"Hiker" <nospam@hiker.com> wrote:
XP Upgrades can and do work very well. In fact, I will match the
performance of my Windows XP system, which started at Windows 3.11 and
has been upgraded (and moved to new hardware) over the years to
Windows 95, Windows 95B, Windows 98, Windows 98 SE, Windows Me,
Windows XP Home, and now Windows XP Pro, against a clean install in
terms of both stability and performance. It boots in less than a
minute (1.7 ghz Celeron with 512 mb RAM)
During the beta testing of Windows XP I tried both clean installs and
upgrade installs of the same version on several different occasions.
The only substantive difference that I ever found between an upgrade
install and a clean install was that a clean install was a real
p.i.t.a. because of the additional time that it took to get all of the
applications installed, updated, and configured.
And with Windows XP Microsoft has changed the way that the upgrade
process works. What actually happens when you install Windows XP as
an upgrade is that it:
- renames the existing Windows folder.
- creates a new Windows folder and does a "clean install" of Windows
- imports registry information and needed files and subfolders from
the old Windows folder into the new one.
- deletes the old Windows folder.
So a lot of the excess baggage (old files etc) are dispensed with by
this upgrade procedure.
Having said all this, it is true that not all upgrade installs go
smoothly, but the majority of them do. And if theupgrade does prove
problematic then you still have the option of doing a clean install.
But I am confident that you will find that an upgrade from Windows 98
SE to Windows XP, if properly planned and prepared for, will go well.
See former MVP Gary Woodruff's article on upgrading to XP at
http://aumha.org/win5/a/xpupgrad.htm for some detailed information and
advice on this.
Good luck
Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca
"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."
