My dad and sis are running a PII 450Mhz with 256MB of RAM (don't ask) and were wondering if its advisable to run WinXP Home Edition on it? I know XP doesn't require too much processing power (I think) just a lot of RAM...

But the thing is, I know I can install it, but is it still possible to get WinXP compatible drivers for the graphics card (16MB nVidia TNT) and the sound system (Altec Lansing something or other... heh)? And where would I find them? Sorry for the trouble, hope you can help.

You <i>can</i> do it, but it don't think I <i>would</i>. That's nearing the low end of the scale listed in the Home Edition system requirements ... and the general "requirements" of this type are always a little extreme, as in being almost too low:

<A HREF="http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/howtobuy/upgrading/sysreqs.asp" target="_new">Windows XP Home Edition System Requirements</A>

Personally, I wouldn't try it without adding at least another 256MB of RAM, considering the processor speed. If you are accustomed to playing games on the computer, the lack of RAM will become almost immediately apparent.

Getting drivers for things like the video card you mentioned shouldn't be a problem. There are several sites that have downloadable drivers, such as <A HREF="http://www.guru3d.com/files/" target="_new">Guru3D.com</A>. As for "Altec Lansing" ... that's the type of speakers you are using, and you would be more concerned with obtaining a driver for the sound card, I think. Speakers don't need drivers.

You might want to check on the hardware compatibility of the system before attempting such an upgrade. <A HREF="http://pcpitstop.com/default.asp" target="_new">PC Pitstop</A> has an online XP Readiness Test that you might find useful.

IMHO, with a PII system with 256MB of RAM, I'd stick with Win98SE for the best results. If you want to run WinXP, get a newer computer that can handle the demands of the operating system, with compatible hardware/software, so you can actually get some use out of the purchase. Otherwise, you are going to be spending quite a bit of time tweaking the operating system to the barebones for performance, which is going to include getting rid of the newer interface (among other things) in order to achieve some kind of acceptable speed levels.

Unless you are an experienced user, and have spent some time previously working with a 32-bit operating system, such as Windows 2000, you are going to find WinXP very different from Win9x, and you could easily spend several weeks locating the necessary information to learn how to use and customize the upgrade. I hope you are handy with a search engine.

I highly suggest, in any situation, that you install the newer operating system on a clean hard drive, and not as an upgrade, or you may be facing some unnecessary and frustrating issues with different kinds of errors. FYI, this can be done with an upgrade disk, if you have a licensed version of a previous operating system, such as Win98, Win98SE, or WinME. You cannot upgrade Windows 95 to WinXP.

Toejam31

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