Windoze 2000? Methinks not. (Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional)

Member Name: theanarchistkid

Product:	Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional
Date:	06/08/01 (1194 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Solid, Lots of power, Loads of advanced features

Disadvantages: Expensive, Not for novices, Slower for games than Windows 9x

I guess by now everyone has seen the oh-so-witty play on Microsoft products/slogans that are doing the rounds in the web. Things such as Micro$oft and Windoze etc have never been particularly funny, but are they justified? Are the products actually overpriced, sluggish bloatware? Well, judging by Windows 2000 the answer is a resounding maybe™.

I received my copy of Windows 2000 a few days ago and I am yet to experience a single crash. I always thought that Windows 98 was more stable than people gave it credit for; it only crashed every so often, yet Windows 2000 has proven to be absolutely rock solid. When installing and setting up Windows 2000 I had to perform some fairly risky operations such as converting a hard disk partition into an NTFS filing system and it all went flawlessly. I already had a copy of Windows 98 on my computer so I expected the installation to be a very messy affair because I wanted to be able to dual boot. To my immense shock, all I had to do was load up Windows 98, stick in the Windows 2000 CD and let it autoplay. Upon doing this the program offered to upgrade my existing copy on Windows 98, or install 2000 and allow me to dual boot.

At this point, I feel that I should state that Windows 2000 is not the replacement for Windows 98. Windows ME is the current MS operating system that is supposed to be suitable for general home use (games, edutainment etc) but I know of many people that use Windows 2000 in conjunction with Windows 98 in order to get the best of both worlds. Windows 2000 isn't an ideal gaming operating system because performance does seem to suffer slightly but if you have Windows 98 on your system as well, it is easy to switch between the two by rebooting your PC. Windows 2000 is really designed with stability and networking in mind so if you want to type up a vital Dooyoo opinion and don't want your computer to crash, Windows 2000 may prove more reliable than Windows 98.

Installing Windo
ws 2000 was a cinch. As I've stated earlier it was a case of putting the CD in and following the on screen prompts. There were no glitches at all which is a nice change from some MS operating systems. Having used Linux and Windows as a dual booting system a couple of years ago I remember that dual booting used to be a real pain to set up. This is no longer the case and the Windows 2000 installation program does all the hard work for you. If you have an older PC, Windows 2000 may not be for you however. It's probably possible to scrape by with 32/64Mb RAM, but if you really want to fly along 128Mb is a sensible minimum. With RAM prices so low at the moment anyway, it would be worth your while upgrading if you have less than 128Mb. The basic OS installation took up over 1Gb on my PC so if you have a smallish hard disk and you want to dual boot, you might benefit from buying a larger capacity one. I originally had a 6.4Gb one but having installed Windows 98 and a few applications I realised that if I wanted to install Windows 2000 I would need a bigger one, hence I now have a nice new 40 Gb model.

The simplest way to dual boot is to set up a partition for each operating system. On my system I split the hard disk into two partitions of 19Gb, put Windows 98 and all its applications onto drive C and then installed Windows 2000 onto drive G. It is worth noting that Windows 2000 likes to use a different filing system to Windows 9x so Windows 98 cannot see any data that is on the Windows 2000 drive. The Windows 2000 drive can see all the data on the Windows 98 drive though so it is fairly simple to share files across the operating systems.

Because Windows 2000 isn't a replacement for Windows 9x you will need new drivers for most of your hardware. The Windows 2000 CD has a lot of drivers on it, but ultimately it's up to the manufacturers of your hardware to make Windows 2000 driver available to the public. Installation of the new drivers is
fairly straight forward. If the manufacturer of your hardware says that your hardware isn't compatible with Windows 2000, the only solution is to change that piece of hardware. A costly excersise at the best of times, so it's worthwhile checking with your hardware manufacturers before you buy Windows 2000.

Actually using Windows 2000 isn't much different to using other recent Microsoft operating systems. Some of the icons are in different places but the general look and feel is the same is Windows 98/ME. One thing that is nice is that pressing Ctrl&Alt&Delete brings up a menu that allows you to lock the computer so that your evil siblings/offspring can't access it. Also it lets you bring up the task manager which is a bit like its Windows 98 counterpart, although it's much better and more efficient.

The standard applications that come with Windows 2000 are similar to Windows 9x. MS Paint is still there as is the calculator and all of that gubbins. One thing that you will notice is that there are a lot more tools for managing your network. This is an area where Windows 2000 really gets on over on Windows 98/ME because it offers a lot more in depth control for networking if you have more than one PC. I managed to network my Windows 2000/98 PC to the Windows 98 PC that I have downstairs with no problems at all. The only thing that I had to do was download a new driver for my NIC and Windows 2000 did most of the rest of the set up for me.

In general use Windows 2000 is a fairly speedy operating system. Windows 98 used to slow down quite a lot after prolongued use but with Windows 2000 this is no longer the case. This is due to the much greater stability of the operating system which prevents things like memory leaks which eventually use up all of your system's resources resulting in the need for a reboot. The 'Start' menu doesn't slide up any more; instead it fades in. This is a nice touch and it does it on
all the menus although it does remind me of using my laptop where the screen is too slow to refresh, resulting in blurred image transitions. After a week or so, the Start menu organises itself so that only your most frequently used applications are visible meaning that programs that you don't use any more become invisible. To access these is a simple matter of holding the mouse cursor over the start menu for an extra few seconds. This kind of simplification makes navigating your way through Windows 2000 much simpler than in the cluttered Windows 98 installation that I have.

The Control Panel of Windows 2000 is slightly different to that of Windows 98 but this is due to extra items for networking and systems administration. These are only really needed for more advanced users but it is useful to know that they are there if you need them. Internet Explorer 5 is installed by default which is handy although on my installation there was no support for Macromedia Flash so I had to download a plugin. This is simple to do, but it would be nice if it was installed by default because a lot of web sites use it. Setting up a connection to the internet is all wizard driven so even the simplest person could do it (ie me). I did have some minor problems setting up my graphics card but this was down to a minor driver problem. During this period Windows wasn't very helpful and didn't suggest any problems as to what could be wrong, but to be fair, it did still work acceptably.

The fact that Windows 2000 offers the user a lot of control is good and bad. For an experienced user it is a pleasure because suddenly you can set up the whole system exactly how you'd like to. For a novice though it means that it is easy the stop Windows from working. And there lies the decision for the buyer; do you feel confident about installing a slightly more complex operating system.

It is worth knowing that Windows 2000 costs around £250 so is totally overprice
d. Windows ME is quite a lot cheaper than this so this could be a considerable consideration when it comes to deciding what OS you would like. Charging this much for it may alienate some home users although for a corporation this probably wouldn't make much difference.

If you have some knowledge of computers, Windows 2000 is a real pleasure to use. Increased funcionality and stability over Windows 98 make it a viable alternative for both the home and office worker, although if you know little about computers you'd be better off sticking with a more mainstream operating system such as Windows ME.

Windoze? Certainly not!
Micro$oft? Quite possibly!

I'm sorry if this opinion dragged on a bit, but if there is anything that you feel I've missed or you would like adding, just leave a comment and I'll do my best to sort it out.

Summary: