Author Topic: WinXP (Read 9567 times)

MinersLantern · « **on:** May 31, 2012, 05:13:59 am »

After my main drive C exploded (win2k) I decided, hmm, this is a good time to upgrade to XP. Huge mistake...

XP has pretty graphics, XP also cannot run my WINMX hash to real ip software, what else does XP successfully fail to do?

I am used to running the not so smart by KM sources to do a cache server. On win2k, that works quite nicely, on XP, I can let the thing run all day and get zero functional iprimaries listed.

Me thinks XP itself is a real problem as far as WINMX goes.

I have other complaints abt XP, aside from WinMX...

Like how it will suddenly freeze the entire computer, just because it dislikes any 'advanced format' (ha as they call it) hard drive.

Sit around for 20 minutes for the stupid OS to find out WTF its doing.

GOD.

Win2k may to an antique but at least it works and works quickly.

I wonder just how much of our WinMX problems are reallly being caused by XP and up...

hollow87 · « **Reply #1 on:** May 31, 2012, 07:33:51 am »

All I can say is WOW, XP has been out since 2001 and it took you 11 years to just try it for the first time?

hollow87 · « **Reply #2 on:** May 31, 2012, 07:37:16 am »

As for some useful information, if XP can't run it but 2k can, try installing the runtime needed to run program and/or setting compatibility mode to 2k
And if your using XP SP3 it has a firewall enabled by default older service packs may also have a firewall that may or may not be on by default.

White Stripes · « **Reply #3 on:** May 31, 2012, 01:07:57 pm »

xp basically is 2k with some tweaks and the windowblinds skinning software installed (no im not kidding.. microsoft licensed a custom version of it to get the 'pretty' grafted onto xp) ... first things first... go here; http://half-open.com/ -- download that and change the 'new limit' to 65535 to get win2k behavior....

for winmx itself right click the app click compatibility tab and tick 'disable visual themes' and 'turn of advanced text services for this program' ... the one that says 'run this program in compatibility mode for' is useless... all it does is lie to the program to tell it a different version number of windows.... ....use the same for other older apps that dont work or behave funny...

oh... and for as much as i hate to say it... make sure ie6 is installed... dont install a newer version to keep compatibility for winmx era software.... ...just... dont use it as your default browser...

White Stripes · « **Reply #4 on:** May 31, 2012, 03:27:11 pm »

Quote

right click the app click compatibility tab

guh... too early to be writing...

ment right click the winmx icon or its .exe and select the compatibility tab

ive had to disable advanced text services to keep the mx ui from randomly freezing for a few seconds at a time on xp.... ....granted thats cos i install xp with east asian language support....

this; http://support.microsoft.com/gp/vbruntime may come in handy as well

MinersLantern · « **Reply #5 on:** June 01, 2012, 07:44:51 am »

I have already tried compatibility mode, same result and same general system weirdness.
Got rid of most of the un-needed services and pretty graphics.

It is as fully updated as it can be via M$ itself.

Yesterday I found another odd problem. I ran the cache server. Result? XP is much to slow on networking to deal with that. It will sit there all day long usually with 0 primaries found. Once in awhile it will find exactly 1 then not find anymore.

I used TCP optimizer to tweak the stack in every way that it can be tweaked, no change.

I was thinking that maybe WinMXWorld had disabled connections from outside cache servers.

I put the Exact same exe from this XP pc onto another one that has 1/5 the clock speed but runs 2k. The cache server had no unusual problems. Went from 2 to 6 to 20 in only a few minutes.

Just a few minutes ago, I tried the same exe once again on this really underpowered netbook I have running Win7 starter edition, it worked fine there too.

The reason I avoided updating to XP when it came out was that I had thousands of programs all nicely installed and everything else running the way I want on 2k. So why fix it when it aint broken? Especially if its going to take literally years to redo everything?

I have another pc that I put XP on just because I had to in order to make the TV tuner card work. That one also acts rather strange and slow. True it does run the card and record broadcast digital TV except when it suddenly decides to freeze for 20 minutes at a time for no particular reason and at random. That one isnt even connected to the internet. lol

I have already tried all the things as far as speeding up XP that can be found via Google.

Kill firewall, shut off AV, disable services, get rid of indexing, and turn off the 'restore' function. (I prefer Linux to do my Windows restores, it does it flawlessly the first time).

I have also updated all the drivers, no change.

Still the only thing I can think of is that XP is just plain, slow and buggy.

It reminds me of the Win98 days. Delete a few thousand files at once. Win98 would freeze awhile, quite a long while, this pc on XP does too. 2k on the same pc simply made all of those files vanish in an instant, no freezing.

I did finally get the dis-advanced green (gonna save the whales) drive working somewhat. It doesnt freeze the system anymore but still shows constant, non-stop activity. If that keeps up, its going to burn itself out in 4 months. Google anything that involves 'green' and hard drive. You will avoid the things like the plague.

I think I will try 2003 Server edition next. It seemed to be scary fast (faster than 2k) when I ran it on VMware and it is still 'supported' by M$. XP was slow for me running virtually too.

The real test will be does it know simple hex math? Can it do networking faster than an abacus??

White Stripes · « **Reply #6 on:** June 01, 2012, 01:19:18 pm »

xp's networking problems are from the half-open limit... did you fix that? btw server 2k3 is xp without the half-open limit at all and without the skinning... otherwise its the same....

what kind of machine are you trying to run xp on that it runs so slowly?

tho in all honesty i miss 2k too... the lack of support for ms for some rather glaring security holes in the os stopped me from using it...

also have a peek at http://www.reactos.com/ -- far from 'finished' but its an interesting project to say the least....

