How Long Can I Keep XP Going?

[yakers]

At home I am mostly Apple computers. While working my computer ran Win XP and I have a HP netbook at home with XP and I am quite happy with it. I would like to keep it going 'forever' or as long as possible. I don't know if it is even upgradable, has 2 GB RAM and 60GB HD. I am a little irritated with Apple as there is a conflict with their new OS 10.7 and Quicken (I know there is an adulterated work around, costs more-does less, no thank you) , also with another program I use regularly and that one will probably not get upgraded. So I want to migrate these over to my netbook but it looks like I will just have the same problem there soon enough.
I know there are hobby folks who keep old DOS, early Windows and even Apple IIE programs going. But I think that takes a lot of effort. I am happy with my configuration but can a non techie just keep them going forever?

 

[MichaelB]

At home I am mostly Apple computers. While working my computer ran Win XP and I have a HP netbook at home with XP and I am quite happy with it. I would like to keep it going 'forever' or as long as possible. I don't know if it is even upgradable, has 2 GB RAM and 60GB HD. I am a little irritated with Apple as there is a conflict with their new OS 10.7 and Quicken (I know there is an adulterated work around, costs more-does less, no thank you) , also with another program I use regularly and that one will probably not get upgraded. So I want to migrate these over to my netbook but it looks like I will just have the same problem there soon enough.
I know there are hobby folks who keep old DOS, early Windows and even Apple IIE programs going. But I think that takes a lot of effort. I am happy with my configuration but can a non techie just keep them going forever?

You should be able to use the computer indefinitely. The key is to not upgrade any software once the platform is stable. You might check the original spec sheet to see what the max memory is and increase the 2GB if you can. 60GB HD is plenty if you stay away from video and not too many images.

 

[Nodak]

Keep very good backups of all your files, software, and a bootable copy of the Windows XP disk. I just had the motherboard and hard drive fail in my laptop. Even with good backups it took almost an entire day to get back to where I was. If they haven't already, Microsoft will stop supporting XP with updates but as long as you have your software disks there's no real reason you can't continue to use XP for years.

 

[FUEGO]

Are you asking about the OS's life span or your particular computer's hardware lifespan?
Microsoft says here that the extended support end date for XP is April 8, 2014, so that gives us XP users another 2.5 years until we have an unsupported OS. I see that being a huge issue with a lot of corporate users, since many/most places still run xp. At home, I have five computers running xp, and I am not eager to be forced to upgrade due to lack of MS support.

For hardware, as long as the netbook runs it can do simple tasks. If your netbook is like mine, it has never been powerful enough to do more than basic office tasks (word processing, spreadsheets, email, internet, etc) and can't do HD video. Should get you at least another few years of basic use, and then you can spring for a new $300 10x more powerful laptop with the latest windows 8 or 9 or whatever on it.

 

[FIREd]

I wonder how Quicken will perform on the netbook. It requires a good amount of RAM to run smoothly.

I am surprised to hear that you are having problems running Quicken on OS 10.7. Since you want to transfer Quicken to the netbook, I am assuming you are running Quicken for PC. Are you running it in bootcamp or do you use something like Parallels to create a virtual machine?

 

[yakers]

I wonder how Quicken will perform on the netbook. It requires a good amount of RAM to run smoothly.

I am surprised to hear that you are having problems running Quicken on OS 10.7. Since you want to transfer Quicken to the netbook, I am assuming you are running Quicken for PC. Are you running it in bootcamp or do you use something like Parallels to create a virtual machine?

No problems with 10.6, but 10.7 will not run my Quicken. AFAIK there is a $25 package that will run but it has less capacity then my current version. And there is another program I run (Wild Devine) that will probably never be upgraded for 10.7. I am not running windows on the Mac but that is an option. easier to just use the netbook.

 

[SteveL]

If you like Quicken, that might be the tough thing. Quicken sunsets its ability to download from Banks/Brokers every three years requiring a new version purchase. At some point, these will no longer be XP compatible. As long as you don't need that function, you will be ok until your HD crashes.

 

[ERD50]

No problems with 10.6, but 10.7 will not run my Quicken. AFAIK there is a $25 package that will run but it has less capacity then my current version. And there is another program I run (Wild Devine) that will probably never be upgraded for 10.7. I am not running windows on the Mac but that is an option. easier to just use the netbook.

Careful - unlike many programs, Quicken may not transfer data so well between Mac/PC. My Sis-IL was having a fit with this a few years back, and I read many horror stories on the web.

You might want to consider a Quicken replacement that is cross platform (linux support would be great for an old laptop).

-ERD50

 

[justplainbll]

I managed to make do with Win98 until 2008 when tax software requirements required the purchase of a new machine along with the then current MS operating system. Last year I added memory to my old machine, added a USB V2 card and installed the Win98 to XP upgrade. The old machine performs quite well with Win98 but struggles with XP.
This year I acquired a laptop with Windows 7 to use in the window mounted air conditioned portion of our house and connected it via a wireless LAN to the my main machine purchased in 2008 and running under VISTA.
Back in the day we used to write some pretty substantial programs that only required less than 200K of memory. These days the system seems rigged to induce you into upgrading hardware and operating systems about every five years. At work we upgraded our mainframes about every eight years. At home I've been through five operating systems in 21 years.
On the brighter side, I hope INTC etc live long and continue to prosper.

 

[chinaco]

Compatibility is a secondary issue. Security is the main concern.

Up to date OS security patches are just as essential as Firewall, Antivirus, etc... which BTW all need to be configured properly and patched!

Don't think of it as LBYM type consideration... look at it like a seat belt and air bags being a modern day necessity for a car (the goal is to protect you from harm during transportation... arrive safely).