Updating to Tiger versus Updating to XP

[Moof1904]

In the past two weeks, I've had the opportunity to update a Mac from Panther to Tiger and a Windows machine from Windows 2000 to XP Pro. Mac was done a bit ago, Windoze process began last night. Very briefly (ignore the sentence fragments and such), here's how they compared (thus far):

Mac:
Repaired permissions
Inserted Tiger DVD, ran installer, machine rebooted
In the various dialogs I selected Archive and Install
Installer ran for 20-30 (I'm guessing) minutes
Machine rebooted
I filled in some dialogs with personalization stuff
Ran software updater. Repaired permissions. Rebooted
Repeated previous step one more time, found some more updates.
Done.
Elapsed time: less than an hour, with me wandering around doing other stuff, humming a happy tune.

PC:
Inserted shiny, brand new XP Pro (with SP 2) CD
Installer launched and ran
Choose to upgrade existing OS
Process said it would take 52 minutes.
Part of the way through, got a dialog that the wireless card in my PC might not be supported by XP. (Rather new Linksys 802.11g card). Told it to continue anyway.
A bit later, received a dialog from MS Office saying something like "the features you are trying to access are not on the available drive" and that I needed to insert my MS Office Pro CD. I hunted around and dug that up, ejected the XP disk, put in the Office disk, let it process.
A bit later, I received a dialog asking me to install the SP2 installer disk. I assumed they meant the XP disk, so I swapped that out with the Office disk. Installation continued.
And continued...
At one hour elapsed time, the machine declared that it was finished and rebooted...
...to a text screen that said "We are sorry for the inconvenience, but Windows did not start properly. Blah blah blah" and offered me the options of starting in Safe Mode, Safe Mode with Netoworking, The Mode It Was In When It Worked Before (or something like that), and Restart from Windows.

None of them worked. They all failed with the same "Sorry for the inconvenience" screen.
So, I rebooted from the disk and told it to install again. I received error messages telling me that XP was already on the designated partition and installing two OSs on the same partition would cause problems. (Apparently, with Windows, installing even one OS on the same partition causes problems.)

Canceled. Rebooted again. This time, choose to repair the installation. It asked what OS I wanted to repair (even though there's only one OS and one partition and one drive on this computer). Told it what partition. It asked for admin password. Typed admin password. It repeated the query for what partition. Endless loop. I canceled.

Rebooted from CD. Choose a new install. Choose partition. Ignored warning about two OSs on single partition. Installer then said it would try to repair the current installation.

Installers processed for an hour. This time, no message about the wireless card, but it once again asked for the Office CD, which I provided and then returned the XP disk when asked.
An hour passes. Installation finishes. I reboot.

Same problem. Text screen: "We're sorry for the inconvenience..."

At this point, I've spent three hours on this task.

So, I rebooted from the CD again. Selected a new install. Low level formatted the drive. Let the installation begin. Went to bed.

This morning, addressed various dialogs asking for computer name, admin info, etc. and left the house with 10 minutes remaining on the install.

Pretty sure I'll return home to find the same error screen once again apologizing for the inconvenience.

Stopping at Home Depot on the way home to buy a very large hammer...

 

[Seasought]

Stopping at Home Depot on the way home to buy a very large hammer...

Turn on some loud Christmas music while smashing it to pieces, refresh yourself with a cool glass of egg nog when finished.

Just think, you could have jumped right to this step without all that stress!

I would be surprised if you had that same problem after doing a completely fresh install (but this is MS I realize). I've had reasonably good luck with XP installs save for the ridiculous activation problems I encounter that involves making phone calls to Microsoft.

 

[mkrishnan]

Thanks for the story, and sorry for your difficulties! I wonder also if a clean install might not have been much easier on the PC, but I've never done a Win2k->XP upgrade before.

It's an interesting story, too, in that you're upgrading hardware from a five-year-old OS to a four-year-old OS (well, updated versions of both) on the PC and from a 2.5-year-old OS to a 0.5-year-old OS on the Mac.... Is any of your hardware newer than XP/SP2? In fact, did SP2 come with driver updates? Perhaps some of the trouble stemmed from having hardware that was created after the OS was?

 

[Moof1904]

"We wish you a [smash!] Merry Christmas, We wish [crash!] you a Merry Christmas..."

Sounds like a great Christmas gift to myself.

 

[mbopy22]

Stopping at Home Depot on the way home to buy a very large hammer...

LOL

Avoid HAMMER you might end up with a piece of chip or something sitcked to your eye... LOL... You better just buy some alcohol and BURN BURN BURN that mothefu... LOL LOL LOL

Sorry that's just the DARKSIDE talking....

 

[fartheststar]

LOL

Avoid HAMMER you might end up with a piece of chip or something sitcked to your eye... LOL... You better just buy some alcohol and BURN BURN BURN that mothefu... LOL LOL LOL

Sorry that's just the DARKSIDE talking....

Sent the Original post to my mother, been trying to convince her for AGES to switch. When she upgraded from ME to XP, she thought the computer was broken because it didn't work the same as it used to with her digital camera. I finally took a look at it and it just worked "different". Both ways (on ME and XP) were not intuitive, they were just un-intuitive in different ways.

She blamed me for installing XP incorrectly - I said to her that apart from putting in the disks and following the instructions there wasn't a lot I could screw up - it was mostly the OS that was doing it.

 

[IJ Reilly]

At least Microsoft is sorry for the inconvenience. That makes it all better.

 

[Seasought]

At least Microsoft is sorry for the inconvenience. That makes it all better.

That's a good point. After all, with operating systems, it's the thought that counts.

