How do I get rid of Windows Vista?

[SatStorm]

Dv8ted2, the build-in DRM on (s)VISTA outshines everything else, good or bad.

According to the law, when DRM is present, we are illegal each time we bypass it for doing what we think is our right (another discussion is what we think is our right and how that is determined by the law and explained by the big ones...). Personally, I don't like to be illegal. And I don't like to find ways to bypass DRM. It is not the solution. DRM don't allow me to do what I think is my right. So, I have only one solution: I fight against it. I want DRM out! On any form: HDCP, file protection, activation or validation. This is the only acceptable solution for me: When I buy something, it is mine! I don't like to be checked, neither to be told so of how to use it and in which order! And I won't allow the determination of "ownership" to be changed, as some big ones try to do so in our times. I'm talking about the idea of "lifetime renting but not owning" that the big ones push to the society the last 10 years. I'm not a slave, so to live in a world that I'm not allowed to own things. So, I'm against that idea also.

DRM serves well this new idea. And (s)VISTA support all forms of DRM. So, VISTA passed the line: It's on the other side. I don't care about the benefits, if it has any. (s)VISTA have DRM and now is an alliance of what I'm against!

Thank God, many people around the world think like me, and that's probably the reason why LINUX finally grows. IMO, LINUX has a problem of egoism and egocentrism. I prefer to deal with it in the future, than to sell my freedom to (s)VISTA!
I prefer to deal with an problematic egoist (LINUX) than a dictator (VISTA).

And on the top of that, this is not even an issue yet! For some more years, WIN XP/2K is more than OK for me and anyone else. Until the day the switch to a new OS gonna be necessary, I hope LINUX gonna turn totally friendly for a middle age stupid PC user, as I gonna turned to be at that time!

[DereX888]

Yeah! DRM for example. On (s)VISTA DRM is a part of the O.S. On XP it was an add on.

I was actually referring to the new security model that windows adopted. Everyone is a restricted (standard) user by default. You have a virtual store where programs can make changes without really touching protected parts of the operating system such as the registry. Driver signing was also beefed up as well as the two way firewall. People are always quick to harp on DRM without really understanding that other changes were introduced. I wish people would drop the DRM talk. It is past beating a dead horse stage and is made irrelevant by companies such as Slysoft.

Thats a "new" security model?
Since Windows NT3 every new user added was a restricted standard user, only the Administrator had (obviously) root's priviledges.
It was Windows XP where Microsoft suddenly decided that people are too stupid to understand the concept of restricted user account (I bet the reasoning behind it was that all those former Windows9x users will not know how to log out themselves and log in as Admin, in order to install most of new software... LOL) and suddenly you didn't have to set up separate Admin account from your own and other users accounts, because "the first on board" was automatically ranked an admin That stupid decision alone is responsible for so many XP machines being rooted, and it wasn't years later until service pack 2 that Msoft added restriction to the main user (always acting as admin by default, unless someone changed that manually) for at least remote connections.
So whats new? If anything, its a step backward to what has been before
You also had option "Run as..." since NT5 as well, so this whole "UAC crap" is just more graphical (and annoying) recode of the old shite, as usual. (in case you want to tell me its different ).


Firewall was "beefed up"?
'scuse me if I laugh hard, but "one-way firewall" was not a firewall at all, it was just the smoke and mirrors, it could only fool n00bs.
You should have said that the Firewall was just added to the XP SP2 and Vista, nit "beefed up". You can't beef up something thats not there (or pretends to do something it doesn't do).

