Win2000 or ME I'm about to reformat my HD

[madhops]

I was wondering if anyone has encountered any problems using Windows2000 on Virtual Dub, TMPEGEnc, ATI MMC7, Adobe programs..etc. Basically anything to do with video/audio capture, editting, and converting. Right now I'm using Windows ME, but I find that it is way too unstable, so I'm thinking of switching to Win2000. Any help, or tips would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

[Videomania]

Win2000 should be the choice. I'm using it and happy with it. Basically using TMPG ENc for backing up DVD into SVCD.

[freydo]

i concur... W2k is the way to go.

[Stinky]

W2K .... less legacy code
less crashes - more stable

ME = 98+extra GUI crap

[TIbrO]

Seeing as how Windows 2000 is Windows NT 5.0, and that OS was made for working, not playing. So Video work performs hundreds of times better and more stable, and possibly faster in Win2K than in any other OS by Microsoft out now. I won't upgrade to Windows XP Professional until someone has cracked the activation thingy, though. I hear that WinXP Pro is just enhanced Win2K.

Millenium Edition crashed horribly when I used that, so don't even touch it, or let it near your PC. It's just super slow Windows 98 Third Edition with new Media Player and lots of more bugs.

The only sad part about Win2K that will be cured in Windows XP (or so they say) is that you can use Matrox Marvels right out of the box, cause MS made WDM Drivers for all the popular video editing cards, which might not work properly in 2K due to no WDM drivers. And also, DOS games will work again because WinXP can emulate Windows 9x in something they call "compatibility mode". So if you can wait, then wait for Windows XP Professional to come out ($299) in November. If you can't wait, then get 2000 Professional (free) now.

[Darkbird]

Windows 2000, the Professional level subtitle says it all.

Just make sure the manufacturers of your hardware have Win2000 support with their drivers.

ATI has not had a good track record with Windows NT and 2000 drivers, but they are apparently getting better.

[patrickm]

why not just set aside a 1G partition at the beginning of your disk and dual boot them? i'm currently on the 2k/ME combo and not having any problems in either. ME does work a bit better for AVI captures w/VFW drivers on my AIW 128 Pro than 2K does. but i think MPEG is a little more stable in 2K under different drivers. both OS's i use MMC 7.1. and as an ATI user, i'm sure you can appreciate ME's 'system restore' feature when playing with the ATI drivers... once you turn off all the garbage in ME its actually just 98SE with system restore and a couple other very minor differences. but all that crap like "dr watson" can just stay in the box...

just install ME first, then 2K, and dual booting will take care of itself. you don't need any additional programs to manage it, as long as you partition your disk before you start. just make sure anything you want ME to read is a FAT32 disk, not NTFS. you can get an NTFS reader for 9x form sysinternals.com or something.

what ATI card are you using? the AIW 128s seem to work well in both OS's, but stuff like the TV wonders don't always. i'll leave it to someone with a radeon to comment on them...

[Sefy]

Unlike those here who seem to be addicts to anything Microsoft says, although 2000 is the better system for actuall work, I would recommand 98SE (NOT, and I repeat NOT ME!!) as it has a much higher compatibility rate then any other Microsoft Crappy poor excuses for an operating system out there!

2000 is good for business, but you WILL run into alot of compatibility problems with it, some here may have not gotten into that, but they will once they get out of using those 5 applications and go into running everything in the market like a Beta Tester would.

And like patrickm suggested, you should consider a Dual Boot, but instead of ME, use 98SE and 2000, so you can compare the two and eventually you can even remove one if you don't like it.

[xzarkad]

I agree with Sefy,

Win 98SE is much more stable and faster than ME. ME may be the latest Windows version, but this does not mean that it's a better version.
Win 2000 does not support all drivers, so you should check if you use (for example) a graphics card, if the drivers are supported.
If you need a OS which has fully compatibility with multiple programs, go for 98SE.

