Time for a new operating system??

webster72n wrote:
|| Just for the record, these are 'minor' occurrences and can easily be
|| fixed by either using Tweak UI, or IE Repair in Add/Remove Programs.
|| Once the system is stabilized, it will most likely stay that way.


I've TweakUI'd and Repair IE'd quite a bit over the years. I've come to the
conclusion that if the only way to stabilize WinME is by turning features
off, and imposing other restrictions such as ram/vcache, etc... then it's
obvious that WinME can't do what it was expected to do.

It basically irks me that WinME is so tempermental with more than 512ram.
Another problem it seems to have is accepting a new AGP video card that I
researched to be WinME compatible. I really wanted to increase the video ram
from 64meg to 128meg and obtain dual DVI/VGA output for supporting a future
LCD screen. The card installed OK, but the performance was problematic.
However, Ubuntu had absolutely no problem with it.

Time to say "solong WinME and thanks or all the fishy performance". .

Use a 2001 Gateway w/Win ME and IE6 as a second computer. Email, surf if
someone on main, games that won't play on Vista, etc..
It is slow, but most of my problems are with MS sites. Took about six tries
w/reboot to reply to this message.
It feels that MS has not only stopped supporting older systems, but is
making it harder for them to interface with MS sites.
Presently have comps with Vista, XP sp2, ME, and 98 in house. All are up to
date with last downloads for each system, but both 98 and ME have problems
with MS sites since the sites have been updated.

" wrote:

I used winme just until a little after they stopped offering support
and they admitted, at the very end, that it was a dud that cannot be
secured. I found windows2000 that I like and is supported but how
about trying Linux and give up the spyware virus magnet, especially on
a system that cannot even be secured in the first place.

Try PcLinux, get the minime version. Simply download the ISO file and
burn it to a CD with DeepBurner and
set your BIOS to boot fropm the CD drive and reboot. Use the system
from your hard drive and decide
if you like it or not. If you like it install it.

"Ogg" wrote in message
...
webster72n wrote:
|| Just for the record, these are 'minor' occurrences and can easily be
|| fixed by either using Tweak UI, or IE Repair in Add/Remove Programs.
|| Once the system is stabilized, it will most likely stay that way.


I've TweakUI'd and Repair IE'd quite a bit over the years. I've come to
the
conclusion that if the only way to stabilize WinME is by turning features
off, and imposing other restrictions such as ram/vcache, etc... then it's
obvious that WinME can't do what it was expected to do.

It basically irks me that WinME is so tempermental with more than 512ram.
Another problem it seems to have is accepting a new AGP video card that I
researched to be WinME compatible. I really wanted to increase the video
ram
from 64meg to 128meg and obtain dual DVI/VGA output for supporting a
future
LCD screen. The card installed OK, but the performance was problematic.
However, Ubuntu had absolutely no problem with it.

Time to say "solong WinME and thanks or all the fishy performance". .

I've tried to "interview" Ubuntu, but my bios refused to cooperate, to the
dismay of Alias, who blamed it on me. If I would want to install Ubuntu or
any other Linux system, I will have to have a newer motherboard or a new
machine.
For that reason I am hanging on to my present setup with ME, since it
fullfills my needs for the time being and with the least amount of trouble
(none of the stuff you are talking about).
You mentioned ME being temperamental when using more than 512 MB's of Ram,
that's only normal, because it's the limit.
All in all, I'm still having fun with WinME.
C U later....

Harry.

I've TweakUI'd and Repair IE'd quite a bit over the years. I've come
to the conclusion that if the only way to stabilize WinME is by
turning features off, and imposing other restrictions such as
ram/vcache, etc... then it's obvious that WinME can't do what it was
expected to do.

I'm sorry but that's absolute rubbish and I'm surprised that you make such
a statement. Take RAM for example, Systems simply didn't have 1 or 2GB of
RAM when Win Me was developed in 1999. During testing I was running with
384MB of RAM and that put my PC in the top 1% of machines being used for
testing. The same can also be said for hard drives and their capacity
where anything over 32GB was considered big. Even XP released in 2001
didn't support drives larger than 137GB until SP1 and then badly with the
problems being ironed out for SP2 released in late 2004. Processors much
the same, 400MHz was around the fastest processors in use at the time.
Faster processors need new bioses and microcode and Win Me in common with
Win 98SE was never updated for such cpus.