Driver signing?
HELLO!!! WTF are you talking about
Its the Microsoft's problem straightforward related to keeping Windows source code in the vault, only. ONLY!
The "signing" process by Msoft is there to ensure the driver's code doesn't do any 'damage' to the system.
If Msoft would have publish the source code, coders from other companies wouldn't have to ask Msoft for "signing" simple drivers code because they would know what are they doing (instead of writing now "in the darkness" based on Msoft's cryptic guidelines and hints about documented and undocumented Windows pinnings).
And why Msoft won't publish the source code? Isn't it copyrighted, registered, trade marked, etc etc etc? It would be so easy to spot and prosecute perpetrators stealing any parts of the Windows code (if there would be any at all LOL), so why dont they publish it? Isn't it because theyre affraid we'll all suddenly know the king is naked, the kernel of Windows has still OS/2's "Copyright 1992 IBM Corporation" all over it, Vista is XP with few useless additions, XP is 2000 with other additions, 2000 is NT4 with yet other additional few lines of code, and so on, and people were paying many times basically for THE SAME OPERATING SYSTEM over and over again - just with different GUIs?

Yes, DRMs. That shit has changed, but as everyone tell you so - it is ANNOYANCE, bow to the RIAA/MPAA cartels, not a "feature" of operating system at all. NO ONE wants it (except for RIAA/MPAA cartel members). It's a grotesque cop watching the user in case he/she would like to do what is conidered "illegal" by the RIAA/MPAA cartels, nothing more or less. Its a gullible assumption that WE ALL ARE THIEVES and we should be watched and spied upon by our own computers, thats all DRM is. Don't even start me on that.

[Dv8ted2]

Yeah! DRM for example. On (s)VISTA DRM is a part of the O.S. On XP it was an add on.

I was actually referring to the new security model that windows adopted. Everyone is a restricted (standard) user by default. You have a virtual store where programs can make changes without really touching protected parts of the operating system such as the registry. Driver signing was also beefed up as well as the two way firewall. People are always quick to harp on DRM without really understanding that other changes were introduced. I wish people would drop the DRM talk. It is past beating a dead horse stage and is made irrelevant by companies such as Slysoft.

Thats a "new" security model?
Since Windows NT3 every new user added was a restricted standard user, only the Administrator had (obviously) root's priviledges.
It was Windows XP where Microsoft suddenly decided that people are too stupid to understand the concept of restricted user account (I bet the reasoning behind it was that all those former Windows9x users will not know how to log out themselves and log in as Admin, in order to install most of new software... LOL) and suddenly you didn't have to set up separate Admin account from your own and other users accounts, because "the first on board" was automatically ranked an admin That stupid decision alone is responsible for so many XP machines being rooted, and it wasn't years later until service pack 2 that Msoft added restriction to the main user (always acting as admin by default, unless someone changed that manually) for at least remote connections.
So whats new? If anything, its a step backward to what has been before
You also had option "Run as..." since NT5 as well, so this whole "UAC crap" is just more graphical (and annoying) recode of the old shite, as usual. (in case you want to tell me its different ).

Yes, DRMs. That shit has changed, but as everyone tell you so - it is ANNOYANCE, bow to the RIAA/MPAA cartels, not a "feature" of operating system at all. NO ONE wants it (except for RIAA/MPAA cartel members). It's a grotesque cop watching the user in case he/she would like to do what is conidered "illegal" by the RIAA/MPAA cartels, nothing more or less. Its a gullible assumption that WE ALL ARE THIEVES and we should be watched and spied upon by our own computers, thats all DRM is. Don't even start me on that.

You missed my point completely. Vista is the first windows OS to use virtual folders and a virtual registry.

[DereX888]

You missed my point completely. Vista is the first windows OS to use virtual folders and a virtual registry.

Have you read about virtual registry and how "big" difference does it make? LOL

[Dv8ted2]

You missed my point completely. Vista is the first windows OS to use virtual folders and a virtual registry.

Have you read about virtual registry and how "big" difference does it make? LOL

Yes, I have two books on it. A pocket admin manual and a huge book. Any more questions? I have shown you some of the differences between the OS's and you make patently false statements. For the record, I use Vista Ultimate at work and Vista Business at home. I use XP in a virtual pc only so I can see what SP3 will do. This gives me a chance to support I can support my co-workers who use both Vista and XP.

