What's the best Windows OS for gaming?

[evlyons]

I hear Win98SE is the best, but with Millenium and WinXP out how do those compare?

-earle.

 

[Agamar]

I am partial to Win2k....It is XP without all the fat.

 

[BigFatCow]

i like 2k, it supports all of my games and runs very stable, but when i had 98 it crashed quite often...

 

[Poontos]

Win98SE -- Probably get the most FPS with this OS. It is stable if setup and proper drivers installed.

WinME -- Crap.

Win2K Pro -- Rock solid. Great app support considering it is was designed to be a workstation OS. Probably the best overall MS OS today.

WinXP Pro -- Pretty solid. Pretty. Too much stuff going on in the background that you do not know about. Too much fluff hiding the rawness (well in comparison to 2000 Pro, not a 'nix OS of course) of what is going on and what happens when you do certain activities.

Your mileage may vary.

 

[Thor86]

Win98SE. But I've heard most recent MS developped games work better under XP. Go figure.

 

[Superwormy]

Win 2k Pro and then Win98 SE, best option is a dual-boot with both

 

[daywalker]

WinME is the king of crashes so stay away. Win98 are much better but they have their bad moments too. I have never tried Win2000 to know what they are and how they work. Right now im running WinXP Pro on my system but if you want to use them for gaming, you re gonna need LOTS of ram on your system. Even 256MB wont be enough to give you a smooth gaming experience (trust me i know). If your memory is above that, then proceed without fear.

 

[evlyons]

Thanks for the input. I am running Win2K right now, and I am still surprised to this day how stable it is. I had tried ME for a few weeks and really know where the term "memory-eater" comes from. It was total junk. Way too many frustrating crashes. Prior to that I ran NT 4.0, and was not into gaming.

I just recently got the "gaming-bug" and had heard that Win2K wasn't worthy of running games. I'm glad to hear different! At the moment, I absolutely refuse going to WinXP, as I want to have control over my OS (I do not want to be required to call M$ if I want to do a clean reinstall, not to mention I want to be able to install it on more than one of my computers).

Thanks for the 411.

-earle.

 

[A-star]

Just use Windows 2000.
It's stable as hell, doesn't have all the bloatware that XP has.
And you can run almost every game on it (some old games don't work on it but I suppose that normal)

 

[crapito]

while I agree with most others that have posted here, especially Poontos, I can't recommend Win2k for the average user, simply cause it's much less user friendly than the Win9x and WinXP "mainstream" OSes. sure, it's stable and robust and if you know what you are doing, probably works very, very well... but, similarly to Linux, it's a difficult migrate for the average Gateway/Dell consumer. just my $.02.

 

[EHobaX]

I would stick to Win 2k. In my experience, I've only found a handful of games that would not work. And most of them sucked anyways. The only one that I couldn't live w/o was my Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2. But there was a patch developed for that, so it does work. Tony Hawk 3 works perfectly.

I've tried the other MS OSes and would stick to 2k. Just b/c an OS is newer doesn't mean it's better.

 

[PizzaDude]

I have 2k and I love it. I am wondering if I should get XP or not. I'm primarily a gamer also.

 

[gsaldivar]

W2K.

*ends discussion*

 

[SinNisTeR]

i hear all these ppl whining about win2k and its game compatibility. for me its played EVERY single game that i installed. and oh boy. did i instal games.

its lite weight, best memory management, stable! i vote win2k!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[evlyons]

VIVA LA WIN2K!!!

-earle.

 

[jlathrop]

Win2K

 

[Demonicon]

If you decide to run XP, you will NEED 512MB or more RAM.

If you try and run any semi-modern game on XP and only have 256MB of RAM, you WILL be miserable.

 

[Pocatello]

W2K for all the new games. Some of favorite games such as Janes F-15 and Microprose European Air War don't work with W2K.

 

[Zoltarc]

<< If you decide to run XP, you will NEED 512MB or more RAM.

If you try and run any semi-modern game on XP and only have 256MB of RAM, you WILL be miserable. >>



No great loss IMO


Windows 2000 for me, espically coupled with SP2

 

[Sunner]

Win2K for me.
Compability between XP and 2K has been equal to me, cept for one thing, Motorhead crashes immediately in XP when run in Win98 compability mode, while 2K runs it flawlessly in comp mode.

Win98 is not stable however you set it up IMO, of course this depends on what your definition of stable is, but 98 doesn't fit anywhere in my definition.

 

[Mem]

Depends on the games,if you run lots of very old games and some use DOS then go Win98SE,however for newer games WinXP is fine,I`ve never had any problems and stability for me is excellent,I guess I`m one very happy XP gamer .

 

[wyvrn]

I did have problems with a few games in Win2k, and I installed a ton of them. Win98SE is better for some games, but Win2k is a much better OS overall. Considering gaming is now a small percentage of my computer usage, I only have a Win98 partition for my wife who just "likes it better".

 

[IwishIcouldprogramandhack]

Depends how tight of a ship you run.

If you are anal, and know how to correctly install a copy of win98 and not really any other apps, but games, then you will have the most speed here. The only way I would recommend this is if, you do a superb install of win 98, tweak it a little, and don't install anything else but the games you intend to play. Every app you install in win98 slows it down and increase its likelyhood of crashing. This will be your fastest option. I have done this before and have loved it. If you do anything else besides games on your computer then dual boot it. Make sure you keep your win98 install clean and no other apps. It must remain pure. If you keep it pure, then it will be as stable as 2k or xp, but with really not other functionality besides alienating your girlfriend .

2k. Well 2k, I can't really speak for as I never played with it. Most of my friends have it, and have loved it. Now they all use XP and love that.

XP. Think of XP as the best of both worlds. You will get almost as much speed as a pure win98 install, but you CAN install other applications. I love winxp, user friendly, fast, stable, etc. I can have all my games installed, icq, aim, office, visual c++, jbuilder, and whatever tickles my fancy, even the crappy shareware/spyware I have to install on occasion doesnt wreck it. If you want to wreck a win98 install, then install as many shareware/freeware file sharing apps as possible. This will strangle it, not so in XP.

I would go with XP personally or a dual of 98 and xp, depending on how tight u can run your ship and if that extra 5 - 10% of speed is worth it.

If you want the fastest possible then create a hybrid 95, 98 install. It removes the IE bloat of 98, but keeps the infintely better memory management of 98 and everything else better about 98. http://www.98lite.net

I use this when speed is the only option. Usually if I want a fresh install for a lan party or something. It simply smokes xp, 2k, and is better than just 98.

Pax.

 

[GeSuN]

I had a couple of compatibility/stability (caused by my hardware) problem with Win2k that I'm not experiencing with XP. I really love 2k but had to changed to XP for more stability...

 

[daywalker]

<< If you decide to run XP, you will NEED 512MB or more RAM.

If you try and run any semi-modern game on XP and only have 256MB of RAM, you WILL be miserable. >>



True... VERY true