Bluey_412 · « **Reply #7 on:** June 03, 2012, 12:22:05 am »

Miners, all i can say is Karma...

In this house, we have some 15 PC's, running XP or Win7. The only time XP is slow is when there is a known hardware issue, a lack of HDD space (page file affected) or there is some crudware installed that is hogging the CPU.

any virginal install of XP is always as fast as any other O/S, hardware permitting (you cant really speed up an aging P2 class Celeron)

So, check out your software installs, make sure there is a big enough pagefile, and stop hating it

Or just use Win7 and run XP in a VM

White Stripes · « **Reply #8 on:** June 03, 2012, 03:18:08 pm »

Quote

...you cant really speed up an aging P2 class Celeron...

i got one to run at a 70mhz fsb clock instead of the usual 66mhz without a volt mod

(chipset wouldnt let me go to 83mhz cos it didnt support it.. glad i didnt actually have an 83mhz fsb chip...)

and yon times past the celeron 300A was a very popular chip to bump from 66mhz fsb to as far as 100mhz (if the board supported it)

all in all tho xp needs a p3+ since the p2 (and older) and k6 it doesnt seem to like... (never tried the athlon since this machine was born running linux) xp seems glued to that blasted SSE instruction set (even tho 3dnow! would have worked just as well)... win2k not so much...

ahh... fun times

MinersLantern · « **Reply #9 on:** June 04, 2012, 06:51:44 am »

After deleting that awful partition and formating and doing the enire thing over using win2k3...

I have discovered that yup, WinXP is slow, and buggy.

Win 2003 Server is ungodly faster.

I open and do things on the silly green drive, I close it, the desktop doesnt sit there for a few seconds with blank icons.

When I go to browse a drive and shift up and down on thousands of files, there is no delay.

And the cache server, just works.

Also none of this silly WGA business.

And w2k3 is going to be supported by Microsoft longer than XP will.

Prolly cause its a' server' OS, use by businesses.

My software I wrote to translate the hashes to ips and port, I am assuming is due to my choice of LCC as an environment. Likely because I was using win2k SDK as my reference to write the thing. This may be why it continues to report and exit whining that the hex number entered isnt a hex number.

No matter.

win2k3 is muchly way silly faster than XP can imagine.

Networking and just even the desktop.

Guess I will have to recheck wtf I was using as a function to do the hex check with.

Otherwise...

It works, flawlessly.

MinersLantern · « **Reply #10 on:** June 04, 2012, 06:54:17 am »

BTW.

XP is not just another copy of win2k.

Research more. There are lots of differences in the base OS.

Win2k3 is even more different.

XP is its own little beast.

Bluey_412 · « **Reply #11 on:** June 04, 2012, 08:25:13 pm »

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm <Scratches head...>

Interesting.....

1 person grumbles, Says XP is bad, Millions of others like it, even refusing to move to Win 7, which is sweet...

Even lots of networks powered by XP, even at Government level

<Scratches head, Again...>

White Stripes · « **Reply #12 on:** June 04, 2012, 08:32:07 pm »

server 2k3 does have 2 things going for it that xp doesnt ... no half open by default (no hack needed) and software raid support (xp can be hacked to allow for this too but its nasty)...

Bluey_412 · « **Reply #13 on:** June 04, 2012, 08:43:43 pm »

Hmmm, I dont think I ever had to hack my XP to operate dual Raid 1 Volumes (yes, 4 raided drives in the one machine)

Bluey_412 · « **Reply #14 on:** June 04, 2012, 08:44:29 pm »

but I run Win& -64 Pro now, so it's moot...

Bluey_412 · « **Reply #15 on:** June 04, 2012, 08:44:53 pm »

oops, 'Win 7'

White Stripes · « **Reply #16 on:** June 05, 2012, 01:39:51 am »

Quote from: Bluey_412 on June 04, 2012, 08:43:43 pm

Hmmm, I dont think I ever had to hack my XP to operate dual Raid 1 Volumes (yes, 4 raided drives in the one machine)

if it was hardware and/or a specific driver it'll do that... mirrored raid it wont... may with hardware but im not sure...

MinersLantern · « **Reply #17 on:** June 07, 2012, 07:26:34 am »

Well, I have gone and done it.

Now on win2k3, the thing is sometimes annoying but still after the untold numbers of security updates, very, very, fast.

HP does not like win2k, you cannot get a driver to run your printer or scanner either.

I just went and decompressed the install software and manually forced 2k3 to use some other XP, 2k, 98, gods knows file as a driver. POOF! magiacally it works on 2k3.

Applied massive numbers of updates, no slowdown at all.

My conclusion..

XP is as slow as frozen snot in January.

True its 'stable' I guess. Its also so slow that it can barely connect to the internet.

Open a drive other than C and close it, XP gets freaked out and takes time to repopulate the desktop icons. ffs.

win2k and 2k3 does that instantly.

Run the cache server...

XP dependably finds zero primaries, all day long.

2k and 2k3 starts finding them anyway, no matter about the flood attacks.

Just fewer of them during the attacks. But more than zero is better than zero anytime.

I likey!

MinersLantern · « **Reply #18 on:** June 07, 2012, 07:32:34 am »

At Blue...

Most people are perfectly happy to be able to lookup a recipe on Google.

Or some naked women pics.

They have no idea wtf an OS is anyway. lol

For such weak and useless functions, XP is wonderful.

'Im lazy and dont want to know or learn anything, just make it work Microsoft'

wonderer · « **Reply #19 on:** June 07, 2012, 05:13:14 pm »

winxp wants to index files on every harddrive it can find
switching off indexiing services in services will safe you a lot of cpu