[DereX888]

You missed my point completely. Vista is the first windows OS to use virtual folders and a virtual registry.

Have you read about virtual registry and how "big" difference does it make? LOL

Yes, I have two books on it. A pocket admin manual and a huge book. Any more questions? I have shown you some of the differences between the OS's and you make patently false statements. For the record, I use Vista Ultimate at work and Vista Business at home. I use XP in a virtual pc only so I can see what SP3 will do, so I can support my co-workers.

I use sVista at work on 2 machines sometimes. XP is on most of other boxes, but also NT4 and still many 2000. Then there is few linux boxes no one wants to use. A mainframe I have no access to, but I can test my lack of unix skills on a terminal when i want
And few Macs, all with OSX now.
And a rendering "farm" clusters too.
And a bunch of other stuff if I'd dig deeper (Sun, HP, you name it).
Its a government building, I believe we have everything (including well stocked library )

So yeah, trust me, I have a very good comparisons first hand

[Dv8ted2]

You missed my point completely. Vista is the first windows OS to use virtual folders and a virtual registry.

Have you read about virtual registry and how "big" difference does it make? LOL

Yes, I have two books on it. A pocket admin manual and a huge book. Any more questions? I have shown you some of the differences between the OS's and you make patently false statements. For the record, I use Vista Ultimate at work and Vista Business at home. I use XP in a virtual pc only so I can see what SP3 will do, so I can support my co-workers.

I use sVista at work on 2 machines sometimes. XP is on most of other boxes, but also NT4 and still many 2000. Then there is few linux boxes no one wants to use. A mainframe I have no access to, but I can test my lack of unix skills on a terminal when i want
And few Macs, all with OSX now.
And a rendering "farm" clusters too.
And a bunch of other stuff if I'd dig deeper (Sun, HP, you name it).
Its a government building, I believe we have everything

So yeah, trust me, I have a very good comparisons first hand

good for you

Now if you could only make true statements, you would be better off. Anyway, I have said my peace, so I will bow out of this discussion.

[DereX888]

Now if you could only make true statements, you would be better off. Anyway, I have said my peace, so I will bow out of this discussion.

Where have I lied?!
Don't just bow out of the discussion after making such accusation, explain!

[Mariot]

I suppose that is true .. but my laptop was due for a reformat anyway, so i just figured i would start over with the new operating system. My only question is, why does M$ feel it necessary to overburden new installs with such useless crap?

How would they on earth otherwise make money? By keeping releasing XP Service packs for free? They needed a new product for upgrades so they put a tons of "extra value" aka junk in it. Changing icons will not cut it.

[Mariot]

And why Msoft won't publish the source code? Isn't it copyrighted, registered, trade marked, etc etc etc? It would be so easy to spot and prosecute perpetrators stealing any parts of the Windows code

As any big software project, it has skeletons in its source code closet that may be perhaps inspired from someplace else. But after years of code adding, rewriting and deleting, nobody can say with certainty what are the "bad" parts.
Release a source code and twenty companies will start suing MS of having stolen their alghorithms, ideas, or name of the variables...
And don't forgot there are also some security concerns and perhaps some alphabet agencies have their fingers in it....

[DereX888]

How would they on earth otherwise make money? By keeping releasing XP Service packs for free? They needed a new product for upgrades so they put a tons of "extra value" aka junk in it. Changing icons will not cut it.

The same way as they do now - from selling Windows licence with all new computers and other stuff.
OEM Vista licence cost is the same as XP's, same as volume licencing corporate subscriptions and others, and those plus Office are Microsoft's main sources of income.Obviously for Microsoft it doesn't matter which Windows version it sells thru OEM and other channels.
Meaningless weird people who do buy retail Windows sometimes also pay more-less the same money regardless of Windows version available in the stores, and I hope you don't think there are many people out there voluntarily buying retail Vista just to "upgrade" their already existing and functioning XP computers
So... yeah, they could have save their money wasted on development of bad product (Windows ME dud comes to comparison here...), or actually - since I'm sure all their coders are paid by hours and not by product - they could have really kept releasing service packs for XP and make it finally some good product (or at least less bug-free).
sVista appears to you as some less bug-prone Windows than XP only because it is still 1 year old and not as many bugs were found there yet as in XP's 7-years of existence But give sVista same lifespan as XP already had, and I bet everything against a penny, that there will be more bugs found in sVista than there was found in XP in those 7 years (because the more lines of code Msoft puts into their OS = the more bugs is found there).

The only reason to push sVista onto market was perhaps the reasoning behind the "NEW!" hype, Msoft's bow to manufacturer's hope to sell more new computers through this failed "new" hype, desperate try to create more sales piggybacked on new OS (kinda like Windows 95 hype pushed computer sales in the end of 90s).

Release a source code and twenty companies will start suing MS of having stolen their alghorithms, ideas, or name of the variables...

Perhaps that's the gist of it and main reason why Windows source code will never see the light of day

[Mariot]

Microsoft must put new product, it cannot live from the OEM sales of old product. It is not as much as the sales, than the fear of shares getting down. If you have 5% of sales down managers still make the same. If their stock falls 5% they suddenly have less assets.
MS is public company, if they don't release new things, the shareholders will start asking "how do you intend to compete with others that do release new things?" and "how do you intend to grow the price of shares?". So there is the unfortunate hunt for year after year "growth". And share price is more a feeling of shareholders about the company direction than anything else. If MS doesn't release the "latest and greatest" OS while Apple does it every year, investors will start selling, shares will start falling.

It doesn't matter that Vista is bloated and nothing from the addition is actually needed. It doesn't matter that it needs more power. It is the hype, if MS says Vista is much better than XP, if sales persons in store says Vista is big step forward, that's already 90% of success.

[disturbed1]

And on the top of that, this is not even an issue yet! For some more years, WIN XP/2K is more than OK for me and anyone else. Until the day the switch to a new OS gonna be necessary, I hope LINUX gonna turn totally friendly for a middle age stupid PC user, as I gonna turned to be at that time!

By that time Linux will be Windows Or at least Ubuntindows 2010, and Gubuntindows, and Kubuntindows, and of course Fookunwindows



Who cares if Vista sucks? Put XP on the sucker. Don't like XP, dig out that copy of Win 2000, or even Win 98. Don't have those? Linux is free.

Seriously, this is the exact same complaints made against XP when it first came out. It's slow, it sucks, my 5 year old computer won't run it. What do you mean I have to spend $30 on a RAM upgrade. It's the OEM's fault for putting the OS on an underpowered machine. Too much eye candy, and on and on and on.

Same heard before.

While you guys are trying to figure out if Coke or Pepsi is the best, I sure as hell won't be thirsty drinking my Mountain Dew.

[JohnnyMalaria]

While you guys are trying to figure out if Coke or Pepsi is the best, I sure as hell won't be thirsty drinking my Mountain Dew.

There are all crass shite whose success is only due to obscene amounts of advertising. Most iconic products are. Same for the computer industry. Goebbels was right. People are stupid. Tell 'em the same lie over and over again and it becomes the truth.

[bendixG15]

I owe everyone an apology. .......................for the uproar, I am sorry.

No apology required. The guys above had a helluva lot of fun reliving the old wars that faded into history.

[DereX888]

Seriously, this is the exact same complaints made against XP when it first came out. It's slow, it sucks, my 5 year old computer won't run it. What do you mean I have to spend $30 on a RAM upgrade. It's the OEM's fault for putting the OS on an underpowered machine. Too much eye candy, and on and on and on.

Same heard before.

sVista sux on NEW machines, not some 5yr old clunkers.
No one sane would even attempt to install this shite on older machine (I hope).

[JohnnyMalaria]

XP sucked on new machines, too. People are still fooled into buying underpowered hardware and then blame the OS for the problems.

