Microsoft to no longer support Windows 98- should I upgrade?

[Dis]

I have Win XP pro, but I haven't upgraded yet. Mainly because Windows 98SE seems to be running fine.

Also another major concern I have is that blaster virus/worm.

If I upgrade to XP pro? will my computer be hit? Because if my computer starts shutting down, I will have no way to get the windows update.

[SlowwHand]

Yes. 5 years ago.

[mrmitchell]

download a removal tool ahead of time before you install winxp. then if you get infected you've got the removal tool on a floppy disk

install a good firewall, good antivirus, good antispyware tool as the first thing (although you should already have them.)

and make sure your computer can run winxp adequately, as well.

if you've jumped through all these hoops and each one is a "Yes", then, go ahead and upgrade.

OTOH, microsoft already poorly supports winxp anyways (there's an article on imarton about some patch or something).

[Dis]

why would they poorly support that? What else do they have to support? XP is their premeir OS right?

[Az]

why would they poorly support that? What else do they have to support? XP is their premeir OS right?

[Skanky Burns]

While upgrading is generally a good thing, you will need fairly modern hardware to run a newer OS at a decent speed.

If 98 suits your needs, why bother changing?

[Dis]

I have a P3 700 with 256 megs of ram.

[Adagio]

Double your ram, then WinXP will be the best choice...

[Solver]

I've found that with 256 MB RAM XP runs considerably faster than Win98. Heck, it ran faster for me with 128 MB.

[Dis]

I hope it does. I had trouble installing windows 98 SE on my mom's computer. Instead I installed winows XP pro disk that I have. It seems to run pretty fast. And her computer is a P3 700 with only 128 megs of ram.

I can't see how an OS needs that much ram. Civ3 does- but that's another story

[monkspider]

Go to ME, it's the fastest OS out there.

[Spiffor]

ME is probably the worst OS I've ever seen

I though MS stopped to support Win98 a year ago. I don't think it changes anything, since MS updates for windows are mostly related to security issues, and nobody exploits 98's security holes anymore.

So, keep SE until switching is an absolute necessity, or if you have a high end computer (for which SE wasn't made).

[Kuciwalker]

I wouldn't say ME is the worst, not nearly. I run ME on my older computer, and it runs quite well, and the only real bugginess I ever experienced on it turned out to be due to the age of my mouse.

[monkspider]

I never understood all the ill will towards ME, for my money, it's still the best OS microsoft has ever made.

[Dis]

I admit my main reason to change is for graphics reason. Seeing those desktop threads make me jealous.