Have any of you ...

[LSP_Ray]

29 minutes ago, Out2gtcha said:

I've been on an old OLD Win 7 machine I built after years of working with *COUGH* that other brand of computers that shall not be named. After various problems including "server" issues I went back and built a Windows machine (now ancient) and have been very happy with it, but the GPU is really long in the tooth, and cannot support Fusion 360, nor my Ripper software, so I had to start using the touchscreen PC that I purchased my mum a while back, and then I took from my moms house when she passed back in February, but never actually got a chance to use nor set up. 

Before getting laid off, all of my laptops had Win 10 on them, which I had no issues with what-so-ever, and always ran great especially with expanded SS drives, including my slicer software and server software. 

Now that my moms touchscreen is set up, it runs Fusion 360, VTS, and my ripper program, but it continually seems to be hinting at me to upgrade to Win 11, which I have not done yet, with the same reservations as pointed out above. Not all Win releases have been winners obviously, but Win 10 has run fantastically, and I havnt yet made a decision to switch to Win 11 yet based on how well the PC is running atm. 

 

Im sure Ill have to make a decision at some point in the not-too-distant future............  

 

My desktop still runs Win98 Pro. I have to keep like that to run my ALPS printer, some game programs, and my Canon camera interface. Plus, it is one of the most stable Windows platforms they made.

[BiggTim]

7 minutes ago, LSP_Ray said:

 

My desktop still runs Win98 Pro. I have to keep like that to run my ALPS printer, some game programs, and my Canon camera interface. Plus, it is one of the most stable Windows platforms they made.

I ran 98SE for years, way past Win8. It was the most stable OS ever.

[JeepsGunsTanks]

Windows 10 is not bad either, honestly. This computer has been on, without reboot for 26 days, 3 hours, and 17 minutes... I only reboot when forced by Windows updates I can no longer delay. 

[Dpgsbody55]

I'm on windows 10.  I bought this machine in 2018 and it runs everything I want well enough, though Win10 is not my favourite version.  Win 98SE gets that gong, followed by Win7.

 

This machine will run the current MS Flight Sim pretty well, and that's always a good test of a PC.  My laptop is broke, also Win10, but I hate laptops and replaced it with a Lenovo Chromebook which is great for web browsing and works as a tablet too, so it has music and movies stored on it for travel.

 

I may replace this machine later in the coming year and that of course will be Win11, unless Win12 has replaced it by then.  I looked at the upgrade to Win11 on this machine a while ago, but it failed the test.  More recently, Mr Microcrap nagged me to make the move, but I politely () declined.  I remember installing previous "upgrades" to older systems and I'll just say it didn't go well and leave it at that.  ()

 

 

Cheers,

Michael

Edited December 2, 2023 by Dpgsbody55

[D.B. Andrus]

7 hours ago, LSP_Ray said:

I have been running W11 on my laptop. Seems ok, though I do not like the app-style setup when you look for programs. And I hate the ongoing trend of computers, of all types, thinking they no better than me as to what I want done. Drives me nuts when I want to manually do something. Of course, I started with DOS so started with having to know what to do.

 

I know, Ray. I went from Windows 7, which would let me do what I wanted, to 11 and it's like I'm stumbling around a dark room filled with Bouncing Betties. No likey.

[MikeMaben]

10 hours ago, LSP_Ray said:

 

My desktop still runs Win98 Pro. I have to keep like that to run my ALPS printer, some game programs, and my Canon camera interface. Plus, it is one of the most stable Windows platforms they made.

Hey Ray, I have a more recent desktop now but I bought a refurb

Dell with Win98 just for the purpose of using my Alps and nothing else.

[LSP_Ray]

16 hours ago, D.B. Andrus said:

 

I know, Ray. I went from Windows 7, which would let me do what I wanted, to 11 and it's like I'm stumbling around a dark room filled with Bouncing Betties. No likey.

Yup, when they got rid of the 'Classic Interface' option, it was a real downer.

[jeroen_R90S]

I run Windows 11 on a refurbed Dell Latitude 5x90 that came with W10 -other than, for Intel, the CPU needing to be at least Core i3/5/7 of the 8th Gen or higher you also need a TPM security chip version 2.0 to be able to run W11. The Dell came with a Pro license so I can use W11 pro now too.