Win Me continues to do exactly what it was designed to do, that is to run
pretty well on hardware common in the domestic environment in 2000 so I'm
sorry to say your statement that Win Me "can't do what it was expected to
do" has little or no relation to reality.

Nevertheless it is now 2008 and unless one is still running late last
century hardware or has a specific task that requires a Win 9x platform
then it is time to move on and has been for the last three years or so.
As for the best platform for your needs, that's for you to choose.

"..thanks or all the fishy performance".

Shame you didn't fix your problems years ago, others did. g
--
Mike Maltby




Ogg wrote:

I've TweakUI'd and Repair IE'd quite a bit over the years. I've come
to the conclusion that if the only way to stabilize WinME is by
turning features off, and imposing other restrictions such as
ram/vcache, etc... then it's obvious that WinME can't do what it was
expected to do.
It basically irks me that WinME is so tempermental with more than
512ram. Another problem it seems to have is accepting a new AGP video
card that I researched to be WinME compatible. I really wanted to
increase the video ram from 64meg to 128meg and obtain dual DVI/VGA
output for supporting a future LCD screen. The card installed OK,
but the performance was problematic. However, Ubuntu had absolutely
no problem with it.
Time to say "solong WinME and thanks or all the fishy performance". .

It feels that MS has not only stopped supporting older systems, but is
making it harder for them to interface with MS sites.

If on the other hand you were to use a news client to post to this
newsgroup you would have no problems. Your posting problem is down to
attempting to use Microsoft's poor web interface to these newsgroups which
is equally poor regardless of the operating system used by the user.
--
Mike Maltby



dlsayremn wrote:

Use a 2001 Gateway w/Win ME and IE6 as a second computer. Email, surf
if someone on main, games that won't play on Vista, etc..
It is slow, but most of my problems are with MS sites. Took about six
tries w/reboot to reply to this message.
It feels that MS has not only stopped supporting older systems, but is
making it harder for them to interface with MS sites.
Presently have comps with Vista, XP sp2, ME, and 98 in house. All are
up to date with last downloads for each system, but both 98 and ME
have problems with MS sites since the sites have been updated.

Ogg wrote:
wrote:
|| Ogg wrote:
||| 2000. WinME itself doesn't provide anything extraordinary to
||| compel me to stay with it. I've tested Ubuntu and a few other
||| distro's with the pc (and the full 756meg), and the results are
||| much more satisfactory.
||
|| If you liked Ubuntu OK then do consider trying PcLinux minime. It
|| installs in I'd say around 5 minutes and isn't packed with a bunch of
|| programs that try to fit into every persons attraction.


Thanks for the heads-up on that. I had heard about PcLinux elsewhere. I'm
not sure if I would settle for the minime version, but I'm going to take a
look.


|| You simply use the synaptic package manager to install programs.
|| Which is another
|| nice thing, you don't have to go to different web sites to download
|| and then install programs. The package manager does it all for you.


That's a plus. I am basically planning to retire my WinME system to do
just www, email, some basic photo editing, and music collections. I feel
much more comfortable doing all that in a Linux environment than the current
tempermental WinME.

Yea, I used ME through it's entire supported lifecycle anbd got my use
out of it. It's definitely not mandatory to all get the new whatever
that comes out in life, but just do what works for you.

Mike M wrote:
Do you have more than one partition on that drive or are you running it as
a single C: drive? If so, then delays are to be expected. Regardless of
the OS keep the system drive clean and lean and place the date elsewhere.
Scandisk and defrags take but a few seconds on my Win Me system where the
partition containing the OS is about 2.5GB.
--
Mike Maltby


It's definitely a good option for anybody and even everybody to create
and use at least another drive. Keeping up on defrag and scandisk this
way you can have a pretty lean fast system using a small amount of
space with ME.

Because when windows fragments I believe the fragments end up here
there and everywhere on the drive.
--
I put in 318 MB of ram into my WinME box from 64MBs and it it really
woke up and defrag worked waay faster

I liked ME cause it was just simply an operating system that did what
I told it to. Sure I had problems but it served me well. Me
personally, the reason I bring up the PCLInux and Linux in general is
that it was like the upgrade that woke up my computer all over again.
I have a far newer one that has XP and a Linux on it but
I don't really use it very much.

webster72n wrote:
"Ogg" wrote in message
...
webster72n wrote:
|| Just for the record, these are 'minor' occurrences and can easily be
|| fixed by either using Tweak UI, or IE Repair in Add/Remove Programs.
|| Once the system is stabilized, it will most likely stay that way.


