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PC ?: 98 vs. XP
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zynthetix



Joined: Jun 12, 2003
Posts: 838
Location: nyc
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PostPosted: Fri Jun 20, 2003 8:53 am    Post subject: PC ?: 98 vs. XP Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

first off, i'd like to say that i enjoy reading the posts around here. (those of you that frequent obviously know your stuff.) it makes me wish i knew this board existed earlier Wink

So, I got my copy of reaktor 4 and the recommended OS these days is Windows XP...

I'm still using Windows 98 SE, and while reaktor is still compatible with this, I am once again questioning if I should upgrade.

FYI, heres a list of relevant hardware:
1 ghz pentium III processor
512 sdram
Echo Gina 16-bit PCI audio card
Lexicon Core2 24-bit PCI audio card

While this isn't some of the newest/fastest hardware, I have 98 SE settings optimized for Cubase 5.1, and it gets the job done.
So I guess the real question here is:

Would upgrading to Windows XP Pro actually benefit my setup in any way, or would things just run slower on my lackluster hardware and give me compatibility problems?

thanks in advance for any replies
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elektro80
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PostPosted: Fri Jun 20, 2003 10:04 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

i have no idea.

Anyway. However nasty WIN98 is supposed to be.. if you have a setup which gets the job done.. it gets the job done. WIN 98 is absolutely OK on a desktop computer as long as what you want have running actually runs. I guess your computer is reasonably stable and nothing is bothering you from the win os core 200 fathoms below.. in the dark dark deep where demons live. So.. it actually works. Cool. installing Xp onto your puter will probably not do anything extremely positive. If your audio rig works just fine now keep it as it is.

XP as an OS is quite good. But it runs best on a fairly modern computer.

When it comes to grafix apps and such.. which I do have experience with both on XP and win98.. if the computer is old.. like yours.. keep 98. Win2K can in certain instances be pretty OK.

Older computers can be very effective workstations if you do not demand unreasonable performance. I do not think.. based on what I know about XP.. that there is something special in there that will make life better re that setup of yours. The only thing you actually could go for instead of bying an XP upgrade CD would actually be to max the RAM to the limit. Inexpensive and possibly only extra little tweak that really improves anything at all.

Another thing is Reaktor 4. Dunno .. but the previous version was a hog at times. My usual recommendation: DO NOT "REPAIR" ANYTHING IF THE RIG WORKS!!! Smile I usually scream this... and fall over on the floor in a coma.

Last edited by elektro80 on Fri Jun 20, 2003 11:28 am; edited 1 time in total
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zynthetix



Joined: Jun 12, 2003
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PostPosted: Fri Jun 20, 2003 10:20 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

thanks for the feedback

the philosiphy "if it isn't broken, don't fix it" is usually wise Wink
( especially with puter/audio rigs)
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DES



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PostPosted: Fri Jun 20, 2003 11:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

Elektro makes some good points here. Actually Win 98SE was pretty good for audio programs. You have a little more control over what Windows can do in 98SE as well (more tweakability..) XP is very stable OS though I have managed to get it to crash on occasion. Something to think about also is that XP really wants the board to be a APCI type of board. If the board is capable of operating in APCI mode, the system seems to have fewer problems - especially when adding plug in cards. A properly configured APCI system will give you something like 21 available IRQ's as compared to the 15 or so normally found.

definately consider adding ram, perhaps a faster hard drive. In fact, if your motherboard doesn't support ATA100 or 133, then you can purchase a plug in card that will support these drives and that can seriously improve performance - especially for Digital Audio Workstations and programs like Gigastudio and others that read their data off disk.

One other thing you might consider - there used to be a program available called Win98Lite.. Basically it takes all of the non-essential crap out of 98 and runs more effeciently. I believe though that the company may have been told by Microsoft to stop producing it...worth looking into though..

DES
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elektro80
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PostPosted: Fri Jun 20, 2003 12:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

Great advice.
Fast disks are important. I am not sure how you work. But figuring out how your way of working affects the disks can be smart. I am using SCSI U160 disks myself. One disk for the tracks I record, one for samples and stuff VST plugs like halion uses and one disk for exporting the mixes. All on separate SCSI channels. ATA disks I usally use for apps and plain storage. This wáy my sad little mac perfoms far better than using a single ATA 200 gig disk.. a lot better in fact.

Only problem is that SCSI disks are a bit expensive. One way to get more effective throughput using ATA drives is.. use those cards DES mentions.. get a pair of those.. and have only one ATA drive connected to each channel. And you might as well use the disks in a way that push the bits in or out.. not both ways at the same time.. hehe.. this is a simplistic way of describing this.. but if you research how ATA and SCSI disks really work you will get the idea. It is easy to understand but takes some time to explain. SCSI is not "better" but different. You pay extra for features that you might not need.. but if you need them.... Smile
ATA drives are nice inexpensive general purpose harddisks. -And getting better all the time.


I have seen guys who keep all the audio apps, the recorded tracks on C and .. playback their samples for Sampletank or Halion from partition D. Bad bad bad.. not smart to do this with an ATA drive ( or any drive really ) Think "physical" drives.
This can be illustrated by the fact that you can set up a song.. using files here and there.. all over the place.. in a way that reduces disk performance drastically.. you can make any ATA drive slow down to a crawl and have the Cubase disk "LED" go RED RED RED RED RED.. and the audio output go: "screeech scratch pink plonk" etc etc Depending on the music genre you are into this can be just great.. or.. not so great. Smile

Defragging the disks regurarly is smart too. And if the disk is full... and you throw a lot away in order to make room .. always defrag. Trust me. This has nothing to do with OSes, but with how computers work.
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mosc
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PostPosted: Fri Jun 20, 2003 1:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

I would leave your computer alone and enjoy it as long as you can. One day it will decide to give you great grief, like our backup server did today. Crying or Very sad (I've lost two servers in about one month).

