ICS - is it worth the hype? (Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional)

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Product:	Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional
Date:	10/04/01 (135 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Its NT!, ICS, Works!

Disadvantages: Big Install!

Working in the IT industry myself I like to keep my finger on the pulse of emerging OS’s and new technological advances, and win2k was no exception. Having previously used win2k Advance Server – I though Professional Edition wasn’t going to be much of a difference – but I was wrong.
Along with a few bugs that were apparent in AS (including the annoying bug when the OS would forget I had an ISDN TA installed!), I found it a lot easier to work with.

Windows 2000, in basic terms isn’t windows as we know it at all – its really Microsoft Windows NT 5. And so as a lot of people wrongly believe – isn’t an upgrade to win98 or 95, although you can use it as such.

When I first got a copy of this – I was dubious. I have never been the biggest Bill Gates fan in the world, and although not anti-Microsoft by any means, I’m by no means their biggest fan! But I gave it a go and to be honest I’m glad that I did. It has never caused my problems, and, unlike Win98 SE, it hasn’t crashed on me once!
It copes with multiple users accessing network resources wonderfully for, what is effectively a client OS. I found it handled that better than the server version itself, which surprised me.

The only quibble I had with it was its speed, which I did attribute to my PC only being a P2 350MhZ. It took a good hour to install and took a massive 800Mb – which for an OS is astronomical in my eyes.

But I found the main feature that I liked (this comes with all W2K versions) is the ICS system.
ICS is Internet connection sharing – a sort of ‘fake proxy server’, that enables multiple connections over a Local Area Network. This system is being used in the office e I work in and although it had a few teething problems – it seems to be running well, all be it with a few minor bugs, such as not allowing UDP packets through and the like.

All in
all the Big BG seesm to have finally made an OS that goes. Nice one Microsoft!

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