[DereX888]

XP sucked on new machines, too. People are still fooled into buying underpowered hardware and then blame the OS for the problems.

Standard of new machines sold in the end of 2001 when XP was released was:
Celeron 900MHz,
Pentium III 1GHZ,
Pentium 4 1.3GHz+,
AMDs 1.2GHz+,
256-512MB RAM
I assure you - such specs are well beyond minimum to run even Windows XP SP2, and were excellent for first Windows XP.
So, NO, you're wrong again, XP did NOT suck when it was released (in the terms of performance on such machines)


Most machines sold today with Vista onboard barely meets Microsoft's own Vista minimum specs, while they would perfectly run XP instead.

BTW- I'm not XP fan, I don't even use XP on my own main machine and I never like it. But facts are facts, so quit BS-ing this sVista nonsense.
ALL 'experts' also agree sVista is a dud, and bringing examples of some high-end machines running fine on sVista won't change the fact, that half of the computing power and resources on those top-notch machines are wasted on keeping operating system running properly. We use operating systems on our computers to run other software we want on them, we don't keep 500Watt PSU supplying quad-core CPUs and gigabytes of RAM just to keep operating system alive! That's a dud in everyone's opinion, quit arguing.

[JohnnyMalaria]

What's the standard of new machines today? I'm sure it's better than the Pentium D 2.8GHz that I run Vista on quite happily (along with XP SP2, x64 and MCE). I'm most productive on Vista. Whether it is slower or not in benchmarks is moot if I actually get more done.

The point I'm making is that there are plenty of PCs being sold today - as 7 years ago - that fall short of the "standard". Unwittingly, people buy them and seem to lay all the blame on the OS. That's absurd, surely.

EDIT - Right now I'm also using a P4 1.8GHz XP system and it is painfully slow. At work, I am also subjected to a P4 hp compaq with XP - it, too, is tedious to use compared to recent XP machines.

[DereX888]

What's the standard of new machines today? I'm sure it's better than the Pentium D 2.8GHz that I run Vista on quite happily (along with XP SP2, x64 and MCE). I'm most productive on Vista. Whether it is slower or not in benchmarks is moot if I actually get more done.

The point I'm making is that there are plenty of PCs being sold today - as 7 years ago - that fall short of the "standard". Unwittingly, people buy them and seem to lay all the blame on the OS. That's absurd, surely.

Now you are confused taking your own personal preference as performance's standard.
My father was very productive and wouldn't change his Windows NT4 laptop for years until laptop died itself and he had no choice.
He was most productive on that clunker too, but was his machine anything what it could have been performance-wise? Obviously not, same as probably your machine with sVista on it isn't, yet again - I don't doubt you being very productive on it.

EDIT - Right now I'm also using a P4 1.8GHz XP system and it is painfully slow. At work, I am also subjected to a P4 hp compaq with XP - it, too, is tedious to use compared to recent XP machines.

I had 233MHz laptop running perfect with Windows 2000.
For some time my main machine had first P4 1.4GHz and Windows XP.
Both very running perfectly fine even though their CPUs weren't best- but they did because they had plenty of RAM. Laptop had 512MB of RAM, and main box had 2GB of RDRAM. That's the key.
I don't believe your 1.8GHz machine is slow on XP - unless you have 512MB RAM or less there. In such case you should have installed Win2000 there (you'll miss colorful icons and Windows Movie Maker only everything else can be installed from Msoft or 3rd parties) and it'll work 'lightning fast' when you compare it to your sVista machine

[JohnnyMalaria]

I don't believe your 1.8GHz machine is slow on XP - unless you have 512MB RAM or less there.

768MB - and it *is* agonizingly slow even after reprep'ing it and reinstalling the required programs. The P4 was a crap CPU destined for an evolutionary dead end.

