Alan writes:

<<Am I safe to assume that _most_ old programs intended for Win 95 will
work fine with Win XP?>>

Very doubtful.  ME is the last of the Win9x line, whereas XP is derived
from NT, therefore unlikely to be very backwards-compatible, unless you are
coming from NT.

Move to XP, and you'll be burning a lot of bridges behind you.  Do your
homework thoroughly, be prepared to replace  most of your existing hardware
unless it's specifically XP-compliant, or at the very least be prepared to
update all hardware drivers (in many cases these do not yet exist).

Unless your computer and all your hardware is very new, or unless you're an
experienced technician who likes to be out on the cutting edge, you could
find the exercise a very expensive one.

I do not speak from experience, only from what I read. See, for example,
Fred Langa's reports on the changeover. And don't rely too much on the Ms
compatibility tests.

There are many reports of difficulties with printers, modems, and CDRW's in
particular.

So the chances of much of your old software working properly are pretty
low, I'd guess. Some will, some won't. If it's NT-compliant, you should be OK.

I take my hat off to those of you brave enough to sail into these uncharted
waters. Me, I'm staying home for a while with my trusty old 95B.

Don Penlington
Free computer tutorials at: http://www.geocities.com/donaldpen/
Also Fractal Galleries,  free icons,  poetry,  and beautiful Queensland beaches.

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