XP Home vs XP Pro

[Jon]

I have been using XP Home for a while and I am very happy with it. However, for work reasons I'm going to have to change to using XP Pro. My question is, can I still play games using XP Pro and how does game performance / compatibility compare to XP Home?

Thanks,

Jon.

[saturnotaku]

XP Pro is for all intents and purposes identical to XP Home. Just XP Pro has some slightly more advanced computer administration features and support for multiple processors. You should notice no performance or compatibility differences.

[The Baron]

XP Pro has SMP (dual procs) and then I think the Local Security Policy Editor in Administration Tools is added, along with a bunch of extra services that you should turn off.... other than that, yeah, EXACTLY the same.

[Jon]

Thanks for the info. I was a bit worried that XP Pro was going to follow Microsofts old philosophy that business users will never play Unreal Tournament.

[Grechie]

i have both xp pro and home, i used to have pro on but then i tohight i would give home a try, nothings new or different, everythign works the same for me even games :D

[Hyper_Snyper]

how about hyperthreading?
does xp home support hyperthreading?

[The Baron]

yes. it does have HT support.

[R.Carter]

Also, Windows XP Pro can join a domain and also has more networking stuff in it than Windows XP Home.

This is why Windows XP Home us useless for most business users.

[Hyper_Snyper]

a little off topic but I don't want to start an entirely new thread for this.

If I upgrade from WinME to WinXP Home will I see a performance increase as well as a stabililty boost?

[The Baron]

unlikely you'll see a performance boost because you only have 256 megs of ram... but WinME is the worst OS ever. so yes, you will see a serious stability increase.

[Jon]

My computer hasn't crashed once since I installed XP Home (other than those I was personally responsible for). I have had it for probably a year now. I would never go back to Windows ME, on average it crashed 4-5 times a day for me. Anyways, my XP Professional CD should arrive tomorrow or Wednesday. Oh yeah, performance between ME and XP was almost identical for me, I do think XP drivers are starting to get pretty good now (from most companies).

[Ryo-Ohki]

Originally posted by Jon
Thanks for the info. I was a bit worried that XP Pro was going to follow Microsofts old philosophy that business users will never play Unreal Tournament.

Windows 2000 Server does the job pretty well. :D

[Jon]

I have to admit that I know very little about Windows 2000. Although I thought Microsoft said when they released it that it was not designed to play games and if people wanted to use it for that they would be disappointed. Maybe support has improved a lot since then. I remember when I first installed XP and most of my hardware wouldn't work because there weren't any drivers for it. I put it back in the box for 2 months until the new sound card drivers came out.