the drive and then
upgrade the OS? It should be noted on the new system the 1g ram is dual
channel. Which is more efficient of the two? Or should I bite the bullet
and install everything from scratch?
Click to expand...
start from scratch, if you don't and you acquire an OS problem, you'll
never know if the 'upgrade' caused it. Then you'll be doing it from scratch
anyway. I find that an upgrade from one OS to another, causes weird video
driver problems and I seem to have to spend allot of time fixing 3d gaming
glitches. 98 to XP is a pretty big leap and I think your going to lose the
advantages of the NTFS.
 
Brian K said:
Thanks everybody for responding so far. I'm a bit confused. Isn't an
Upgrade copy of XP SP2 designed to work with 98SE converting it's files
and drivers over into the XP format?
Click to expand...

Yes, you can do that, but it's a really bad idea. One of the best reasons
to upgrade is to convert to NTFS file system. You can't do that with an
upgrade, you need to re-partition the disk.

But again, I'd wait until Vista is released to buy a new OS. -Dave
 
start from scratch, if you don't and you acquire an OS problem, you'll
never know if the 'upgrade' caused it. Then you'll be doing it from scratch
anyway. I find that an upgrade from one OS to another, causes weird video
driver problems and I seem to have to spend allot of time fixing 3d gaming
glitches. 98 to XP is a pretty big leap and I think your going to lose the
advantages of the NTFS.
Click to expand...
Ok. I have another question that's related. I have an external backup
drive where I have copies of downloaded programs, data files,
Thunderbird mail, applications. Will NTFS XP on my main HDD be able to
see the backup drive which was partitioned and backed up under 98SE?

--
________
To email me, Edit "blog" from my email address.
Brian M. Kochera
"Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once!"
View My Web Page: http://home.earthlink.net/~brian1951
 
Brian K said:
My existing system is a Pentium III 450, 320 m ram, 80 g hdd. My new
system will have an AMD 64 3400+, 1g ram with the same 80 g hdd for
starters. I've upgraded before, to avoid wiping my drive and reinstalling
everything, I take a short cut. Just before shutting down the old system,
I delete all the motherboard and machine related stuff from the device
manager that won't be in the new system. That way plug 'n play insures
that the right stuff is installed.

I will be working with a bare bones system that has the video, sound, and
Ethernet onboard. My question is this. Would it be better to install
the Win XP SP 2 upgrade over the 98SE on the old machine and do my
shortcut? Or, should I do my shortcut transfer the drive and then upgrade
the OS? It should be noted on the new system the 1g ram is dual channel.
Which is more efficient of the two? Or should I bite the bullet and
install everything from scratch?

--
________
To email me, Edit "blog" from my email address.
Brian M. Kochera "Some mistakes are too much fun to only make once!"
View My Web Page: http://home.earthlink.net/~brian1951
Click to expand...

Definately bite the bullet and install everything from scratch!
My Nforce4 motherboard does NOT support Win98.
Mike.
 
Brian K said:
Ok. I have another question that's related. I have an external backup
drive where I have copies of downloaded programs, data files,
Thunderbird mail, applications. Will NTFS XP on my main HDD be able to
see the backup drive which was partitioned and backed up under 98SE?
Click to expand...


in short Yes. And XP is WAYYYYY better at recognizing USB mass storage
 
No. It can't handle the board or that much RAM. It would be a
disaster.
Nobody knows when Vista will really be out, and how long it'll take
after that before it is stable. XP is here, it works, and it runs
quite fast on just about anything you can buy today.
Click to expand...

Amen.

Charlie
 
If you want to avoid unending headaches and nasty Registry errors, do the
right thing and install the OS from scratch. You'll thank yourself down the
road. Upgrades from Win 98 to XP are notorious for failing.
 
Brian K said:
Thanks everybody for responding so far. I'm a bit confused.
Click to expand...

By not getting the answer you wanted. You could have tried limiting
our options, but that probably wouldn't have worked either.
Isn't an Upgrade copy of XP SP2 designed to work with 98SE
converting it's files and drivers over into the XP format?
Click to expand...

Firstly, you should already have a removable media copy of any
important files. A USB flash drive works nicely. The suggestion
about cloning is a good one too IMO.

As almost everyone is telling you, doing a clean install on a newly
formatted hard drive is best. The upgrade copy should work just fine
for that.
 
Like some of the other posters here, I don't see why
you want XP if you don't need it for something
specific. If you really want it, you can buy the OEM
version online for about $90, similar to the upgrade
CD price bought at retail. Then you don't need to risk
the upgrade problems. (As far as I know that's
perfectly legal. Tigerdirect.com, for instance, has
it listed for sale.)

If you stick with '98: Stick with only 500 MB memory.
Research the board. Via and Sis have Win9x drivers
but some onchip sound and video no longer does.

Intel stopped supporting 9x, I think, with the 945 line.
NVidia GeForce stopped with v. 3. ATI Radeon just
started supporting Linux but doesn't support Win9x.
Etc.

I've just been researching this myself because I
use Win98SE and I've built machines for others
that run 98 or ME.
I wanted to figure out what kind of Win9x support
was available before it's gone, and stock up, because
I don't want myself or friends to get stuck having to
use XP or even worse, Vista.
(I expect to eventually transition to Linux but want to
make sure that I'm not *pushed* into it for lack of
hardware support.)
 
mayayana said:
I've just been researching this myself because I
use Win98SE and I've built machines for others
that run 98 or ME.
Click to expand...

That's cruel.
I wanted to figure out what kind of Win9x support
was available before it's gone, and stock up, because
I don't want myself or friends to get stuck having to
use XP or even worse, Vista.
(I expect to eventually transition to Linux but want to
make sure that I'm not *pushed* into it for lack of
hardware support.)
Click to expand...

I've been telling my neighbors to buy Windows XP. I do things the
easy way and messing with Windows 9x is the hard way. I wish I had
switched to XP one or two years earlier, but maybe the extended
struggle with Windows 9x was useful for something. Good luck with
your struggle.
 
That's cruel.


I've been telling my neighbors to buy Windows XP. I do things the
easy way and messing with Windows 9x is the hard way. I wish I had
switched to XP one or two years earlier...
Click to expand...

I suspect that if you really felt confident in
that decision then you wouldn't feel a need to
issue such a forceful rebuttal out of thin air -
without the least bit of curiosity about my reasoning
or about the circumstances. (Not that I want to
start a new debate about XP. :)
 
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