[madhops]

Thanks for all the input guys. I think I will scrap ME and will go the Win2K route. How complicated is duel booting? And what's the advantage of having it (keep in mind I'm not a gamer, and most of my programs say they are compatible with Win2K), do you just switch from one OS to the other on-the-fly, I don't know anything about duel booting?!? I've read before that people have had problems with the Huffyuv CODEC on Win2K, while others say it works fine...so what's the deal? Does the Wrapper for ATI work in win2k, so that I can still capture AVI in Virtual Dub - I'm using ATI MMC 7.1 (ATI All-In-Wonder Pro 32MB AGP but I'm working on getting the Radeon version).

OK and one kinda off topic question, I've got 2 computers networked at home, will I need to have them both on Win2000 in order to share files and printers. Right now they are both running WinME.

Thanks again people.

[Stinky]

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
On 2001-08-03 15:32:56, madhops wrote:
Does the Wrapper for ATI work in win2k, so that I can still capture AVI in Virtual Dub - I'm using ATI MMC 7.1 (ATI All-In-Wonder Pro 32MB AGP but I'm working on getting the Radeon version).

OK and one kinda off topic question, I've got 2 computers networked at home, will I need to have them both on Win2000 in order to share files and printers. Right now they are both running WinME.
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

first question - yes the wrapper works just fine in W2K

second question - you can share printers and files on ANY version of Windows as long as you have a hub (for your local area network) - just select File and Print Sharing in your network settings



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Stinky on 2001-08-03 15:59:38 ]</font>

[slp1998ss]

Windows ME stands for Missing Everything.Go with 2000

[patrickm]

<TABLE BORDER=0 ALIGN=CENTER WIDTH=85%><TR><TD><font size=-1>Quote:</font><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR><TR><TD><FONT SIZE=-1><BLOCKQUOTE>
How complicated is duel booting? And what's the advantage of having it (keep in mind I'm not a gamer, and most of my programs say they are compatible with Win2K), do you just switch from one OS to the other on-the-fly, I don't know anything about duel booting?!?

I'm using ATI MMC 7.1 (ATI All-In-Wonder Pro 32MB AGP but I'm working on getting the Radeon

OK and one kinda off topic question, I've got 2 computers networked at home, will I need to have them both on Win2000 in order to share files and printers. Right now they are both running WinME.
</BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></TD></TR><TR><TD><HR size=1 color=black></TD></TR></TABLE>

dual booting is simple with win2K. you just install the other OS first, and 2K automatically realizes it's there and sets up the necessary dual boot options. when you turn on your computer, it boots to a screen (OS Loader) similar to the "please choose 1. normal mode 2. safe mode 3. command prompt.... etc" that everything since win95 uses. you just select which OS you want to start and hit enter. to switch between them requires a reboot. the advantage is that you can use either OS for whatever it's better at or whatever the other one can't run. in a sense, it'd be kinda like insurance against everything going wrong when you upgrade since you already have one working, and it only costs you about 1G of space or less.

if you're sharing printers and using a mixture of OS's, leave the printers attached to 98/ME if possible, since the logging in processes is far simpler (you'd need to create an account on your 2k machine using the same name and password as the logon for your win98 to share the other way, and it's needlessly complicated)

as for the ATI cards stick with the AIW 128 AGP. there's no advantage to using a radeon unless you're a gamer, especially in win98/ME, where there are no real VFW drivers for radeon. the capture hardware on both is identical.

[madhops]

Thanks for all the advice guys, you've been a great help, I think I know what I'm gonna do now.

[Sefy]

Just a precaution since no one else seems to mention it, if you use W2k's dual boot features, and W2k goes caput on you, then so will your other OS, i'd highly suggest you use a diffrent approach, which is more complicated, but will save you from trouble if one OS decides to bite it.
Get yourself the DOS version of Partition Magic 6.01 (can fit on a 1.44mb floppy) and get yourself the free graphical Boot Manager XOSL (www.xosl.org) and create yourself 3 partitions:
1) Primary Windows98SE (FAT32)
2) Primary Windows2000 (NTFS)
3) Extended Partition (FAT32)
this will create two diffrent bootable partitions that won't see each other (2000 will see 98, but 98 won't see 2000, however, you can tell 2000 not to access 98 so it won't trash it) and an extra partition which both will be able to access, so if you capture with 98, you can access the files in 2000 and edit or encode or whatever, or the other way around.
Safer, Better, more protected.