mike wrote:
John Rumm wrote in
:

installations, but I'd prefer to do a clean install on a newly
formatted disc - any comments?).
After a couple of months use it probably does not make much
difference. I have two xp systems, one has evolved from an original
Win2K system that itself inherited some stuff going right back to
win95. The other was a clean install of XP MCE. In use there is no
real feeling of one being that much more crufty than the other,

Thanks for the info, John, but what does it mean in terms of which of the
many XP versions you buy - if I buy one that updates 98 surely it wouldn't
work if wanted to scrub out the whole computer and stsrt again, as I do
with 98 from time to time. It's usually because I've sodded it up, but it's
nice to start again with a clean install and clear out the garbage that
collects.

If you buy the "upgrade" version at retail then you can either use it to
upgrade an installed OS (and hence inherit its apps and settings), or
you can use it to do a clean install. If you go for a clean install
then it will prompt you to insert a win98 CD or similar during the
install process to verify you have the right to upgrade.

(IIUC you can do both types of install with any of the retail
versions[1], but not the OEM ones)

[1] Student / teacher is probably the cheapest if you meet the (lax)
requirements.


--
Cheers,

John.

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