I've TweakUI'd and Repair IE'd quite a bit over the years. I've come to
the
conclusion that if the only way to stabilize WinME is by turning features
off, and imposing other restrictions such as ram/vcache, etc... then it's
obvious that WinME can't do what it was expected to do.

It basically irks me that WinME is so tempermental with more than 512ram.
Another problem it seems to have is accepting a new AGP video card that I
researched to be WinME compatible. I really wanted to increase the video
ram
from 64meg to 128meg and obtain dual DVI/VGA output for supporting a
future
LCD screen. The card installed OK, but the performance was problematic.
However, Ubuntu had absolutely no problem with it.

Time to say "solong WinME and thanks or all the fishy performance". .

I've tried to "interview" Ubuntu, but my bios refused to cooperate, to the
dismay of Alias, who blamed it on me. If I would want to install Ubuntu or
any other Linux system, I will have to have a newer motherboard or a new
machine.

Well, that's not necessarily true, Linux has been around for a long
while and many distributions will accommodate all kinds of older
systems. The name Linux is kind of generic when it comes to what
the distributions can accomplish and or designed to accomplish. I
personally wouldn't recommend
Ubuntu as the first choice for Linux to anybody, even if I figured it
would probably work well for them.

As far as a new motherboard goes, wow, I recently 'nearly' got a new
one but luckily with a chain of benign events, I realized that could
have been kind of more than an annoyance that it would have been worth
for
me.

For what it's worth I live near a microcenter computer store and they
often have motherboard CPU combos
for less than $80.00, I hope that within a few months to build a new
system.

Mike M wrote:
|| I'm sorry but that's absolute rubbish and I'm surprised that you
|| make such a statement. Take RAM for example, Systems simply didn't
|| have 1 or 2GB of RAM when Win Me was developed in 1999..

Review your research. I purchased a 1gig-capable 1ghz pc in 1999. The
basic purchase configuration was 128meg ram. I requested a total of 256meg
(with one module) which raised the price by atleast $200 at the time. And
THAT configuration was on its way out of the market already. Granted..
WinME was on its way out of the market by then as well, replaced by XP. But
I decided to stay with the pre-built WinME pc because the price was about
half of a XP system at the time.


|| ....The same can also be
|| said for hard drives and their capacity where anything over 32GB was
|| considered big.

My pc had 40gig. 40giggers were quite readily available. Yes.. I thought
that would be plenty at the time.


|| .. Processors much the same,
|| 400MHz was around the fastest processors in use at the time.

You have your dates mixed up. 1gHz CPUs were very common in 1999/2000.


|| Win Me continues to do exactly what it was designed to do, that is
|| to run pretty well on hardware common in the domestic environment in
|| 2000..

If you have to disable features in an OS to reach an acceptable level of
performance, then the OS was designed poorly and could NOT do was it was
expected to do with all those features.


||| "so long WinME and thanks or all the fishy performance".
||
|| Shame you didn't fix your problems years ago, others did. g


My first 2 years of usung WinME were hell. Then I discovered this ng and a
couple of other fine WinME support forums. I received a lot of helpful hints
and tips from the folks here, including you. Then the next 4 years of using
WinME went fairly smoothly. But the common concensus was to disable a pile
of WinME features, reduce settings, and even delete certain WinME components
such as PCHealth. I did all that. WinME was "usable" again. But there
still existed the strange way that the Explore process would refresh the
desktop and jumble the icons, and the occasional lock-up when the pc was
just sitting idle! I tolerated most of that rather well. Recently, in the
last 2 years since I added 512meg more ram and did some more WinME "fixes",
the performance has not been good. The whole idea with adding more ram was
so that I could have more windows open and switch between 3 or 4 apps.
That's not an extraordinary expectation. With the ram upgrade, WinME has
trouble managing more windows.

I don't want to downgrade my existing hardware, and I don't want to waste
any more $'s on new stuff, OS nor HW. I want to keep the total 756meg of
ram. I want to re-install my new/old 128meg AGP with dual VGA/DVI and TV
Out ports. It's all brand-new WinME-ready hardware from 2000. There is
nothing wrong with the hardware.

