Works just fine under Win2k and sped up the gameplay in EQ enough that my roommate is in some temple in the back end of SoL killing shit with his guild.... 
Oh well... at least he got me Disinfecting Aura.
By gaining acceptance as a home OS, Win2k paved the way for patches to existing games to make them run on Win2k, and it ensured that new games being released would run on Win2k... and if they run on Win2k, they'll run on WinXP. Now that ALL modern software runs on the 2K/XP kernel, it's safe for Microsoft to start pushing it toward home use.
As far as compatibility goes, don't listen to Maradon. Win2k will likely run every piece of software you have as long as it's not more than a couple years old, and even then it's pretty good unless you're talking about an old DOS-based game.
The main problem you're likely to run into with Win2k is drivers for older or obscure hardware, and that's something I've been saying since Win2k came out -- you'll NEVER want to go back to 9x/ME, unless you're missing a driver.
XP's a LOT better in the driver department, and it has slightly improved support for old DOS games, but it's still more likely than not that they won't work. That's the tradeoff of not having DOS underneath Windows anymore.
If you're intent on avoiding XP for some reason, Win2k will work just fine... but keep in mind, XP is stronger in driver support than Win2k... don't shy away from XP because of some reports of some pieces of hardware not being supported out of the box with it, because the problem is ten times worse with 2K.
Don't get too upset about the Product Activation either. A lot of people with an axe to grind toward Microsoft have portrayed it in a very bad light, when in reality it's a very painless process that takes about 15 seconds to complete. Click OK, wait a moment, and you're done. It does it for you over the Internet, or through a dialup toll-free number. You don't need to actually call Microsoft to activate unless your system doesn't have net access or a modem.
When it comes to dual-booting, make sure you have Win9x installed first, then install Win2k/XP to the other drive. The Win2k/XP installer will set up multiboot. The Win9x/ME installer doesn't.
If you have more than 256M of RAM, you'll find that 2K/XP runs faster than 9x/ME on the same system, because 2k/XP has a vastly improved memory management system. the 9x/ME kernels don't generally utilize memory over 256M at all, and what they do use they manage poorly for backward compatibility reasons, whereas 2K/XP will use as much memory as you have in your system (well, up to 2TB), and it manages it well because it doesn't need to dance around the old DOS 640k base memory architecture. [ 12-06-2001: Message edited by: Drysart ]
I really couldn't think of something to say here... so, umm, good job Drys. [ 12-06-2001: Message edited by: Kegwen Tabibito ]
quote:
Koska Kintaro had this to say about (_|_):
System Shock 2 (won't even install. Comes up "You're running an NT system, you're fucked"),
"D:\Setup.exe" -lgntforce
I don't think you really looked to install it for real
quote:
Koska Kintaro wrote this and went back to looking for porn:
Deus Ex has problems,
Please specify ; Using both the DirectX and OpenGL drivers, Deus Ex runs smooth in the greatest resolution, can be put in windowed mode unlike most UnrealEngine games and works 100%.
quote:
Koska Kintaro wrote this stupid crap:
Half-Life has problems,
Again, specify ; the only thing that is remotely different is the server browser not displaying all servers
quote:
Koska Kintaro had this to say about Ricky Martin:
most things with the Q3 engine have problems,
Heavy Metal F.A.K.K. 2: check. Return to Castle Wolfenstein: check. Quake 3 Arena: check. Star Trek Elite Force: check.
Thank you, drive through.
quote:
Koska Kintaro wrote this, obviously thinking too hard:
Tachyon had some severe performance problems,
If you have performance problems with it, your system's the problem cause I had it before I even upgraded my drivers in Win2K, and it ran everything fine even in the middle of a fully populated asteroid belt.[/QB][/QUOTE]
quote:
Koska Kintaro wrote this, half-drunk yet perfectly normal:
and every game I played had general soupyness and performance issues.
Existant but far from noticeable with any decent hardware.
quote:
Koska Kintaro wrote this, half-drunk yet perfectly normal:
In XP my games didn't only perform better than 2k, they performed better than they ever have on my PC.
Superstition, or bad drivers in Win2K.
quote:
Tier wrote, obviously thinking too hard:
Superstition, or bad drivers in Win2K.
Considering that Win2K and WinXP use a pretty much identical video subsystem, yeah. 
That's why the drivers are interchangable between the two.
