Am I crazy to stick with XP on my old PC?

Zubenal · Sep 8, 2015

I have an old Dell D620. I have had several. Its been a great workhorse for me. I have learned to break it down to a shell and rebuild entierly. I am loath to throw it out.
I have a Intel Core 2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz processor and 2 gig of ram.

I think I want to keep running XP on it. Is that crazy?

So, do I keep it? Do I upgrade the os?

Also, I am having trouble with the video drivers. When I try to install I get a message that says that the system does not support them. But, these are the original drivers.
What gives?

Elizabeth23 · Sep 8, 2015

http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/19/product-support/product/latitude-d620/drivers

are you using one of the three drivers listed above??

what exactly is the error message??

have you done a clean install that you are getting this message??

what does event viewer show for this issue??

eatup · Sep 9, 2015

Zubenal said:
I have an old Dell D620. I have had several. Its been a great workhorse for me. I have learned to break it down to a shell and rebuild entierly. I am loath to throw it out.
I have a Intel Core 2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz processor and 2 gig of ram.

I think I want to keep running XP on it. Is that crazy?

So, do I keep it? Do I upgrade the os?

Also, I am having trouble with the video drivers. When I try to install I get a message that says that the system does not support them. But, these are the original drivers.
What gives?

Have you tried to get the video drivers from intel's website? They're "different" than the ones you find on OEM web pages. Also, confirmed that you have to be pretty crazy to throw that machine out. Specs sounds about on par with the machine I'm typing this post on, which happens to be the one I use day in and out for my main "work". I also have a pretty recent desktop (Ivy Bridge quad core CPU 8GB RAM). That one sucks major on Win8.1 compared to this one on XP with a meager 2GB RAM that closely matches your Dell specs!

Aunty Jack · Sep 9, 2015

Hello Zubenal

Video drivers

Put Dell D620 Drivers in Google and these will show for your machine and XP.

Or alternately just copy/paste the above details into your browser to find these drivers.

Hope this helps,

Mark. (Aunty Jack).

nVidia Quadro NVS 110M, Quadro FX 350M, Quadro NVS 120M, v.175.97 WHQL, A08

Intel 945GM Graphics Controller, v.6.14.10.4814, A05Windows 2000 and XP 32 bit Graphics driver for Intel 945GM graphics family

Intel 945GM Graphics Controller, v.6.14.10.4634, A03

Intel 945GM Graphics Controller, v.6.14.10.4814, A05Windows 2000 and XP 32 bit Graphics driver for Intel 945GM graphics family

Don't abandon XP, as an OS it is still one of the best especially for older machines.

Termingamer2-JD · Sep 9, 2015

You should stick with XP. Just because XP is end of support since Q1 2014, doesn't mean that its user base is left.

There's still demand for custom visual styles even now for instance, probably less than the other XP OS's...

And XP is pretty compatible. Older programs work and a lot of new ones do too.

xperience · Sep 11, 2015

Zubenal said:
I have an old Dell D620. I have had several. Its been a great workhorse for me. I have learned to break it down to a shell and rebuild entierly. I am loath to throw it out.
I have a Intel Core 2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz processor and 2 gig of ram.

I think I want to keep running XP on it. Is that crazy?

So, do I keep it? Do I upgrade the os?

Also, I am having trouble with the video drivers. When I try to install I get a message that says that the system does not support them. But, these are the original drivers.
What gives?

I wouldn't let Xp near a internet connection, why don't you put a Linux distro on it, totally safe on the net and you don't need a anti virus.

eatup · Sep 11, 2015

xperience said:
I wouldn't let Xp near a internet connection, why don't you put a Linux distro on it, totally safe on the net and you don't need a anti virus.

Lol. Lol. Lol. This XP computer is my work computer that is connected to the net ALL THE TIME. What keeps me safe is MSE client ver 4.4.304.0. This is the version that doesn't nag you about XP EoL and the version that continually updates its definitions until I think 2020!

So long as you avoid IE8 at all costs and use other more secured browsers, your XP system (with the proper anti-malware in place, such as MSE) will be as secured as the latest Windows! And besides, it's not like there's any real benefit to using IE8 when the latest FireFox still runs on XP and has all the latest web technologies, such as html5 embedded videos...

Jody Thornton · Sep 11, 2015

eatup said:
So long as you avoid IE8 at all costs and use other more secured browsers, your XP system ... will be as secured as the latest Windows! ...

I'm not so sure that's true. Even older DLLs have exploitable holes in them and there are ways your system can be manipulated without even being aware of it. I'm not saying don't use XP (in fact use the POSReady hack and patch at least some of the holes...lol), but thinking Windows XP is JUST as safe as Vista/7/8/10 is a mistake.

Those updates in newer Windows releases patch something after all.

eatup · Sep 11, 2015

Jody Thornton said:
I'm not so sure that's true. Even older DLLs have exploitable holes in them and there are ways your system can be manipulated without even being aware of it. I'm not saying don't use XP (in fact use the POSReady hack and patch at least some of the holes...lol), but thinking Windows XP is JUST as safe as Vista/7/8/10 is a mistake.

Those updates in newer Windows releases patch something after all.

That used to be what those patches were meant for. That is no longer the case. Most patches on the newer windows are just enough to keep users from wanting to say switch over to Linux or Macs.

Security is no longer a concern of Microsoft. They're more concerned about building "telemetry" functions into Windows 7/8.1 now, which is why I've haven't updated my Win7/8.1 partitions since March...

Think I've also read from somewhere, "security is a joke on any given operating system". To say that say Windows 8.1 is more secured than XP b/c it's still being patched is a misconceived statement. So long as you have an anti-malware client installed, it should detect unwanted activities the moment they happen. Usually when an attack vector happens, there is a period of stealth where the malicious agent implants itself into the system (if it manages to sneak past the anti-malware client). But soon as it tries to access system resources, the anti-malware client is there to alert you. In other words, security on any given system is only as good as the anti-malware client and not the security holes or lack thereof that may need patching...

You · Nov 28, 2015

Zubenal said:
I have an old Dell D620. I have had several. Its been a great workhorse for me. I have learned to break it down to a shell and rebuild entierly. I am loath to throw it out.
I have a Intel Core 2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00GHz processor and 2 gig of ram.

I think I want to keep running XP on it. Is that crazy?

So, do I keep it? Do I upgrade the os?

Also, I am having trouble with the video drivers. When I try to install I get a message that says that the system does not support them. But, these are the original drivers.
What gives?

Keep Windows XP if it works for you. If you want, you can trick Windows Update on Windows XP to download updates for Windows Server 2003 and Embedded which are still supported (they are very similar to Windows XP).

http://www.zdnet.com/article/registry-hack-enables-continued-updates-for-windows-xp/

But I think that 2 GB of RAM and that CPU should be enough to run most of the newer versions. Many Windows 10 tablets only have 1 GB of RAM and users reported good performance. Although you might want to upgrade the HDD to a faster one if it's one of the slower ones, or even an SSD.