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| AXION TECHNOLOGIES - REVIEWS |
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| Before you Click OK!! |
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| By Raymond Griffith |
| Friday,May 17,2002 |
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Before upgrading your OS, or purchasing a new piece of hardware, I strongly recommend visiting Microsoft's site to help you determine compatibility.
for this article i am only going to focus on Windows XP (both Home and Pro versions)
There are a couple of options available to help you see if your hardware is supported. Microsoft provides a Hardware Compatibility List. Known as the HCL, you can search for your specific product either by manufacturer, or by type of device. The HCL will indicate which Microsoft operating systems a given device has been tested for. The OS's listed include Windows 98/ME, NT, 2000, and XP. An Icon will be present in the Column for supported devices, and additional (minimal) information regarding the functionality, and driver tested.
Microsoft provides a Compatibility test as well. This test for compatibility can be accessed prior to installing XP. When your Windows XP CD is inserted (with Auto insert notification enabled) you are given several options. You can Install, read more regarding XP, initiate the compatibility test, or browse the CD. I strongly recommend initiating the compatibility test. Any listings for devices that may or will require driver updates should be noted, and then searched for so they may be installed to allow functionality. Some Software may be listed as well; it is a good idea to visit the software's manufacturer's site to obtain any patches to make the program(s) compatible. In some cases, you may have to buy a newer version of software, if a patch is not available.
If you already own your Windows XP CD, Run the compatibility test BEFORE your upgrade your OS- it will save you time and frustration!
to search the HCL you can go to The Microsoft- Hardware Compatibility List
There is also a search option available, that will search by Model to help determine if your system meets the requirements for an upgrade. you can find this here.
The requirements for Windows XP have been posted by Microsoft as:
" PC with 300 megahertz or higher processor clock speed recommended; 233 MHz minimum required (single or dual processor system);* Intel Pentium/Celeron family, or AMD K6/Athlon/Duron family, or compatible processor recommended
" 128 megabytes (MB) of RAM or higher recommended (64 MB minimum supported; may limit performance and some features)
" 1.5 gigabytes (GB) of available hard disk space*
" CD-ROM or DVD drive
" Keyboard and Microsoft Mouse or compatible pointing device
These are the minimums, and recommended requirements. I would recommend at least a 450MHz CPU and 256m of RAM for Windows XP. It will function with the minimums; however performance is less than desirable.
The most frequent issue faced when purchasing new components or upgrading your OS, is driver support. Many customers have called with problems related to devices no longer functioning after upgrading their OS to Windows XP (Pro or Home versions). In some cases if your hardware has Windows 2000 driver support, you may be able to use the Windows 2000 driver, if an XP driver is not available. this may or may not work, but if there are no XP drivers available, using a Windows 2000 driver may allow some functionality
While XP does come with an impressive driver data base, it cannot possibly support every device, and it is possible that some (possibly your) hardware is not supported, and will not be supported under this OS. This leaves you with the choice of not migrating to Win XP or purchasing a new device to replace the unsupported one with a fully Win XP supported/compliant device.
Raymond Griffith
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