Corrupting Win2k, XP

[gerf]

well, i installed 2k when i got back from work, which promptly had winlogin make me restart before i could start the OS after one reboot, which was after everything froze in the middle of applying SP4. Well, setup this next time wouldn't even complete, it errored out at some point, told me to contact my system administrator.

So i turned to myself an said, "Damn this sucks. I think we should just use this old 450p3 for a while, till i know my financial situation, at which time i might look for a new psu/mobo/cpu/ram for a low price, but sacrificing speed for reliability." "Nifty, i thought. An 1800+ Athlon XP would suit me fine, with, say, 512MB DDR (not sure what speed), and a PSU, and perhaps check Anandtech for mobo roundups." "Sounds great gerf, let's take a nap." "Let's, i said."

And thus, i'm taking a nap, as i don't feel like getting overly frustrated about a silly computer.

[NooNoo]

Sounds like a plan to me!!

[gerf]

thanks for the ideas, it helped me narrow it down. I actually recommend to people to go to these forums, and lurk a bit (i don't know a lotta stuff, not very helpful very often, but i try when i can)

thanks guys (and gal )

[gerf]

I installed win98 (first edition), and ran the computer on and off for a while, while i used my old 450p3 for basic tasks (irc, aim, icq, winamp, browsing). Well, win98 ran just fine, so i did a win98 to 2000 update. I ran this for a couple weeks with no problem. I threw all my random software in it (dvd player, nero, half-life, windows updates, officeXP, ect), to see if that would make it fault again. Nope, ran fine.

So, now i've been running a few weeks with no problems. Everything important i do is saved on my other drive, just in case, but i've had no problems.

This got me to wondering: what's the difference between a fresh win2k install, and a 'update' to win2k. Besides using FAT32 instead of the NTFS option. Are there old drivers being used? I'm going to take it easy on this computer for now, until i really know what went wrong

[NooNoo]

Yes, upgrading means bringing forward problems that may not have been obvious in the old OS. Never upgrade unless you absolutely have to.

[confus-ed]

Originally posted by gerf
....This got me to wondering: what's the difference between a fresh win2k install, and a 'update' to win2k. Besides using FAT32 instead of the NTFS option. Are there old drivers being used? I'm going to take it easy on this computer for now, until i really know what went wrong

Well I can certainly say that for XP (so I suspect w2k will do exactly the same) with an 'upgrade' windoze attempts to 'cobble up' (bodge!) any drivers it doesn't have available from 9x style ones to w2k/xp ones, this may or may not be 'good'....

I've done this 'deliberately' to get supposedly unsupported in w2k/xp devices going & I can say for sure it works, sometimes ... but othertimes it just causes 'confus-ed-ness' like here, I guess that's what happens when you try & force 'old' stuff to work with new stuff, it certainly works with me

[Brian.com]

I had the same problems, and it turned out to be a bad 2000 CD. It would appear that files were getting corrupted somehow during the install. I found this out by replacing most of the components in the machine, only to have the same problem. Finally, I tried a different 2000 CD, problems gone.

It's something to think about.

[gerf]

The problem was a second bad hard drive. Pretty annoying coincidence actually.

The second drive i'd gotten was not remanufactured, but had sat in storage for 4 years. But either way, it was crap, and out of warranty. I ended up using another smaller drive, which is still running fine.

On another note, i had a 13 gig hard drive that seemed entirely dead. On some advice, i threw it in the freezer. I later took it out, moved residences, and finally got it to work again: i built my mom and dad their first computer for this past christmas (450p3, 192 megs of ram, 13 gig hdd, winXP). This is the first they've used a computer, so i feel like a 'good' son now. But, i think that the freezer idea has some merit, though debatable of course.