Re: Should I install Windows XP on an Old Laptop?

Tech-Archive recommends: Repair Windows Errors & Optimize Windows Performance

Christopher Isherwood wrote:
I have an old IBM ThinkPad 600X, with 64MB System RAM and 448MHz Intel Pentium III
Processor. It was originally a business laptop, running Windows NT 4, but was resold
with 98SE.

If I upgrade the RAM to 192MB, would XP run well, or should I upgrade to 320MB? Is my processor good enough?


I'm afraid, given those specifications, that the the word "glacial" comes to mind, and you'll want to upgrade to at least 512Mb of Ram and probably a larger hard drive if you're planning on installing many applications. The CPU will be the bottle-neck, I'm afraid. Frankly, I wouldn't put any OS more demanding then WinNT or Win98 on that old a platform; you almost certainly won't be able to find WinXP-compatible device drivers for the laptop's components.

Acceptable performance is, of course, a matter of personal opinion and depends entirely upon what *you* expect to do with your computer. If all you want to do is play WinXP's built-in games, send and receive simple emails, browse the Internet (while avoiding the more "ornamental" web sites) etc., such a machine may well meet your needs. If, however, you plan to take advantage of WinXP's multimedia capabilities, play graphic-intensive games, or do advanced word or data processing, such a machine would probably be woefully inadequate.

If you turn off all of WinXP GUI eye-candy, it will still be very slow, but it might be usable for simple text editing, email, web-browsing, etc. It won't be any good for graphics-intensive applications, and most newer games. (During the public preview period, I tested WinXP on a 500 MHz machine with 256 Mb of RAM, and it was much slower than I like.)

To help improve WinXP's performance on older machines:

1) Right-click the Task Bar > Properties > Start Menu, ensure "Classic Start menu" is selected.

2) Right-click an empty spot on the Desktop > Properties > Themes > select "Windows Classic."

3) Right-click My Computer > Properties > Performance > Settings > Visual Effects, ensure "Adjust for best performance" is selected.



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Bruce Chambers

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