Thinkpads Forum

Some people, right here on the ThinkPad forums, told me Windows XP must have *at* *least* a one Ghz CPU and *at* *least* 1 Gb RAM or it will be horribly slow.

You people should know better.

Now that XP is running quite nicely on my 240 (400Mhz Celeron, 320Mb RAM) I've been wondering about 7. I know some of you are using it on your 600X's. How fast or slow is it, especialy compared to XP on a 240? What CPU/RAM are you using?

I have heard the same advice, and yes, xp is useable on a older system, as long as you know, understand and follow the limitations - youtube and flash being the biggest limitations, as well as disk paging if you are a heavy multitasker. Even in general use, my grandfather's system was feeling sluggish with 512mb ram in xp (p4 2.26ghz). It all depends on how you use the system, and what you expect from it - if you run xp and word 2002, you should be fine - if you want to unwind and play a game, you may have a problem.

I had windows 7 running on the dell in my sig for a while (p3 500mhz, 256mb ram), and it was slow (but not as slow as I expected), too slow to be usefull - 5 min startup times, a lag from when you clicked the mouse... overall not worth it - for the cost of the windows 7 upgrade, you could buy a decent used thinkpad, depending on how hard you tried.

Edit - The system requirements that are currently listed are for a system that you want minimal effort to get running and maintain - you want to throw windows, office and AV and give it to a kid. If you want to spend the time, it will run well on most systems.

This applies to both XP and 7 on older hardware...

Windows XP or 7 can be made to run (the OS itself) quite nicely on older hardware. Microsoft actually released a version of XP called Windows FLP (Fundamentals for Legacy PCs) to its corporate customers... Microsoft themselves RECCOMENDED 300MHz, 128MB ram, 1GB drive... the minimums were 233MHz, 64MB ram 610MB drive, both with 800x600 video.

This is all not without a price... MANY services were not included or disabled (i.e. to make XP Pro like FLP you need to tweak the heck out of it).

Windows 7 is the same, tweak it to the max, use the system for VERY general tasks and your good to go.

That's for the operating system itself... don't expect to run the latest and greatest software in such an OS though. No Firefox 4.0 with loads of addons, consider Firefox 2 with only nessacery addons (AdBlock Plus, NoScript). Forget about newer versions of office suites... I still use Office 97 for a lot of tasks. As far as games, dont expect FarCry or F.E.A.R. - but who doesn't enjoy a good game of Empire Earth... Flash should be avoided, simple flash apps are likely to run, like these i mirrored for my 5yo.

There are many tiny apps available on the net to get stuff done, and the smaller the app, the better. Consider many smaller "single purpose" apps to those "jack of all trades" type bloatware monsters. Learn batch programming and use command line versions of apps... wget, lame, 7zip(7za.exe), many others... coupled with batch files, they are very powerfull (old or new hardware).

System requirements are set for an out of the box "decent" experience with all the "pretty" and lot's of "Easy buttons" turned on by default, more hardware makes for a better experience OOTB... If you have less, expect todo more tweaking (I still do such tweaking on my main quad core machine, who doesn't want more speed )

a good start for XP is Black Viper's Windows XP Super Tweaks

First, I should have said what kind of 600X I'm using:850Mhz PIII, will have 576Mb before I try 7.

Before I upgraded the CPU, it was a 650Mhz PII, 500Mhz on batteries, and it still played Flash videos (youtube, etc.) perfectly. I have not nLighted or tweaked anything.

Flash videos on the 240 are the only thing that I've had any trouble with. Occasionaly, it seems a little slow, mostly opening something like an Office 2007 application, but most of the time it's ok. It's just slow enough, once in a while, that if I can get a usable web browser, I might go back to 98 & 2000. Cleaning up the hard drive, and a few little tweaks might solve the problem too.

XP and Office 2007 really are *Perfect* on the 600X; nothing is too slow, even with 320Mb RAM, even when the CPU was 500Mhz.

IIRC, there is a graphics chip driver for XP on the 600X, but there is not for 7. So, while 7 will work with the standard Windows graphics driver, there will be no video acceleration at all, so you would be very limited in what you can do graphically. That limitation alone makes the desktop feel very sluggish.

The slowest/oldest machine I ever installed W7 on was a T23 and that was painful, even with a gig of RAM and a newer hard drive.

The oldest machine that behaved tolerably under W7 was A31p, and even that I would not recommend.

FLP is the way to go on older machines, I like it a bunch. And a maxed-out 600x would downright fly with it.

On the other hand, there's really no reason IMHO to torture classic hardware with the latest operating system from MS. Not to mention the fact that the amount of missing drivers might prove to be a very serious issue for even the most basic functionality.

