Windows98 or Windows NT, which is better

[Xiaojian Liu]

It is the time for me to make a decision.
I am going to order a new computer for my
research. The OS is optional, Windows 98 or
Windows NT. Can anyone tell me which one is more suitable for VC++ programming?

[Roger Osborn]

Unless you have hardware (or games...) that need 95/98 I'd go for NT every time. It is far more resilient if your program is faulty and locks up, or attempts to corrupt memory (i.e. during normal VC++ development...). Also NTFS is a solid file sytem.

Working full time on VC++ development I don't expect to reboot more than once a week under NT.
It was much more often on 95. NT is more memory hungry though, so if you're strapped for memory 98 might give better performance. 64Mb is pretty much a minimum for development, 128Mb or more advised.

[Masaaki]

Hi.

Because Window 98 uses new FAT32, this file system is not compatable with Window NT FAT32.
I installed Window 95, Window NT Workstation and Window NT Server and formatted my 12.8 GB hard disk by FAT32, not NTFS
partly because I want to use my file on these OSs. But I lost the advantage of security of NTFS.

I suppose that you may wait Window 2000 if Window 2000 supports new Widnow98 FAT32. But I have no clue of this.
At present, I'm not interested in Window 98 because I enjoyed my Window 95 and Window NT, including SQL Server 6.5 and IIS4.0
to my home machine. Window NT provides us OS loader having a chance to choose OS.

HTH.
-Masaaki Onishi-

[David Langis]

Personally, i prefer Windows NT for developpement for many reasons. Windows 95/98 tends to get corrupted when a program crashes often like it is the case when you make a program. That said, if your program should run under Windows NT, 95 and 98, it would be a wise decision to install both Windows 95 and NT so you can test on both platform. My experience is that a program does not run the same way on both systems.

[Masaaki]

Hi.

I also prefer Window NT because Window NT is more stable than
Window 95.
But the problem is my hardware because my sound card can't be sopported by Window NT. I succeeded upgrading the video card
for Window NT, but I can't find my sound card company web site.

Because my hard disk is formatted by FAT32, one logical partition is
restricted at 2044 MB. This is also disadvantage for FAT32.
But I freely moved my files from Window95 to WindowNT.
Also Sun Java works any drive if I installed active drive -
C drive - Window 95.

Regards.
-Masaaki Onishi-

[Xiaojian Liu]

Dear All,

Many thanks for your replies.
I have decided to take your advices and buy
a Workstation (Windows NT 4.0 with NTFS).

I will use this to do some distributed
computing stuff (can be a mixture of java
RMI, CORBA and VC++).

[David Giovannini]

It has been my experience that NT is more resiliant to programming. It is just a lot more stable. 98 and 95 are basically the same beast.

I also have found enough differences between the three OS's that thurough testing needed to be done on them all.

I actually use a Mac G3 for testing. Virtual PC makes maintaining multiple test hard drives easy. The Virtual PC hard drives are Mac files. Want to test a different OS- just move in that file. Want to test a clean install- delete the old file and copy in a new one with a "virgin" OS. Granted these files are about 300 MB a peice- but copying a large file is easier than reformatng and re-intalling an OS.

In a nut shell I program in NT for speed and reliablilty and test on a Mac because I can get the testing variety I need.
Dave

[Wayne Fuller]

Also, if you have a big enough hard drive and you are serious about programming, get System Commander. I have 4 operating systems on my computer and none of them know about the other one. It is great. I create a program and can test it on four different OS's. It is a little tricky to get it going, but it is worth it.

Wayne