I remember buying the ME upgrade... mostly because it came with about lebenty-gajillion dollars worth of free software (after mail-in rebates). Turned out that ME was the best part of the deal. Needless to say I have avoided that sort of deal ever since. Don ----- Original Message ----- From: "Larry Southerland" <larrysoutherland@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> To: <pctechtalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Sunday, March 30, 2008 1:17 AM Subject: -=PCTechTalk=- Re: OT: On Internet Radio........ > Recalling my own experiences (and those of my friends) with Win ME(nace), > Gman's experience was similar to our own: Installing the Windows ME > upgrade > onto a previously-working Windows 98 system. Reviewing my old notes (from > my computer journals) from that period, the problems that I personally had > centered on (1) sluggish performance; (2) driver problems (unless the > driver > was built into ME, obtaining ME-specific drivers for some of my devices > was > a problem); (3) software incompatibility (more so that when moving, for > example, from 95 to 98) -- I spent a lot of time and money purchasing new > versions of utility programs and several other software packages so that > they would run (in theory) under ME; and (4) since ME was so short-lived, > getting books to help track down problems was an issue -- I eventually had > to flatten the partition and do a clean installation of ME and learn to > get > rid of several programs that I had used for years (I remember Wordperfect > 2000 Legal Edition having "issues" with ME, for example). I also remember > adding more memory to the machine to make it run less sluggishly. I also > have notes about a lot of BSODs (Blue Screens of Death) under WinME; part > of > this was due to the "DLL hell" created by trying to get drivers to work > with > ME (e.g., some Win9x drivers would work with ME; many would not -- it was > a > "crap shoot"). I seem to remember that one of ME's claims to fame was > that > it supposedly doubled the amount of certain blocks of resources (GDI and > heap memory) from 64 Megs to 128 Megs, but this later turned out to be > FUD. > Being a "heavy user" of Windows (actually, of computers) since they first > came out, I, understandably, saw a lot of BSODs, often caused by running > out > of GDI and heap resources (and "memory leaks" as closed applications > didn't > fully release memory back to the pool). That being said, I never even > made > it to the 49.7 day mark to see if my system would have been affected by > that > bug; I'd have to reboot (or be rebooted) every week or so (at the latest). > (OTOH: my copy of OS/2 ran for 12 months without having to be rebooted and > I > rebooted it by choice at that point). > > I want to make clear that I wasn't basing my assessment *entirely* on what > the computer pundits wrote (or have subsequently written) about ME. I > wasted about 8 months trying to live with an ME-based system; I eventually > switched to Win2K (I ran Windows 98 in a separate partition using > Partition > Magic so that apps (e.g., games) that didn't like Win2K could be run. I > only posted the article to confirm from an independent source (after the > fact) that the vast majority of users had "bad experiences" with the OS. > ME > was probably one of the most short-lived products M$ ever put out (right > up > there with "Bob"). I know one of the people who worked on the development > of ME at M$ as a programmer during that time as an intern. He did not > have > a lot of nice things to say about ME or M$. He was the first to confirm > that M$ often releases products "before their time" because of "cash flow" > concerns. (He is now a store manager at a local Office Depot.) > > I am glad that Jo Ann's experience with ME was so "uneventful." I believe > that Gman's observation is correct -- her results may most-likely be > traced > back to having purchased it on a pre-built (and therefore pretested) > system: > no device driver issues; maybe most of the apps she used coming > preinstalled > on the system (e.g., Works Suite???), etc. Other people were, > unfortunately, not so lucky. ;-( --------------------------------------------------------------- Please remember to trim your replies (including this sentence and everything below it) and adjust the subject line as necessary. To unsubscribe or change your email settings: //www.freelists.org/webpage/pctechtalk To access our Archives: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PCTechTalk/messages/ //www.freelists.org/archives/pctechtalk/ To contact only the PCTT Mod Squad, write to: pctechtalk-moderators@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ---------------------------------------------------------------