Posted on 04/08/2014 11:51:45 AM PDT by deoetdoctrinae
Will Windows 8 run on my 386SX?
Depends on how much work you want to put into it. The API is published, if you really want to keep your XP running on new hardware you can, it’s just way more work than it’s worth. Of course if you’ve got new hardware that whole “times are tough” argument goes out the window. Really people can use what’s working for them, my mechanic had a computer with a green monochrome monitor and 2 5-1/4 bay well into the 00s, it did everything they needed and they had no need to upgrade, until the grease in the air finally ate it.
Funny you mention that. I have one of the original mapping gps’s. The map creation software is on a cd which only runs in win ‘98. I have a compaq pc with a whopping 48 megs of ram just for that purpose. It even asks if I want to go online to check for updates.
LOL. As my Grandaddy used to say, “They don’t make’em like they used to”.
“I can’t even remember the last time I used XP, people need to catch up and stop whining.”
The only people using that are lazy businesses, people using easily obtained pirated copies, and folks that should know better but think they are really proving a point by continued use. The “It ain’t broke” brigade.
I am a little jaded with every other release being betaware OSs. It started with ME...Vista...8. So my expectations are pretty low and probably biased.
XP was great and no complaints with Win 7. Win2k was good. Win 98 was good.
Anyway, good luck running Win 8 on an 8 year old computer. Heck, good luck with a 5 year... 4 year old computer.
Or folks whose businesses run very expensive software that requires it.
AT least we still have some years of Vista and 7 before 8 goes completely to crap on everything.
Ya. When you have 50 computers and requiring a full OS upgrade I can see why business are not eager to make the leap. OS upgrades are not fun — I have done a few — upgrade the OS (at least an hour, maybe two), reinstall the apps, cross your fingers and hope that the drivers exist for your hardware, etc. etc.
But now they won’t have a choice.
Too bad MS won’t sell the source to a third party for continued support. We’d be willing to pay a fee for monthly support.
xp support is going to become a great opportunity for many people.
yup. i still have nt 4.0 machines that work fine.
yes just make sure to wipe the hard drive first before installing.
They have a choice: don’t upgrade. Really if their stuff is working they don’t need to upgrade. If they needed to upgrade they would have already.
My suggestion for Microsoft. Make every version of any M'soft operating system available (legally licensed) over the web for a small licensing fee. Then, when one needs to upgrade hardware due to machine death, have the new computer (running Windows 8 (or later for the future)) set up the version the buyer of the new machine needs to run for legacy purposes, in a virtual machine.
Ya. The only risk are viruses. BTW, MSE is no longer supported.
Or if not Microsoft, some other cloud service that makes the appropriate deal with Microsoft.
Of course there’s the question of where the data will live. In the cloud? Locally? Both?
Good idea. That might help. Although running as virtual machine never seems to work quite right.
Funny how “the hardware outlasted the software.” Usually it is the other way around with PCs.
Wrong. There are many businesses who have highly expensive hardware (gas chromatographs, mass spectrometers, CNC mills, and many other categories)that cost hundreds of thousands (or millions) of dollars for which the computer serves as the control box. Quite often, the control SOFTWARE for such expensive equipment has not been re-written to run under later OS's, and likely never will be. You can actually buy new hardware specifically designed to run older OS's, so that the expensive legacy hardware can be kept operational.
Well since the XP boxes can’t run the new IE the virus risk is pretty minimal, add a good firewall for the company and virus scanner for the desktops and it’s a non-issue. And really in business nobody upgrades the OS on machines, you get a new machine. Since computers depreciate in 4 years there’s no reason to upgrade the OS in place. If they machine is less than 4 years old it doesn’t have XP, if it’s old enough to have depreciated out a long time ago and it’s at least 2 generations of hardware behind the curve, get your people new hardware and make your accountants earn their money.
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