best os for gaming?

[exp]

I use Win98SE for maximum compatibility.

 

[DT4K]

XP also uses NTFS. It doesn't sound like the NTFS aspect of Win2k was a problem.
From my understanding, (I would have to check to make sure) even in un-pretty mode XP loses out to Win2k in performance albeit not as much.

I'm suprised to hear of game incompatabilities with Win2k. It's been around a while and should have had these things worked out. What specific games did you have trouble with ?

I realize XP uses NTFS. Maybe that wasn't the problem. At the time I assumed it was, because when installing, I would get an error message saying there was not enough disk space, even though I had like 8 gigs free. It must have been something about the way the games installer was reading free space, but I'm not sure why it worked fine in XP.

Most of the games I have had problems with have been my kids games designed for win 95/98. Stuff like Reader Rabbit, Sesame Street, etc. I may have been able to get them to work with various patches and updates, but I decided to try XP and I've been very satisfied with it. But if I didn't play games, I would probably run 2K instead. It definitely has a cleaner feel to it.

 

[dietrologia]

I also recommend the dual boot 98se/XP setup. There are just some games that won't run well under XP no matter what I try.

 

[ToXiCRaGE]

I'd say Win 98SE would be the fastest plus it would work with older games but not so stable as Win2K or XP. I am running Win2K Pro now and I absolutely love it - no problems what so ever and it runs fast. As far as I remember there was an article about this on Anandtech (or something close to it) and the fastest one was 98SE>2000>XP. You got to remember though that fps also depend on the type of game you play. The max difference between 98SE and XP in frame rates was less than 10fps.

 

[Salvador]

I dual boot 98SE and XP Pro as well. I find that most of the games that I run do run better in 98SE, so that's why I have it. Everything else I do is in XP Pro.

Sal

 

[travler]

win2k is hands down the best gaming OS. its stable, fast, can handle lots of memory, and compatible with about anything you thrown at it including old DOS games.


I dont reccomend XP unless you like to gamble. From rading numerous tech-forums and gaming-forums XP has graphics problems spanning a very diverse variety of hardware from pentiums to VIA chipsets, from Radeons to Geforces. Symtopms include frequent lockups, BSOD, and or terrible framerates. These problems appear unique to XP and according to VIA labs there is no question it is a winXP bug. However it doesnt affect a majority of users. I experienced the problem with 2 different AMD boxes and about 8 different driver combinations before giving up and going back to win2k.

 

[travler]

Originally posted by: Shanti

It is just as good for gaming and better than XP at pretty much everything else (except for being slow and pretty).

I disagree. 2000 was MS's best OS, but has compatibility issues with many games.

2000 is great for stability. 98 is great for compatibility. XP is great for both.
Half of my games(Win 98 era) would not work properly in win2K. Some wouldn't even install with NTFS.
I had frequent crashes with win98.

Im curtrious what these games are. I have a prety large game library dating back to 1998 and some old DOS games from the 80s that run flawlessy on win2k without any tweaks other than the compatability patch for win2k. I only use NTFS. might as well run win98 if you are going to use FAT32. File system shouldnt matter, though. it is independant of software. Definatly all newer games run on win2k. You might have problems if you are running realy old sound or video cards with. they didnt start making decent drivers for it untill mid 2001.

 

[MWink]

I've always found WinME to run games much faster than XP/2000. Normally I would dual boot but my new Inspiron 8200 does not support WinME at all! :|

 

[NikPreviousAcct]

Originally posted by: Jumpem
I really like XP Pro.

 

[BFG10K]

Windows XP Pro is the fastest and most stable gaming OS while Windows 98SE takes the crown for compatibility.

 

[Turkey22]

ME lol just kidding. Once I get new hardware I'm going to XP Pro.

 

[Hrochard]

XP Pro has been compatible with every game I've tried.

 

[DT4K]

Here's an interesting link with some benchmark comparisons between XP, 2K, and Me.

It looks like XP wins in several, and when it doesn't it is so close that you wouldn't notice the difference.

Those of you who claim XP runs stuff slower and is equivalent to a processor downgrade, could you post some benchmark links?
I'm not saying your wrong, I don't really know, but if you have some evidence to back up your claim, I would like to see it.

 

[DT4K]

Regarding my last post above, it seems there is some disagreement about the performance issue.
This link seems to indicate that 98 performs better than XP.
And this one shows XP outperforming win Me.
So it seems that maybe it depends on a number of factors.

As I stated in a previous post, most of the games I had trouble with in win 2Kwere kids games designed for win 95/98. And it is possible that I could have worked through these issues.

But for me, Win XP Pro has been trouble-free and the performance has been just as good as on win98 (though I didn't benchmark anything).

 

[harbinger52]

Another Vote for XP PRO. Had to go to 512mb of DDR though, 256 was a bit slow.

 

[epsilon]

Originally posted by: Shanti
Here's an interesting link with some benchmark comparisons between XP, 2K, and Me.



Those of you who claim XP runs stuff slower and is equivalent to a processor downgrade, could you post some benchmark links?
I'm not saying your wrong, I don't really know, but if you have some evidence to back up your claim, I would like to see it.

ZDNET ? Are you kidding ? If you want to read an article from a site you can trust you can start with one written for the very site we're jabbering on.
Anandtech's Own Article On WinXP. Subtitled "feel the pain"

Seriously, ZDNET is a joke. Ever read their print publications ? I gave up on them a long time ago.

 

[HJB417]

Originally posted by: magneto125
I was just wondering whats the best windows os to use for gaming? I'm about to put together a gaming pc and i wanted the best performance. Any input would be appreciated!!!!!

OS/2 Warp. Is anyone with me on this one?

j/k

Win2k/WinXP. I'd try both and see which one works better. I think games run faster in win9x but I don't think there's a big increase in speed. The system stability and system management of win2k/winxp greatly outweigh the possible speed increase of win9x. I think you should dualboot with win95/98 and winXP/2k making winxp/2k your primary OS. There are some games that might not work at all in (anyone got mechwarrior2 series to work in win2k?) so it's usually good to have win95/98 as a second OS for such games.

Hardware and drivers play an important role though. People can give you the general stats here but I think it's best you either tell us the system specs or benchmark the system with each OS yourself.

 

[Sunner]

Win2K.

I've seen people say XP is better from a compability point of view, but I've never seen anyone mention what games work so much better.

The only difference I saw between Win2K and XP in terms of compability was that Motorhead wouldn't run on XP, while it runs perfectly on Win2K.