XP or Vista Home Basic?

[Skalor]

Hey! I recently just purchased the top end Macbook Pro.

I want to install windows onto it, but I have 2 options:

Microsoft Windows Vista Home Basic Edition (The CHEAP one)
This will cost me: £58

or

XP (Not sure which version)
This will cost me: Nothing (friend has spare Disc and Liscence)

Which should I get?. A friend said that Vista will be better for gaming, im not a HARDCORE pc gamer but I would like to play casually. From what ive read, the Basic Vista is reviewed badly!

One more question. When Windows is installed, and the partition is created. Does it just take HALF the Hard Drive? Or does it only take as much as it needs, or do you choose or what? (Ive never done this before).

Thanks for your time and advice

- Matty

 

[72930]

XP will be faster to start and will often have higher framerates. A few games are Vista-only. Its up to you what is more important.

 

[The Flashing Fi]

Hey! I recently just purchased the top end Macbook Pro.

I want to install windows onto it, but I have 2 options:

Microsoft Windows Vista Home Basic Edition (The CHEAP one)
This will cost me: £58

or

XP (Not sure which version)
This will cost me: Nothing (friend has spare Disc and Liscence)

Which should I get?. A friend said that Vista will be better for gaming, im not a HARDCORE pc gamer but I would like to play casually. From what ive read, the Basic Vista is reviewed badly!

One more question. When Windows is installed, and the partition is created. Does it just take HALF the Hard Drive? Or does it only take as much as it needs, or do you choose or what? (Ive never done this before).

Thanks for your time and advice

- Matty

Windows Vista Basic is a waste of cash. The only real offer Vista Basic has over XP is DX10, which is only "important" if the games you play use DX10, but often times, you can't even tell the difference.

Other than that, Vista Basic is a crippled version of Vista in quite a few ways. Even if the Aero interface (transparency) isn't important to you nor Windows Media Center, then Vista Basic's only offer over XP is DX10. Since you can get XP (the difference between XP Home and XP Pro to the average consumer and gamer is nearly non-existent, btw) for free, I don't see the point in buying Vista Basic.

 

[Bern]

I've just installed Vista Home Premium 64 bit onto my MBP and it runs really well, it recognises and has available to it all 4 GB of ram I have installed. I only have it there to play games and if necessary I use Google Docs for word processing.

Vista Home Basic really would be a waste of your time and money so if your choice is only between that and XP then go with XP.

 

[The Menacer]

If all you can get is Windows XP Home, go with Vista Basic. But I strongly recommend that you get Home Premium. A lot less restrictions, and a lot more features.

 

[Skalor]

Thanks for the tips guys.

Ive got the free XP Pro + SP2 Disc today from my mate so i'm gonna install that now.

Thanks again

- Matty

 

[The Menacer]

Thanks for the tips guys.

Ive got the free XP Pro + SP2 Disc today from my mate so i'm gonna install that now.

Thanks again

- Matty

Perfect! XP pro is much better than home.

 

[The Flashing Fi]

Perfect! XP pro is much better than home.

To the end user, there is no difference. Neither one is more faster than the other. The main difference is that XP Pro can join a domain, and XP Home can't. There is also fewer network utilities that many people will never use, unless, of course, you're going to be in a large network.