Other than some annoyances already mentioned it works pretty smooth. I hated all the W95/98/ME versions and was glad when NT4/2000/XP became their new future route! Main annoyance carried over from W10 is their pushing for a Microsoft cloud account and Onedrive. Also at first it had nice photo's on the login screen, now I get Forza Motorsport Xbox game screenshots which are in fact masquarding as advertisments (I suppose only switching to a Linux OS will get rid of that... but getting off topic here)

I've found W11 to have some neat features, useful for me at least, like WSL where you can run Linux fully integrated within Windows > makes it a lot easier to manage my network with SSH and key pairs for example

 

edit: IIRC the Pro version of W10 and 11 comes with Hyper-V which, using hardware passthrough, may allow those old W98 boxes to run virtualized?

 

On a related note, for anyone still needing older unpatched OS'ses I highy reccommend you at least cut off the internet access.

 

Jeroen

Edited December 3, 2023 by jeroen_R90S

[jeroen_R90S]

On 12/1/2023 at 10:12 PM, LSP_Ray said:

I started with DOS so started with having to know what to do.

the good (?) old days of C:\>_ on an CGA/EGA/VGA montor

Today there's powershell as you are probably aware. You can get rid of a lot of junk or make changes that are not configurable otherwise via this way what you can't via the GUI. Just annoying that it is what it is, having to do it that way.

Edited December 3, 2023 by jeroen_R90S

[jeroen_R90S]

On 12/1/2023 at 9:42 AM, Pete Fleischmann said:

My Mac runs great- just sayin 

P

not very surprising with it's BSD/*nix roots, though I prefer the originals  

[Gazzas]

I refuse the update every time it comes up.  Not even gonna bother with it until I get a new laptop...   yes, I use only a laptop.  I figure if this laptop was made for Win 10, it can stay on Win 10.

[LSP_Ray]

7 hours ago, jeroen_R90S said:

 

 

edit: IIRC the Pro version of W10 and 11 comes with Hyper-V which, using hardware passthrough, may allow those old W98 boxes to run virtualized?

 

 

Jeroen

Don't think that would work for the ALPS requirements. The drivers are pretty picky. Even on the Win98 machine. It also requires the older two-way parallel interface.

[ChuckD]

On 12/1/2023 at 5:40 PM, LSP_Ray said:

 

My desktop still runs Win98 Pro. I have to keep like that to run my ALPS printer, some game programs, and my Canon camera interface. Plus, it is one of the most stable Windows platforms they made.

Sweet merciful God, please don't connect that to the Internet. 

[jeroen_R90S]

On 12/3/2023 at 11:04 PM, LSP_Ray said:

Don't think that would work for the ALPS requirements. The drivers are pretty picky. Even on the Win98 machine. It also requires the older two-way parallel interface.

It's hard to judge one's technical / IT skill though a forum, but in the past I've had success by using a separate LPT interface cards in my host PC and using "direct passthrough" of that slot to the virtual machine, which means it is directly assigned to that VM and can only be seen and used by that VM.

You can then virtualize the whole of the old PC as it is and transfer it to the host machine where it'll pick up that LPT port and hardware changes (most virtualization hosts can use pretty old emulated hardware just for this purpose) A neater way would be to spin up a new VM and install w98 on that (gets rid of a lot of crap, usually...) but it may introduce issues like you mentioned.

 

I've managed to get this working with some pretty esoteric parallel and serial hardware from crumbling or (already dead) medical and industrial systems, but it can take more than a little bit of fiddling... on the other hand, since you virtualize your old physical box there's not much to lose (you can keep that intact), other than buying an LPT card like this one:

https://www.startech.com/en-us/cards-adapters/pex1p2

 

Jeroen

[LSP_Ray]

That might work, though I have read of others trying similar stuff with LPT cards on newer machines and have had all kinds of trouble. Like I said, ALPS are picky! Since I have two old machines I will keep them as dedicated setups and will use new machines for everything else. If it works, don't fix it!