My $0.02 only...

Yea, i agree... XP tweaked or WinFLP is the way to go if you must have M$...

I prefer Debian unstable myself (the Linux kernel was recently updated to support cardbus on my 760's! A 15 year old machine STILL supported in Linux It was suprisingly easy to get the Yenta patch included in the mainstream kernel )

> FLP is the way to go on older machines, I like it a bunch. And a maxed-out 600x would
> downright fly with it.

XP Pro, completely untweaked, *is* outright flying on my 600X, and it's not quite maxed out yet. This silly propaganda about XP system requirements has got to go, imediately.

On the other hand, Windows 7 sounds pretty ugly. (What's so pretty about ugly?)

I'm also running Office 2007 on the 600X, and I'm very happy with that too. I tried IBM Lotus Symphony 3.0 an that was ...s...l...o...w...!

> My $0.02 only...

Sorry, I can't affore that.

We gotta be carefull as to what people think are fast... some people actually consider a Mustang or a Camaro FAST... hahahaha... I'll take my Dodge D50 with a Cadillac 8.2 L over one of those anyday. It grabs an 8.9 in the 1/4 and cost me a LOT less then a vette or viper Of course i had to tweak it with a bigger engine though...

Speed is subjective... I figure i am just too used to a highly customized version of XP Pro sp2 running on a quad core that when i use it on older machines it doesn't seem "fast" unless it is tweaked out.

> We gotta be carefull as to what people think are fast...
> Speed is subjective...

Ok, let's *define* fast.

Fast means:

1. Flash/Quicktime and Windows Media Player videos play just like watching TV, no stopping, jerking etc.

2. Web sites with lots of flash and java script do not slow the computer down.

3. Applications - even big ones like Office 2007 - load in less than 10 seconds. This is mostly determined by hard drive speed and program size, and would be the same on any OS.

4. No waiting for the hard drive except when opening an application or data file, or disk operations (formatting, copying, defrag, etc.)

By this definition, XP pro, untweaked, is fast on an 500 Mhz PII with 320Mb RAM.

Even on a 400Mhz Celeron with 320Mb it's not bad, except for flash and WMP video, but maybe with a few tweaks, that would work too...?

ajkula66 wrote: On the other hand, there's really no reason IMHO to torture classic hardware with the latest operating system from MS. Not to mention the fact that the amount of missing drivers might prove to be a very serious issue for even the most basic functionality.

Except the fun of it.

Now you guys have me wondering if I could upgrade my 600E to run XP.... I think that might be a fun project for after I get my next primary laptop, though.

Bookworm wrote:XP Pro, completely untweaked, *is* outright flying on my 600X

Is this XP with SP3, all the security updates, and a virus scanner? Or is it just the original XP, with no updates? The original XP is quite fast even with only 128MB RAM and a 233MHz CPU

Windows FLP, released to corporate users... This IS XP, just majorly tweaked, and stripped of bloat... see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Fu ... Legacy_PCs

You can acheive WAY better results with XP SP2 Pro and a little time(well a LOT of time the 1st time )

I have personally shoehorned XP onto a ThinkPad 760XL (P166 104MB ram), and if it weren't for driver issues it woulda ran "ok", after tweaking, it was quite peppy This was all just to see if i could... I LOVE torturing OLD hardware

> Is this XP with SP3, all the security updates, and a virus scanner? Or is it just the original
> XP, with no updates?

XP Pro, SP2, McAffe anti virus not running in the background. (I just update and scan twice a week).

> Even on a 400Mhz Celeron with 320Mb it's not bad, except for flash and WMP video,

I went back too 98 and 2000, with no increase in speed, and video playback is just as bad. I'm going back to XP, so I can use OneNote and Digital Image Suite 2006. Even Map Point - I think it was 2009 - worked supprisingly well.

>I have personally shoehorned XP onto a ThinkPad 760XL

Even I wouldn't do that...

> after tweaking, it was quite peppy

What tweaks? I think my 240 could use a few.

Bookworm wrote: > after tweaking, it was quite peppy

What tweaks? I think my 240 could use a few.

Standard stuff,,, mostly services that you can disable... indexing, system restore, windows update... many more listed at BlackViper's site.

No background processes that aren't absolutely nessacery, my daily desktop that i'm typing this on currently has 22 processes running, 2 of which are Firefox and Thunderbird.

Right click my computer, properties, advanced, performance settings... 90% of that is unchecked, the only 2 i have checked are use visual styles, and use common tasks in folders.

Turn off thumb.db creation, disable last accessed time in NTFS file systems... the list goes ON and ON...