[disturbed1]

For some time my main machine had first P4 1.4GHz and Windows XP.
Both very running perfectly fine even though their CPUs weren't best- but they did because they had plenty of RAM. Laptop had 512MB of RAM, and main box had 2GB of RDRAM. That's the key.
I don't believe your 1.8GHz machine is slow on XP - unless you have 512MB RAM or less there. In such case you should have installed Win2000 there (you'll miss colorful icons and Windows Movie Maker only everything else can be installed from Msoft or 3rd parties) and it'll work 'lightning fast' when you compare it to your sVista machine

The minimum hardware requirements for Windows XP Home Edition are:
• Pentium 233-megahertz (MHz) processor or faster (300 MHz is recommended)
• At least 64 megabytes (MB) of RAM (128 MB is recommended)
• At least 1.5 gigabytes (GB) of available space on the hard disk
• CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive
• Keyboard and a Microsoft Mouse or some other compatible pointing device
• Video adapter and monitor with Super VGA (800 x 600)or higher resolution
• Sound card
• Speakers or headphones

WITH OUT TWEAKING XP is hell to run on less than 256mb ram. It is a pain to run on an AMD 900 512mb RAM. And that's a 5 year old PC when XP came out.

Keep in mind, most OEMs sold XP machines with 128mb RAM.

For some time my main machine had first P4 1.4GHz and Windows XP.
Both very running perfectly fine even though their CPUs weren't best- but they did because they had plenty of RAM. Laptop had 512MB of RAM, and main box had 2GB of RDRAM.

So by your logic, a good experience for XP is 4.666667 x rec. CPU speed, and 16 x rec. RAM. Then for the same Vista experience you had with XP you would need a 4.66GHZ CPU and 8gigs of RAM for the basic.

* 1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
* 512 MB of system memory
* 20 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
* Support for DirectX 9 graphics and 32 MB of graphics memory
* DVD-ROM drive
* Audio Output
* Internet access (fees may apply)

Premium
#

1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
1 GB of system memory
40 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
Support for DirectX 9 graphics with:
WDDM Driver
128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)
Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware
32 bits per pixel

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314865/en-us
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/editions/systemrequirements.mspx

[Stingray]

All I can say is that XP didnt exactly run fast on the high end systems of its time... and neither does Vista now. You need roughly 1GB RAM to get XP running smoothly, and when it was released many brand computer like HP stuck them with 128MB. Good luck running XP with that...

[DereX888]

All I can say is that XP didnt exactly run fast on the high end systems of its time... and neither does Vista now. You need roughly 1GB RAM to get XP running smoothly, and when it was released many brand computer like HP stuck them with 128MB. Good luck running XP with that...

I still have Radioshack's flyer from November 2001.
There are no 'regular price' machines with 128MB RAM.
Although the cheapest desktop PC on sale had 256MB RAM and came with Windows ME, and one of the machines with Windows XP had indeed had only 128MB Rambus RAM with asterix - upgrade to 256MB PC800 for $299 only
Also please keep in mind Radioshack is not really a computer store, and they always sold somewhat out-of-date systems at higher prices.

Windows XP itself runs excellent on 768MB RAM
You need more when you add other stuff (say i.e. Norton garbage - you'll need like 10000000GB of RAM to run it...)

[greymalkin]

my own personal experience with vista x64 business was pretty awful. I bought a brand new system with a gigabyte board (the new 780G board) and paired it with 4gb DDR2 800 ram, a 160gb SATAII drive, a SATA DVD Burner, and an AMD X2 5200+ (2.7ghz) 64-bit processor. I thought I would be smokin! After a long and painful install I found that half my programs didn't work, and these are recent programs (premiere pro 2.0, nero 7, etc.) Also it was usually pretty responsive after I turned off the ridiculous indexing service, but having upgraded from a p4 3ghz with 1gb of ram (and XP) I expected quite a difference in application performance but found it was either the same or slower. It would also randomly stop responding for a few seconds which should not happen with a dual core system with 4gb ram and a fresh install of the OS. I had all the latest drivers installed and everything (this is probably my 10th or so build through the years) it was nothing short of disappointing.

