JPC - Jason Clarke - Latest Comments in One Year Entropy Rule Valid with XP?

Re: One Year Entropy Rule Valid with XP?

Chris — Mon, 30 Aug 2004 02:51:10 -0000

I've seen "Windows entropy," but not since the release of XP. I second Marc, though -- my last machine had only what I needed to survive on it, and never once did I want to restage it. The Win2K box downstairs, though, has had random applications installed and uninstalled so many times that it's a beast to use. The amount of software you put on it is key.

I'd love to know why that is... is it registry bloat? Drive fragmentation? An excess number of registered components?

Re: One Year Entropy Rule Valid with XP?

Jason — Sat, 28 Aug 2004 20:18:14 -0000

Wow - two great comments already! Marc, I hear where you're coming from. I'm also a self-confessed gadget / utility freak, and tend to install and uninstall an inordinate amount of software on my machines. I have friends that reinstall their OS every few months it seems, and while I install and uninstall a lot more "stuff" (ok, a lot of it is crap, but you have to try it to see, right?) I'm surprised that I haven't run into that problem with a machine that's going on 3 years in production. Maybe I've just been lucky on that one, or maybe I'm slowing down compared to how I used to treat my systems. But it seems to me that Windows gets a bad rap for the 1 year arthritis or entropy problem, and that any other OS that was treated the same way (lots of installs and uninstalls) would have similar issues.

Re: One Year Entropy Rule Valid with XP?

Glen — Sat, 28 Aug 2004 14:28:39 -0000

And then there are the likes of me. Bare minimum. Don't rock the boat. No testing. No gaming. I surf. I Blog. I rip tunes from vinyl. I burn CD's. ho-hum.... but goin on 3 years.

Re: One Year Entropy Rule Valid with XP?

Marc Orchant — Sat, 28 Aug 2004 13:41:33 -0000

Jason:

It depends a bit on how much software you install and uninstall - that is the single biggest contributor to Windows arthritis (or entropy as you label it). I have had XP systems get so crufty I've had to rebuild them after six months (I test a *lot* of software) and others that last 18 months before getting too cranky to put up with.