Dave,
I currently have two XP computers and one Win98 computer on my
home network.
First, there is a difference between XP Home and XP Pro versions.
In the Home version, everyone is an administrator, and it follows
the peer to peer network model. I prefer this approach for
simplicity. Everyone can share files with everyone. No passwords
are necessary. No kids or wife bugging "the administrator" about
things.
Second, if you are running a network with an Internet connection,
make sure the permissions are set properly to avoid someone out
in Internet-land from sharing your C: drive :.) A firewall is one
approach. Another is setting up the network to use NetBeui instead
of TCP/IP, between computers. XP comes with TCP/IP only
installed, however, Netbeui is on the XP CDROM and can be
installed. The steps to do this can be found in a PC World article
which is on their Web site (no, I don't have the URL handy).
For me, XP has worked well. It defintiely is more stable than 98,
and doesn't require periodic rebooting to free up resources that
were never released when they should have been. On the down
side, some software/hardware that ran on 98 won't run on XP. A
few of the kids' CDROMs, for example. Also my Visioneer scanner,
only 2 years old, is not supported under XP, but I was able to
install it with a very klugey and convoluted install procedure from
Visioneer (and they have no intention of updating their drivers, etc. -
last time I buy from them!).
If you are into networking, you may like the server/user model.
Personally, I prefer peer to peer for simplicity, and no need to keep
a server PC up and running at all times.
73,
Barry W2UP
I
3 Jul 02, at 13:17, Dave L Thompson wrote:
> The XYL just upgraded the family PC to a compaq running Windows XP.
> While this has some trappings of Windows 9X when you start looking
> inside its really Windows NT.
>
> The wife is, among other things, a certified microsoft NT
> administrator.
> She set the PC up as a windows NT with separate log ons for all of
> the
> family and two of us have passwords. But only she has permissions to
> load new software. I was working with the PC and started to install
> Norton Anti Virus 2002. I did as the software told me and stopped to
> shut down any other software running and not only did the norton
> desktop short cut disappear but so did the software. The wife
> starting searching for it and found it in the systems area which only
> the systems admin can get to.
> While looking thru the systems folders she ran across the main XP
> folder
> which calls the Windows NT folder.
>
> Compaq and other PC vendors are now only loading XP. The tech at
> compaq says the merger of Windows 9X into NT is 90% complete. The
> main advantage of XP is that it runs 9X software without requiring
> conversion to NT. There is no DOS there so you have to load Dos 6
> (Dos 7 was the limited version under 9X). Guess the DOS software gang
> are in for tough sledding!
>
> Being NT this should make for much easier networks as NT has (so does
> W 9X) has networking built in. The difference is that NT fully
> supports the break apart of server and client even if they are on the
> same box. We had a contract with a major airport where software was
> written for NT but tested on W9X. It took almost another conversion
> to move fully to NT. After the first phase we put the development PC
> on NT and made life simpler! The easiest way is to make one PC be the
> server and attach a number of clients at each station (for multi ops).
> The question is how much of writelog should remain on the server and
> be shared by each client. The wife thinks the logging software for
> sure but perhaps each client should have all the interconnect for
> keying, rig control, and DVK.
> Plug in modules may be on the server or the client although the RTTY
> and
> PSK31 types lend themselves to the client. You still can run keying
> on the LPT port if the clients are all W 9X. The current wireless
> networks run on 2.4GHZ. They claim they can run in very hostile RF
> environments (multi op stations??). Hopefully this is true.
>
> The next shocker is that Micro soft is planning to support only two
> operating systems in the future. Some version of NT and the clients
> will all become CE thin client.
>
> 73 Dave K4JRB
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--
Barry Kutner, W2UP Internet: w2up@mindspring.com
Newtown, PA Frankford Radio Club
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