Best version of Windows

LittleJay, post: 31579, member: 114 said:

That is quite the collection you there Wenda!

It's not bad, no.

Last 'score' was only a few months ago, I walked into a local op-shop and there, in a glass cabinet, keeping a couple of PC and Playstation games company was...

A boxed copy of Windows XP Pro SP2, still in its original shrink-wrap!
For only $5.00 Aus.

Sadly it's no longer in the shrink-wrap as I needed to use the disk, my old original one was beyond using due to age, scratches etc.


Wenda.

I voted for Seven but I used 95a 95 OSR2 with FAT 32 and USB and 98 version 1 and 98SE and knew no better till I got NT4 SP5 then 6A, that would multi task properly. Winamp would play music while you were playing Quake networked against the wife LOL. I really liked NT4 because it did as it was told and was not plug and play except for an add on on the CD.Then I got 2000 about a year after it came out. That was probably the peak. MS would add compatibility packs releases to make games and software work on the new OS. It was the start of the rot of Professional Workstations being dumbed down by consumer junk. XP was absolute crap when it came out and was not much cop until SP3 when I moved to it. Vista SP2 worked well on my system as does 7. I have now got 2 powerful machines one with an SSD and the other with regular spinners and I have heavily customized Windows 8.11 with Classic Shell and a bunch of Windows tweaks just how I like it. The only thing I can say is 7 LOOKS better than 8.x to my eyes on my $350 LG 16:10 monitors. Yes I am very fussy with picture quality having been in TV engineering for 30 + years. There is something different about the lower quality graphics engine in 8.x that does not draw such a nice screen. Honest I can see it plain as day on my machines running the same looking desktop and the same programs. If 8.2 has Aero it would be a winner no kidding. [ATTACH=full]1271[/ATTACH]

Well, I just went back to Windows 7 Pro. Yes, Windows 8.1 is very good but I really don't make use of the "apps" that much so I went back to 7. It seems to run faster on my current PC and I like it a bit more.

It seems to run faster on my current PC and I like it a bit more.

Windows 8 boots up and shuts down noticeably faster on my PC than 7. Other than that, once either OS is up and running, I don't notice any difference in performance.

Lee, post: 32844, member: 135 said:

I have never gone backwards. Once I put a new OS on a computer it stays until a new OS comes out. For an example my iMac 27 now has the developer preview 2 of 10.10, and that will be on there until the finished version of 10.10 hits the street. Not really sure why albeit going backwards always felt like I was unable to learn something new. . .just me. . .:)

I'm not concerned as much about learning new features in an operating system as much as I want to use one that suits my needs the best. At the moment Windows 7 meets my need far better than Windows 8.1 does. I have no need for apps and small improvement in boot up and shut down don't make it worth it for me at least.

Overall, I want an OS that just does what it's supposed to, allow me to run the programs I want to. No more, no less. IMO, Windows 8.1 has too much fluff.

jimbo45, post: 33034, member: 69 said:

Hi there

I found W2003 SERVER actually the best OS -- I did a few things to get it to work as a desktop OS and it performed blindingly well -- It was based on W2000 and W2000 server rather than the "dumbed down" consumer version of XP. I still use it as a VM (it's still got a little while to go before EOL).

I used the tips here to convert to a Desktop OS. ( I was lucky because I got W2K3 Server for FREE on a training program so I thought I'd still use it !!).

http://www.msfn.org/win2k3/

Cheers
jimbo

Did much the same thing with Windows Server 2008R2
http://www.win2008r2workstation.com/

Works like a dream.