I have a .REG file that does most of this for me on new installs... I've been adding to it since 2001 when I first tried XP, all entries commented

Just a simple text file you can add bits and pieces to...
I also use SP2, updates ain't a big deal IF you compute smartly... It feels faster then SP3 for me at least, an is very stable... my current uptime is over 2 months since last reboot (that one was from a power outage the UPS didn't handle)

Bookworm wrote:XP Pro, SP2, McAffe anti virus not running in the background. (I just update and scan twice a week).

That explains it. When people say XP requires at least 512MB RAM and 1GHz, they are referring to XP SP3 with all the updates and a virus scanner running.

And for a system that you are going to give to a non-tech savvy person, you want to ensure that it just works - i.e. no tweaks/tools or tasks to remember (running a virus scan once a week)

I gave such a system to my dad (very non-tech savvy)... It was behind a router, had a hosts file from hell, and I showed him jotti.org for any file he downloaded.

It uses Firefox... bout the only thing he does is browse the web... this machine is an old K6 500, it is in his shed/barn in the backyard... he looks up stuff he is working on out there... google images, wiki, etc... nothing heavy... he realizes it is an old machine and he knows if something don't work he should truck inside and use the AMD Athlon X3 450 I built him.

It also runs XP SP2 with all my usual tweaks... It's been about 6 months since he called me up with a question. It was the newer machine, he was on a government site that checked his version of Adobe Reader (it was 7, they wanted 10 or something).... I showed him howto bypass the check(was quite simple) and download the pdf... surprise surprise... it WORKED in version 7

He understands the machine in the shed is old, his main machine just plain works, he doesn't like the smaller screens on laptops, so i put the old one out in the shed with wireless and an old 19" tube monitor(man that thing is HUGE). Older people that are less tech savvy seem to have more patience with older stuff... It seems to be the younger crowd who wants all the "pretty" new toys that a newer machine provides.

I let my dad use a netbook(external monitor/keys/mouse) with 7 on it for a week or so... He asked me... "I see it looks different, but why do I need it?", I of course told him he didn't

Most people will never notice the tweaks, missing services, or tasks(that AINT running)... Even the most non-tech savvy person can be taught to run SpyBot once a week when they walk away from the machine, or manually scan a newly downloaded file.

People are actually getting more and more "dumbed down" when it comes to computers because of all this letting the (in comparison) stupid computer take care of things for them... when something does go wrong, they don't have any more of a clue then the computer does

ozzymud wrote:<snip>
People are actually getting more and more "dumbed down" when it comes to computers because of all this letting the (in comparison) stupid computer take care of things for them... when something does go wrong, they don't have any more of a clue then the computer does

Windows 8 and the touch screen will "dumb down" folks even more. Great for the repair business though.

Majestic wrote:Great for the repair business though.

Makes being a tech a less enjoyable job though... I could only giggle at some of the stupid people for so long before it was just another hassle. For my current base of people I tech for, education is more profitable for me then just fix it...

Teach a man to fish.... and all that

ozzymud wrote:

I could only giggle at some of the stupid people for so long before it was just another hassle.

In my modest experience, a properly calculated cost of a service call cures certain levels of stupidity...

At my hourly rate, not too many people can afford to be stupid.

That's the type of education that I provide to my customers.

Yes, they will check whether the card is lit, or computer plugged in, trust me on that one.

They will restart the router, or the entire phone system...because they've learned the hard way.

All of them have been taught that my time is *valuable* although I charge less than local so-called competition...

ozzymud wrote:People are actually getting more and more "dumbed down" when it comes to computers because of all this letting the (in comparison) stupid computer take care of things for them... when something does go wrong, they don't have any more of a clue then the computer does

^^^ This.

I think it's also in part the whole Apple software ideology of "oh hey we'll do everything for you the way we think you want it to be done" being appealing to the technologically challenged.

Heh, too bad they don't have a CLUE as to how I want todo things

Although I am gainfully employed in an IT dept where I love my job, I still do work on the side. Yes, my customers have learned that my time is valuable as is their time. Therefore they know that I bill for phone calls (unless it is very very basic) and e-mails (same rules). If I have to remote into a system, that meter is running. Heck the meter is running unless I tell them it is not.

Now when they call me they describe the problem, the steps they have taken (reset machines, NAS, network, and so on) yes they ran their updates and did a virus scan. At that point they have done the first 2 hours of what they would have paid me to do in the first place. Over the years my clients have gone from mice hitting the feeding bar, to people who do their own basic troubleshooting and pickup the batphone only when necessary.

To be quite honest, I love what I do.