WinME vs. Win98SE

[thag]

I've just come from

http://firingsquad.gamers.com/features/winmeeval/default.asp

Quite an intereseting article. I'm getting a new computer soon and would like some user feedback from people who have run both OS's. What say you?

 

[angel1610]

Well to tell you it's more stable (no more blue screen) and game wize well it takes a lot of memorie resources, but it's better for me i find.
Maybe other users don't like it but that you'll be the judge.....

 

[Subsailor]

Try to get ME. It is an upgrade to Win 98SE with some new gui interfaces and "hidden dos" functions. I've tried both and will purchase ME when it is final.

 

[dogbite]

Heres the dirt, I have been running Win ME OEM release for about 3 weeks, I have found that it does not like Aol or bluelight.com free internet software, So i signed up with earthlink. I am running a Athlon based system And I loaded the 2 new amd drivers,ide and agp miniport, From what I have read, alot of people are having trouble with soundblaster live,I am not,One problem I am having is my system will not come out of standby mode, so I disabled it, I did a full install and all went well,All of my games and apps run very good and my system in general seems to be very stable. I think when its released in a couple of weeks you will see much more driver support..
So whats my opinion, its a good O/S and it will only get better..

 

[Blayze]

Im running the final version on my 2nd system (Celeron 466, 96 megs of RAM, etc...)
only problem I had was installing the drivers for the video card.
latest drivers gave me a bsod when I booted up so I had to go into safemode and do a system restore.

loaded the drivers that came with the card (dated 10/97 ) and everything is ok.
btw the card is an old diamond steath 2 (Rendition V2100) running with a Monster 2 (Voodoo 2).

 

[pvanosta]

I'm running WinME on both my systems without any noticeable problems (at least: none I can attribute to the OS).
My first system has the Soundblaster Live running without problems.
My second system has AOL running without any problems.

One tip: make sure you use the latest drivers for all your hardware.

I like WinME. It's more stable and has better hardware support and better USB than Win98SE.

It also appears a little faster.

 

[Dan]

I've used both and I prefer WinME to Win98SE. I have it in two systems and have found it to be more stable, with faster bootups and shutdowns. I have a SoundBlaster Live in one system and use BlueLight as a back-up to my DSL. I haven't had problems with either one.

I don't like the fact that ME is a glutton for resources and that damn System Restore function gobbles up free drive space like a bear at a picnic.

I'm about to try Win2K. Should be interesting.

 

[RJRD2]

I have been runnig Me for a couple weeks..I'm going back to 98se as soon as I get my replacement sound card..If you like blue screens, Me is 4 you!

I have:
p3v4x
550E
cl 32mb gts

 

[xtreme2k]

forget the 2

join the NT/2000 club

1 week no restart now
still as stable as hell
beat that

 

[toenut]

I've been running ME for about two weeks now. Installation was very easy as it detected everything and I had no conflicts with anything. It is running perfectly fine even though I am running stuff like WindowBlinds and Litestep. The only problem I am having and others seem to be having too is that my Palm cradle freezes my system whenever it is plugged in. Hopefully that will get fixed once ME is released. I decided to try 98 yesterday and oh did hell broke loose. My SB Live had conflicts with my Winfast 256 DDR and the game controller drivers stopped my cold in DOS, so I took that line out from the autoexec.bat. Then, when I installed my Netgear network card, my system started freaking out. Right after that I went back to ME where I had no problems once again. So now I'm just waiting for the Palm cradle thing to be fixed so I can finally synch up my two weeks of unsaved data.

 

[jungleman]

Been running ME for about a week now and haven't had any problems with my palm (Vx) syncing (serial) with my pc. You have the latest version of palm desktop? I think its something like 3.0.3.

 

[toenut]

I have a Palm IIIxe as does my roommate. It has nothing to do with the Palm Desktop software because once I have the cradle plugged into my serial port, my system stops responding, so I can't even install the Palm Desktop software. Another guy on this board with a IIIxe had the same problem, so maybe it is something with the Palm III cradles. Anyone else have more info on this?

 

[toenut]

Okay, this is strange. I got it to work, but get this. I have to unplug my cradle when I startup and when I shutdown. If I have it plugged in when I startup, it will get into Windows, but it will not run the shell. If I have it plugged in when I shutdown, the screen will darken, but it just stops there. Once I unplug the cradle the system will continue with the startup or shutdown. Really screwed up, but I guess I will have to live with it.

 

[Raincity]

I have been using winme for two months and it seems more stable to me. The only flaw I have found so far is the properties tab for game controllers shows my MS swidewinder devices as generic when plugged into usb. This was a problem in 98se but Ms had a inf fix for it and the 98se fix doesnt work in winme.

 

[Grminalac]

I have been running the final retail version of ME for quite some time. Although I occasionally run into trouble my system runs stable, with no BSOD since I formatted and reinstalled from scratch. Two minor flaws I have seen. 1. Did not work natively with my scanner, had to download a patch from HP. 2. Quite frequently, even though I properly shutdown, scandisk starts when the comp loads the os and says I had an improper shutdown.
Other than that I'm very happy with the product. Minor problems I had with I.E. and ICQ seem not to trouble me anymore.

 

[stingbandel]

I am running both WIn ME and Win 2K and I prefer Win 2K over Win ME. Both of them are stable and I don't find any problem with both of them but in term of stability maybe I think Win 2K is better. Just my opinion though

Darno

 

[SlickVic]

Have run both the beta and now the final version, and it's rock steady, no BSOD's, and get quick boot-ups.

Do a clean install though, as installing over 98SE was a problem.

 

[FreakAzoid]

If you decide to install Me and you do have problems with a device/driver remove the device/driver and reinstall it BUT use the manufacturers drivers NOT MS's. I had two drivers that didn't want to work correctly so i removed them and let Me reinstall using its drivers but the problem remained. Then I did a remove and used manufacturers and they worked great.

 

[Wooster]

Read Sept issue of PC World and it does have Win98 & WinMe comparison.

 

[csctech]

Does anybody know if Windows ME supports mulitple processors??

 

[SUOrangeman]

No multi-processor supprt in WinME. Same as its predecessors, Win98SE, Win98, Win95, Win 3.1.

-SUO, WinME beta tester

 

[Noirish]

winme is more stable than win98se.
Before I installed winme, I had tried to install win98se on my celeron 850 and asus p3v4x for about 10 times or more.
For each installation, it crashed in the middle of the process, after the completion of the installation, or when new apps is added.
winme gave me a trouble free installation.

The few problems I have with winme is that
- wmp7 crashes too much
- imcompatibility with norton utilities, particularly files in windows\inf\
- matrox driver can't find directx even though winme seems to have directx7a (since it wouldn't allow me to upgrade from 7 to 7a)

overall, it's much better than win98se since it's really just win98 third edition.

 

[thag]

I'd like to thank everyone for responding; it looks like WinME is the way to go for me. I'm currently running Win95. I would probably use W2K except that I really only use it for games and internet ;-)

Thanks again
Regards

 

[Wooster]

Orangle

Windows ME seems having problem with its System File Protection feature. Every time you want to overwrite or update its system files, it will automatically restore to its default files. This feature can't even disable. That's where all the trouble starts. I assuming that's why you can't update your DirectX 7.

Please don't flame me if I am wrong , this is quote from PC World magazine.

 

[masterskartrg]

win me is nice and more stable then Win98 imo but trying to put dx8 from 7 is a b$%*# after months of running me i had to reinstall do to dx8 troublesome