Unlike you, my computing needs have grown a little bit. I can't stay with
WinME if it can't support a basic hardware upgrade from its own era. From
my exposure to the various Linuxes, the change will be a kind of breath of
fresh air as well.

Review your dates. Win Me wasn't even released until June 2000. My cpu
comments were out by about a year.

You have your dates mixed up. 1gHz CPUs were very common in
1999/2000.

Simply not true. The first 1GHz cpus were not released until May 2000.

Pentium IIIs Slot I Katami's were first available in May 1999 with a
600MHz version being released in August 1999. These were replaced by
Coppermines using socket 370 in October 1999 with a 1 GHz version released
in May 2000 so yes, this would have been at the same time that Win Me was
released but to say that they were common in 1999 is false and not true
either of 2000 other than for top of the range systems. Tulatins ranging
from 1GHz to 1.4GHz were first released during 2001.

And THAT configuration was on its way out of the market already.

Simply untrue..

Unlike you, my computing needs have grown a little bit.

Oh dear. Such complete and total ignorance and perhaps sum up your post.
You have absolutely no idea about my computing needs let alone the
hardware and operating systems that I am running. I haven't used Win Me
other than in a support role since September 2000 when I first started
running XP although I do still have a Celeron 333MHz with 256MB that ran
flawlessly for years and was used by my family. Much of my Win Me support
is by running Win Me in a virtual machine.

From my exposure to the various Linuxes, the change will be a
kind of breath of fresh air as well

Some might say the same would be true if you and perhaps myself were to
cease posting to this newsgroup.
--
Mike Maltby



Ogg wrote:

Mike M wrote:
I'm sorry but that's absolute rubbish and I'm surprised that you
make such a statement. Take RAM for example, Systems simply didn't
have 1 or 2GB of RAM when Win Me was developed in 1999..

Review your research. I purchased a 1gig-capable 1ghz pc in 1999. The
basic purchase configuration was 128meg ram. I requested a total
of 256meg (with one module) which raised the price by atleast $200 at
the time. And THAT configuration was on its way out of the market
already. Granted.. WinME was on its way out of the market by then as
well, replaced by XP. But I decided to stay with the pre-built WinME
pc because the price was about half of a XP system at the time.


....The same can also be
said for hard drives and their capacity where anything over 32GB was
considered big.

My pc had 40gig. 40giggers were quite readily available. Yes.. I
thought that would be plenty at the time.


.. Processors much the same,
400MHz was around the fastest processors in use at the time.

You have your dates mixed up. 1gHz CPUs were very common in
1999/2000.

Win Me continues to do exactly what it was designed to do, that is
to run pretty well on hardware common in the domestic environment in
2000..

If you have to disable features in an OS to reach an acceptable level
of performance, then the OS was designed poorly and could NOT do was
it was expected to do with all those features.


"so long WinME and thanks or all the fishy performance".

Shame you didn't fix your problems years ago, others did. g


My first 2 years of usung WinME were hell. Then I discovered this ng
and a couple of other fine WinME support forums. I received a lot of
helpful hints and tips from the folks here, including you. Then the
next 4 years of using WinME went fairly smoothly. But the common
concensus was to disable a pile of WinME features, reduce settings,
and even delete certain WinME components such as PCHealth. I did
all that. WinME was "usable" again. But there still existed the
strange way that the Explore process would refresh the desktop and
jumble the icons, and the occasional lock-up when the pc was just
sitting idle! I tolerated most of that rather well. Recently, in the
last 2 years since I added 512meg more ram and did some more WinME
"fixes", the performance has not been good. The whole idea with
adding more ram was so that I could have more windows open and switch
between 3 or 4 apps. That's not an extraordinary expectation. With
the ram upgrade, WinME has trouble managing more windows.
I don't want to downgrade my existing hardware, and I don't want to
waste any more $'s on new stuff, OS nor HW. I want to keep the total
756meg of ram. I want to re-install my new/old 128meg AGP with dual
VGA/DVI and TV Out ports. It's all brand-new WinME-ready hardware
from 2000. There is nothing wrong with the hardware.

Unlike you, my computing needs have grown a little bit. I can't stay
with WinME if it can't support a basic hardware upgrade from its own
era. From my exposure to the various Linuxes, the change will be a
kind of breath of fresh air as well.