Drivers

[andrei]

Now I'm confused, I always thought Windows 2000 was the merger of Windows 9* and Windows NT and that they wanted to do everything in a single OS.

[fluggo99]

Yeah, and I heard there were three!!

Would that be Win2K Pro, Win2K Lite, and Win2K Piece of Junk?

[andrei]

Piece of junk or no, it will overtake Win 98 as Win 98 overtook Win 95.

The time of upgrade counts, you'll have to upgrade when it's more stable, let other people, more experienced people get the first realeas, enrage themselves, and the buy it, after Microsoft does some modifications, when they fix the major bugs. Or when maybe the price will drop a bit, like Microsoft will ever drop prices.

Linux is not so appealing when you're looking at games, from that point of view Wind2k becomes more appealing.

Sooner or later we all will switch to Windows 2000, the question is when ?

[This message has been edited by andrei (edited 06 January 2000).]

[Elie]

Here's what Microsoft will release...

1-Windows Millennium, based on Win95 Kernel.
It offers a much more robust OS and more stability than Win9x.

2-Windows 2000 Pro to replace WinNT
workstation based on WinNT Kernel

3-Windows 2000 Server to replace NT 4.0
Server

4-Windows 2000 Advanced server geared to
medium sized companies

5-Windows 2000 Datacenter Server to replace
Windows NT Enterprise geared to large
corporation.

The gamer will most likely buy Windows Millennium, but would preffer Windows 2K professional for it's SMP capabilities which Millennium lacks.

Take your pick.

Besides I wouldn't jump to the conclusion and say it's a piece if junk yet

Cheers,
Elie

[This message has been edited by Elie (edited 06 January 2000).]

[Brian Ellis]

Elie

With one exception (which they did not develop themselves), I've yet to come across a MS software that was not a piece of junk.

Millennium, if it uses the 9x kernel, is destined to be one, because it uses the DOS legacy.

98 was supposed to be "a much more robust OS and more stability than Win95", to use your words - and failed. 98SE ditto and is worse than FE. This is probably just another load of Micros**t crappish hype designed to make fools part with their money again on what should be a free debugging update.

When NT4 was introduced, it was supposed to be perfection, but it was so perfect, how many updates did they issue in a vain attempt to debug it?

And W2000 has been in so-called alpha/beta testing for so long, it is as late as a Matrox software.

I like Linux for its **real** stability - and you can get all the peripherals working straight out of the box, with something akin to PnP. In my case, the only one that failed was the modem. Soundblaster card, CD-ROM, Millennium II, network card, even an 8 bit SCSI card that came with my scanner (which no dialect of Windows will do). As an experiment, I ran Linux for a month without switching off -- or rebooting. I'd be damn lucky to do that for a day with W98 or a week with NT4 -- from bitter experience.

I agree that MS has the OEM market by the short and curlies and as such will dominate the market for a few years to come, but -- excusing the ultra-mixed metaphors -- many knowledgeable people see the light and are putting one cheek of their asses on separate stools, this being the thin end of the wedge for MS. Especially, now that some heavyweights like Sun Microsystems and Corel are embracing Linux philosophy with varying degrees of dedication.

My crystal ball tells me that Linux will be as easy to use as W 200? within one year or two: the momentum has started, like it never did for e.g. OS/2.

This is not only a reaction against unstable Windows, it is also philosophical. Bill Gates tries to play God (he'ld take a royalty on every prayer sent to Him/Her, if he could!), but he forgets he has not the perfection of God. Linux does not have this atrocious arrogance of MS and it is this that annoys users, just as much as buggy software.

BTW, I've just bought a new computer which will be the first dedicated exclusively to Linux (multibooting has always been a weak point, I find).

Whew, having got that lot off my chest...


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Brian (the terrible)