Considering Windows2K - need advice!!

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Top20Burnout

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If anyone is using Windows 2000, I'd like to know if you have any horror stories regarding audio soft/hardware. I mainly use Cubasis, Cubase, Wavelab, and Sound Forge, plus a lot of plugins that I've picked up along the way.

I'm running a Tascam US-224, an SB Live Platinum for a little MIDI, an AMD Duron 1200MHz CPU on a motherboard with a VIA chipset. At the moment, everything is fairly stable under Win98SE, but the processor and the 7200 RPM hard drive are both brand-new, and I still have a few issues to work through with the new setup.

Would an upgrade to Win2k improve my audio performance at all, or would it only cause me more headaches than I need?

Are there any known problems with Win2k and audio that I need to know about?

Any help is greatly appreciated.

T20B
 
I love Win2k. Virtually no crashes ever. I use about the same stuff as you with no problems. Still not a reason to change though if you aren't having any problems with 98se.
 
Win2K provides mucho stability, especially compared to Win98. I have a meager Dell PIII, 450mhz, 256MB RAM with a Delta 44 card. I tried to upgrade from 98 but I had problems with the Delta, so I did a fresh install and all is well. My uptime record is at 30 days and I only need to reboot when doing an installation. With my 98 system, I had to reboot before each session, and even then I would get clicks/pops when recording with N-Track. Good luck and I recommend doing a fresh install. If you have 2 drives, you can put all your data on the 2nd drive and not have to worry about restoring any of that. I just had to reinstall all my programs which wasn't too bad.

PS - make sure that any hw you need has Win2K support. Go to the vendor's website and check for the appropriate drivers.
 
I hear a heck of a lot more Win9x/ME horror stories than Windows 2000 horror stories :)

It's fine, just make sure you can get drivers for all of your hardware and that your software is supported.

But just so you know, MS just gave Windows 2000 nine more months to live (e.g. OEM vendors should be installing XP only after nine months). That doesn't mean that it won't continue to be supported...it's just something to think about. Personally I hate XP and will continue using 2000.

Slackmaster 2000
 
Win2k is ok, but there is no reason not to go to xp if your hardware supports it. Its faster, and more stable still than 2k(although 2k is pretty damn stable). I for one, will be glad when we kill off the last 2k machine on our network here at work. But, we still have some NT 4.0 boxes up and running. after using xp, 2k just seems so primative....
 
Hey, thanks everybody.

Some differing opinions here, for sure. One of the main reasons I wanted to upgrade was to try the new demo of Cubase SX, which won't run on 98. Cubase meshes really well with my Tascam box, so it would be great if the new version of Cubase were more stable and user-friendly than the current ones. I'm looking for the "perfect" all-in-one recording/mixing software, and still haven't found one that I'm totally happy with. Maybe there isn't one.

Anyway, thanks again. I'm leaning toward the upgrade, but now I may wait to check out XP.
 
Heads up: M$ will not support or sell retail versions of Windows 2000 anytime after September or so. Which means no updates, service packs, or expansion of support in terms of drivers for newer hardware, etc.

Which is actually a bummer, as IMO 2K was the best OS M$ has made. XP just has too much spyware, extra frills and candy built in. News is the reason they're doing it is that XP server is not selling - at all. So they're cutting out life support on 2000 in the hope that they can have a new cash cow in the form of XP server edition, only since XP's not got into the enterprise very well, businesses are slow to move to XP server.

Basically, more money to Bill, and less joy to millions of 2K fans, myself included. As I read somewhere else, I'd be a few sandwiches short of a penguin if I had the applications.

Sang
 
Sangram said:
News is the reason they're doing it is that XP server is not selling - at all.
Click to expand...

Yeah, since there isn't an XP server, I would imagine it isnt selling very well. There is the .net server that is in Beta...that is sorta gonna be the XP server version, but its at Beta3 right at the moment, not even a release candidate yet, so it will be a while. I havent got to play with it much yet, but it will probalby be a lot closer to 2k than XP. You dont need the game compatability or the Fisher Price interface in a server. 2k contained a lot of backward compatability stuff for use in the old lan mgr netorking stuff from NT. I suspect that the new one will not have as much of that.

The reason they are killing off 2K is because they are trying wean the public off of the old technology...Get rid of all the old lan mgr crap and go to thier bastardized version of Kerberos....THis is actually a good thing. Yeah, xp does phone home, but that can be disabled easily....and all the bells and whistles can be turned off so it looks just like 2k, but runs faster ans is more compatible. XP is what 2k should have been. (personally, I like the fisher price interface, but I have a sick sense of humor).
 
2K is definitely a big step up from 98SE. But, if you are buying a new OS there is little reason not to go with XP. Just make sure your sound card supports it, but I think all of them do by now. I've used both 2K and XP, and while both are similar in terms of performance and stability, I gotta say that installing XP was ridiculously easy. It just recognized everything and installed the right drivers. You do need to turn off some "bells and whistles", but that's no big deal.
 
...another vote for XP. I upgraded from W98se to Win2k, and althought I love Win2k, I know I should have upgraded to XP because the support will end up going away sooner.
 
neirbo said:
. You do need to turn off some "bells and whistles", but that's no big deal.
Click to expand...

I never have, in fact, I have every Bell and whistle turned on full tilt boogie, and my athlon xp 1800 still smokes. But my machine here at work does slow down a bit.
 
More great info, and much appreciated.

The best solution I've found so far is the dual boot option of Win2k. I was able to keep my original Win98 os (just in case) and also install Win2k on another drive partition.

Then, I installed all my important music software (and NOTHING else) on the clean Win2k os. From the limited amount of testing I've done so far, I believe this is going to work out very nicely. I can still boot Win98 to play on the internet, or work with graphics, etc., then boot to 2k when I want to record music.

As for future support, well, as long as the software I need will run on this os, I really don't need a lot of support. I'm not interested in keeping up with the joneses, or any new networking technology, because I'm just not into that scene at all. Just need a clean, stable, noise-free music environment, and I can't afford a totally dedicated music computer at the moment.

Many thanks for all the help!
 
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