So last night I broke up with vista and reloaded XP. It installed quickly, the motherboard drivers and all applications flew through and now I'm enjoying the speed boost I was expecting. The application pop open, nothing fails or crashes, and all is right with the world again.

Luckily the vista only cost me 10 bucks with a student discount, and I'm holding onto it in case they get their act together but for now it was just a buggy, slow, and annoying experience.

If you want the eye candy of vista just download a theme for XP..you will still have the reliability and speed of XP with the visual stylings of vista .

[redwudz]

I bought XP64 when it came out and gave up after a few months for lack of drivers and usable programs. It seems at times that support for 64 bit OSs is minimal, both from MS and the software and hardware vendors.

I suspect the same problems with V64. That's the main reason I didn't purchase it. But I have three of my computers running Vista 32 at present with no major problems.

[SatStorm]

Try this:
Load on Virtualdub with the mpeg2 plugin, a music video at 720X576 framesize, grabbed from a satellite music channel. "World Music Channel" for example, from the Express AM22 satellite. Choose a 3 min music video for the test.
Add a filter chance like this: Deinterlace (unfold) - MSU Smart Debloging - Deinterlace (Fold) - null transform - crop (72 lines from the top +72 from the bottom) - delogo - neatvideo - view fields - Resize at 720X576 - MSU Smart Sharpen - Video Denoise - unview fields. Frameserve this to TMPEGenc 2.5.
I do that daily (my hobby is to collect European dance music videos). Using XP+SP3 beta, I need around 28 min on my C2D6600 to convert this project. Using Vista+SP1 I need 41 min.
Using W2K I need ~28min too (that's why I switched to WinXP+SP3beta)

Conclusion: Vista needs optimization to do my job as fast as I do it with XP today. So why to use Vista? I see no point.

[Stingray]

All I can say is that XP didnt exactly run fast on the high end systems of its time... and neither does Vista now. You need roughly 1GB RAM to get XP running smoothly, and when it was released many brand computer like HP stuck them with 128MB. Good luck running XP with that...

I still have Radioshack's flyer from November 2001.
There are no 'regular price' machines with 128MB RAM.
Although the cheapest desktop PC on sale had 256MB RAM and came with Windows ME, and one of the machines with Windows XP had indeed had only 128MB Rambus RAM with asterix - upgrade to 256MB PC800 for $299 only
Also please keep in mind Radioshack is not really a computer store, and they always sold somewhat out-of-date systems at higher prices.

Windows XP itself runs excellent on 768MB RAM
You need more when you add other stuff (say i.e. Norton garbage - you'll need like 10000000GB of RAM to run it...)

Well I dont know anything about something called "Radioshack" but there were many brands that only shipped with 128-256MB RAM and that is only enough to run XP smoothly when nothing else (AV, firewall etc) is installed. If you compare XP to 2000, 2000 runs like a dream in comparison. Or at leats did when you compared them on XPs release... of cpourse these are all my personal experiences, they need not apply to everyone. 8)

[greymalkin]

Radioshack is an electronics store in the US. I guess we forget sometimes we are talking with people all over the world :P.

[DereX888]

Radioshack is an electronics store in the US. I guess we forget sometimes we are talking with people all over the world :P.

Nah, some people have nothing to say or are just too plain to imagine anything beyond their local reality (not to mention lazy - how hard is to type "radioshack" in google to see what is - beside I gave enough clues in my post as to what kind of store RS is, so anyone from outside of USA could insert their local equivalent).
I read many times about i.e. "tesco" which I have never been to, nor it doesn't exist in USA, but I assume its a local euroversion of Walmart, and I'm sure I'm not far off in my assumption
The point was there were no computers with 128MB of RAM sold in the end of 2001 when XP was released (meaning majority of boxes sold with XP from begining had adequate amount of RAM to run its OS smoothly, versus what is mostly sold now with sVista).