 

[BornAgainMac]

Wait til the next version

Don't worry. In Vista, the "We're sorry for the inconvenience..." message will come up using the new text effects that look like the Genie effects on the Mac. The font will have better readability on flat panel displays and you can right mouse click the text and select what color you want. It will be really cool!

 

[mbopy22]

Don't worry. In Vista, the "We're sorry for the inconvenience..." message will come up using the new text effects that look like the Genie effects on the Mac. The font will have better readability on flat panel displays and you can right mouse click the text and select what color you want. It will be really cool!

PLOP... heheheheehhe LOL LOOL LOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL I just felt to the floor... that's just hilarious... LOL

I'm sure that if you right click the "We're sorry..." you'll be able to set it as desktop or screensaver...


MIcrosoft and Bill Gates are based on the British phrase for building things....

"Why make it simple if you can make it complicated..."

 

[m-dogg]

Hehehhh, this is a funny thread. Reminds me of when I upgraded my old PC from Win ME to XP. And also reminds me of how much easier it was to upgrade from Pather to Tiger earlier this year.

 

[slu]

Mac:
Elapsed time: less than an hour, with me wandering around doing other stuff, humming a happy tune.

This is a funny thread, but I want to know what type of Mac only took an hour to upgrade from Panther to Tiger. Because when I updated the iMac in my sig to Tiger, with software updates, it took probably around 2 hours or more.

And I remember how awful it can be to upgrade a Windows box. A few years ago, I tried to install a print driver in my wife's grandmother's machine and long story short, I totally f'd up the machine to the point where a re-install was the only option. After that didn't work, the format and re-install was the only option. Worst 12 hours of my life. And the last time I touched ANYONE'S windows box to "fix" or "install" something.

My life has been so much better since I ditched my PC and stopped playing geek squad to all my friends and family. My stock line now is, "Sorry, I can't help you, I use a Mac now."

 

[pulsewidth947]

Yeah you pretty much NEVER wanna update windows.. Always a fresh install.

I managed to install Tiger fresh and reload all my apps/preferences from a clone, all while being drunk and watching the 4400! No having to keep an eye out for XP's constant dialog boxes during install!

 

[pknz]

Tiger updating requires 2 DVDs for their extra applications and what not.

 

[IJ Reilly]

Tiger updating requires 2 DVDs for their extra applications and what not.

My copy of Tiger came on one DVD.

 

[bigandy]

My copy of Tiger came on one DVD.

as did mine and the ones of all the people i know, prompting me to wander what some people on here have been smoking, and if i can have some...?

 

[hob]

And people in this thread are all excited about the prospect of running windows on their macs... Pah!

My life has been so much better since I ditched my PC and stopped playing geek squad to all my friends and family. My stock line now is, "Sorry, I can't help you, I use a Mac now."

Me too! Infact, my friend asked him to reinstall his packard-bell laptop, I said I was busy for the next few days, so he got his housemate to help. Suffice to say his housemate was more busy for the next few days!!

 

[hob]

My copy of Tiger came on one DVD.

as did mine and the ones of all the people i know, prompting me to wander what some people on here have been smoking, and if i can have some...?

People that need to ask are never cool enough to deserve it

My copy of Tiger came on one DVD.

My PowerMac installation DVD's (what some people might call "Tiger") came on Two DVD's. End of mystery!!

 

[Randall]

Mac:
Repaired permissions
Inserted Tiger DVD, ran installer, machine rebooted

I just wanted to let you know, that if you're gonna be running the installer, then repairing permissions before you do so is 100% USELESS. The installer runs as root, therefore you do not need to repair permissions before the installation.

And about your XP headaches, it may interest you to know that an "update" is not intended for the faint of heart. You WILL experience problems if you don't run a clean install. This tends to be true for all Operating Systems, but it is especially true for Windows. If you did a fresh install, then your problems go away. You should keep a seperate partition on the drive for mission critical data or whatever files you want to save.

 

[Randall]

Me too! Infact, my friend asked him to reinstall his packard-bell laptop, I said I was busy for the next few days, so he got his housemate to help. Suffice to say his housemate was more busy for the next few days!!

Packard-bell!?! ROTFLMAO

stop you're killing me. LOL

 

[Nermal]

My copy of Tiger came on one DVD.

Two for me, because it also includes Classic in about 20 different languages.

Anyway, getting back on topic, I remember installing an XP beta back in 2001. What a nightmare! You need to understand that a lot of hardware simply did not have XP drivers back then. Sometimes the 2000 drivers would work, and sometimes they'd cause a bluescreen at boot!

 

[mad jew]

Installing XP clean is more satisfying than installing OSX clean because it's more effective.

The upgrade process from anything pre-XP to XP itself should be outlawed, punishable by death. XP must be clean installed, every time!

 

[Randall]

Installing XP clean is more satisfying than installing OSX clean because it's more effective.

The upgrade process from anything pre-XP to XP itself should be outlawed, punishable by death. XP must be clean installed, every time!

Always good to see a voice of reason around here. "Updating" to XP is a total disaster, mainly because it is a drasticly different OS compaired to say Windows 98 *shudder*

 

[wkw]

what a pain in the neck. I am going to start taking autocad classes and I was considering the purchase of a pc so I could work at home. After reading your experience I think I am just going to use the pc's at school for as long as I can.

 

[TheMasin9]

tape it

Turn on some loud Christmas music while smashing it to pieces, refresh yourself with a cool glass of egg nog when finished.

Just think, you could have jumped right to this step without all that stress!

I would be surprised if you had that same problem after doing a completely fresh install (but this is MS I realize). I've had reasonably good luck with XP installs save for the ridiculous activation problems I encounter that involves making phone calls to Microsoft.

make sure u video tape it and post a link to it!! Well see how a pc sands up to a mac!!!