Also, while DES is quite on target about the disk drives, I wouldn't upgrade the disks until you're ready to upgrade to a new computer. Then you'll get more memory, faster disks, faster processor and XP. W98 can't support the huge disks that are available anyway. I think you can only have about 130 GB on a drive partition. Better yet, when the time comes you may be ready to give up on Microsoft and get an Apple.

There are some tests, BTW, where putting more than 512 MB of memory in a Win98 machine makes it run slower!

There are some newer audio drivers that I don't believe you can get for 98, but if your software doesn't complain, then neither should you. Laughing

_________________
--Howard
my music and other stuff
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elektro80
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PostPosted: Fri Jun 20, 2003 5:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

Someone should bribe the pope.. you need that sainthood really bad! Howard! Well said!
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zynthetix



Joined: Jun 12, 2003
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PostPosted: Sat Jun 21, 2003 8:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

i second that emotion. Laughing

oh, and "Win98lite" kinda intrigued me...heres what i found:
http://www.litepc.com/index.html

As for Windows 98 and ram, I've heard the most it can see is 786 megs, and performance increase stops at about 300 (don't know if i believe that last statistic though)
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DES



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PostPosted: Sat Jun 21, 2003 3:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

There have been issues with memory leakage in 98 for excessive amounts of ram - honestly 512meg should be more then adequate for what you are doing. Some apps though use ram for storing sample data for playback (Atmosphere for instance) and having it available is nice - by optimizing the OS though you can reclaim some of the ram being used by the OS so that apps have it available. My feelings about the hard drives though are that you can find 60 and 80 gig drives for very good prices - you can always transplant them to newer machines if you replace what you are using, and your system should be able to handle them. BTW - that PC you have Zynthetix (-that's a cool name!) is far from being unusable - 1ghz gives you a lot of processing power. Too many people have to spend their money on the latest, fastest computers and unfortunately a lot of good powerful computers get relegated to email or internet duties. My Internet computer (a P-III 733) is also used for running sequencers, softsynths - and even Digital Audio Apps when needed. When I first got it I ran 98 - then went to Win 2K and now have XP on it. You might want to check the motherboard's manufacturer website and see if there are any bios updates - you might be able to put in a faster processor - gain a couple hundred Mhz and the older CPU's are very reasonably priced. BTW - if you do replace the CPU - KEEP THE OLD ONE. If the new one should fail you will have a spare available till you can replace it. Did you mention what motherboard your system has?

Another option - you could set up your system for Dual boot - see if it works with XP - if not delte it (of course then you would then have a copy XP not being used until you updated the system). If it works well, reformat all the drives, repartion and re-install XP as the only OS.
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elektro80
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PostPosted: Sat Jun 21, 2003 4:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

I remember a discussion I had with a dutch Microsoft dude. He showed me some APIs you could use for applications that needed to use RAM in a special way in WIN98. And that API should be able to go past that limit you mentioned. As far as I remember.. this API was most suitable to keep gigantic tables of data. Anyway.. this is actual one of the issues that repeatably show up when you discuss Mac vs, Windows. But.. times are changing. RAM is cheap. And operating systems will still be improved a lot.
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dmosc



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PostPosted: Mon Jun 23, 2003 9:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote  Mark this post and the followings unread

hello all, I'm howard's Son. At the moment, a self-employed computer builder. I enjoy such discussions as win98SE vs XP and hope my opinions will be of some value.

Although it is hard to argue with the "if it's not broke, don't fix it" philosophy, I have to wonder how satisfied you are with 98SE. Most people who used the 95 based OSes (95, 98, ME) complain constantly of random program crashes, hangs, and other instabilities. I personally stopped using 98 when my computer would rarely shutdown on it's own and liked to search for long-since disconnected printers and computers for several minutes during startup. I know some people who rarely have crashes with them but they tend to be the ones who don't tax their systems with installing and uninstalling programs, fill it with modern gadgets like USB 2.0, or do a lot of networking. Still, 98 brings a lot to the table. It is small, quick, and is usually considered a much better choice than 95 or ME.

In addition to stability, the latest NT core (2K, XP) supports more of the new features like cavernous HDs, superfast external devices, etc. It is true that some hardware, especially parts you wouldn't expect to care like your modem, will have issues running under XP but I can tell your your processor is more than capable of it and your other cards are easy enough to check with their model numbers. On newer hardware that uses things like firewire, USB2.0, serial ata, etc XP becomes a must rather than an upgrade option.

On the issue of performance, many gamers for instance will see faster benchmarks on 98 then XP because the games were designed specifically FOR that OS. Using this logic, the fastest OS is probably going to be the one that was new when the software you are using was developed.

Also, I wanted to agree with the point raised by elektro80 mentioning the need for HD performance in not just recording, but all applications. I however dissagree with how he gets there. I feel ATA, specifically ATA-RAID is the cheapest, fastest, and easiest to deal with solution for data storage on any level, multi-terabyte mainframe on down. Using the onboard raid controllers found on many newer motherboards, HD bandwidths greater than any single drive can easily be achieved in systems with under $1000 pricetags. Also, the Data security of redundant drives for your critical data is a very valuable thing. My latest project is two new servers for this and other mosc.com sites, each featuring ATA-RAID 1 with the ability to lose a drive in realtime and keep running as well as able to achieve readtimes faster than a single-drive system all for the cost of less than those computers you see advertised on TV.

-Daniel (dmosc)
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