Upgrade or Buy New?

[Guest]

I have an older Dell (P3, 733mHz, W98SE). In order to run a new app that
requires XP I need to either upgrade or buy a new box.

I'd like to upgrade since I also own a "never-opened" XP Pro Upgrade and my
closet is starting to fill up with old machines! However, I'm getting
contradictory advice of whether upgrading the old machine will run well or
not. This machine is used for office tasks, email and browsing. No heavy
apps. (I'm guessing that the new XP-only application will be fairly light
since it's a tool eBay provides for people who sell a lot on eBay...why would
they release a resource-intensive product that many of their sellers might
not be able to use? Bad business decision and eBay is a smart company!)

If I upgrade I was planning on boosting RAM to 512.

So, do I upgrade or buy new?

 

[Galen]

In CRWWORKER <[email protected]> had this to say:

My reply is at the bottom of your sent message:

I have an older Dell (P3, 733mHz, W98SE). In order to run a new app
that requires XP I need to either upgrade or buy a new box.

I'd like to upgrade since I also own a "never-opened" XP Pro Upgrade
and my closet is starting to fill up with old machines! However, I'm
getting contradictory advice of whether upgrading the old machine
will run well or not. This machine is used for office tasks, email
and browsing. No heavy apps. (I'm guessing that the new XP-only
application will be fairly light since it's a tool eBay provides for
people who sell a lot on eBay...why would they release a
resource-intensive product that many of their sellers might not be
able to use? Bad business decision and eBay is a smart company!)

If I upgrade I was planning on boosting RAM to 512.

So, do I upgrade or buy new?

You can get away with that likely. I don't see any reason why you wouldn't
be able to though it'd be a little slow. What you'd want to do is go ahead
and do the upgrade of RAM (good choice and a very smart move) and then make
sure that's working. Then boot to your upgrade CD and do the upgrade to XP.
You'll want your older CD for 98se handy so that you can insert it (if
asked) as the qualifying media. The slowest system I've run it on was an old
PII 350 and it worked just fine. Bootup and shutdown will likely be slower
than you are used to but other than that the system should run pretty much
at about the same speeds you're used to now. One thing you might want to do
is avoid using the newer XP themes with it and using the classic theme
instead.

--
Galen - MS MVP - Windows (Shell/User & IE)
http://dts-l.org/

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[Carey Frisch [MVP]]

Your current Dell PC will run fine after upgrading
to Windows XP. Installing additional RAM will
boost overall performance. Just follow this advice:

How Do I Use the Windows XP Upgrade Advisor?
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/pro/upgrading/advisor.mspx

How to prepare to upgrade Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition to Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;316639

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows - Shell/User
Microsoft Community Newsgroups
news://msnews.microsoft.com/

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:

| I have an older Dell (P3, 733mHz, W98SE). In order to run a new app that
| requires XP I need to either upgrade or buy a new box.
|
| I'd like to upgrade since I also own a "never-opened" XP Pro Upgrade and my
| closet is starting to fill up with old machines! However, I'm getting
| contradictory advice of whether upgrading the old machine will run well or
| not. This machine is used for office tasks, email and browsing. No heavy
| apps. (I'm guessing that the new XP-only application will be fairly light
| since it's a tool eBay provides for people who sell a lot on eBay...why would
| they release a resource-intensive product that many of their sellers might
| not be able to use? Bad business decision and eBay is a smart company!)
|
| If I upgrade I was planning on boosting RAM to 512.
|
| So, do I upgrade or buy new?

 

[Michael Stevens]

In

I have an older Dell (P3, 733mHz, W98SE). In order to run a new app
that requires XP I need to either upgrade or buy a new box.

I'd like to upgrade since I also own a "never-opened" XP Pro Upgrade
and my closet is starting to fill up with old machines! However, I'm
getting contradictory advice of whether upgrading the old machine
will run well or not. This machine is used for office tasks, email
and browsing. No heavy apps. (I'm guessing that the new XP-only
application will be fairly light since it's a tool eBay provides for
people who sell a lot on eBay...why would they release a
resource-intensive product that many of their sellers might not be
able to use? Bad business decision and eBay is a smart company!)

If I upgrade I was planning on boosting RAM to 512.

So, do I upgrade or buy new?

Buy new, by the time you purchase the upgrade, memory, update software etc.
you still have an obsolete system for close to the same price as a entry
level XP system with much more capability.
--
Michael Stevens MS-MVP XP
(e-mail address removed)
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com
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