Stay With Win98 or upgrade to WinXP?

by ComputerBob

July 18, 2006

This morning, I received an email from an old friend, asking the following:

It's time for us to upgrade and XP Home seemed like the way to go, but I wanted your opinion... would you recommend an upgrade to 98SE or a new install of XP Home? If I upgrade, I'll always have to keep my 98 disk if there is ever a problem and I have to re-install XP, correct? And if I just install XP from scratch, don't I lose everything on my hard drive?

Here is what I wrote in reply:

The only reason I'm finally giving up on Win98SE is because Microsoft ended all support for Windows 98, SE, and ME on July 11.

Here's what I wrote about it in my Journal on that day:

Today is the day that Microsoft ends all support for Windows 98 and ME. For the past few years, the company has been trying to cajole, convince, and scare the 50 million users of those operating systems to upgrade their PCs to Windows XP. That could be a very expensive option for companies and schools whose older PC hardware would also have to be upgraded or replaced in order to run XP. ZDNet thinks that some users might choose to switch to Linux instead. I know that's what I'm hoping to do.

Here's what I wrote in my Journal on July 14:

Now that Microsoft has dropped all support for Windows 98 and ME, users of those older operating systems are trying even harder to support each other. For example, the Unofficial Windows98 Second Edition Service Pack 2.1a site says that it "contains all Windows98 SE updates from Windows Update site and more." I think it's nice that people are trying to help each other, but I have no way to verify whether it works completely correctly and absolutely securely, so I would never trust my computer's reliability or security to any privately produced "Windows Service Pack." That's why I'm trying to replace my old version of Windows with a brand new, free, secure, and fully supported version of Linux. In other words, if you see that the Captain and crew have abandoned the sinking ship, don't trust one of your fellow passengers to keep it afloatâ??find a lifeboat.

Unless you're feeling adventurous, I recommend that you switch to Windows XP Home Edition instead of staying with Win98SE. If you buy the Windows XP Home Edition UPGRADE installation CD (the cheapest way to go), then you will be required to pop your Windows 98 CD in for a few seconds during the XP installation, just to prove that you have the right to upgrade your PC to Windows XP.

If you buy the FULL, non-upgrade XP Home Edition installation CD (which is more expensive), you won't have to "prove" your prior Windows ownership to MS, so you would no longer need to keep your Windows 98 CD.

Even if you use the UPGRADE CD, I recommend that you backup any mportant data on your computer and then FORMAT the hard drive and install Windows XP from scratch, instead of upgrading your existing Windows 98 to Windows XP. The reason being that if you upgrade any existing Windows version to Windows XP, you end up with some old Windows stuff in addition to the new Windows XP stuff. You'll get a much smaller, cleaner, more trouble-free installation of Windows XP if you install it onto a formatted hard drive, which you can do with either the XP UPGRADE CD and the XP FULL CD.

Before you spend money on a Windows XP installation CD, be sure to check the Windows XP Hardware Compatibility List and/or download and run the Windows XP Upgrade Advisor, to see if your current hardware is capable of running Windows XP.

Two days later, I received the following reply from my friend:

"Once again, you prove that you're 'not just another pretty face.'"