Decision made.Sticking with XP

Not forever but I've decided to wait at least another 6 months then review my decision.
I seem to be using the computer less and less and everything has been so stable I hate to fiddle. Only program upgrade in the last 12 months has been going to Office 2007.

I don't need anything more for the moment, XP meeting all my needs and I want to divert more of my funds into other interests.

Still slowly accumulating new hardware of the stuff that wont date like PSU, some PCI cards, HDD, USB3 stuff.

Will wait for newer and better SSD for system and more 64bit software on the market.

Still be a Windows 7 forums reader and member as such a great forum and bunch of people.

Mychael

Looks as if you have your priorities in order.

That is good sound advice for anyone in a similar situation.

Upgrades should only be considered if the user finds a need in having them.

I'm waiting for this myself.

You're doing the right thing, Mychael. If what you have is working for you, and you want to wait for the right time, that's the right thing to do.

I'm waiting for the SSD's to come down in price myself, and see larger (256GB) ones become popular, and affordable. WD already produces one of that size, but price is an obstacle to me. 64GB is too small, so is the 128GB one, at least for my needs it is. A 256GB one in a notebook would work well for me, I could "downsize" that far, and use the original for other purposes.

Even then, I'd want that to have at least a couple of USB 3.0 ports, and one eSATA port, or one of those USB/eSATA combo ports that's becoming popular on notebooks. I'll gladly pay more for expansion, as it seems that there's never enough room anymore. My backups are over 500GB now, and that's compressed.

Cat

There is definately no harm in waiting, as the newest and most expensive stuff today will be more reasonably priced in 6 months. I'm so onboard for a SSD but in no hurry to get one as the cost is still prohibitative, the same with USB 3.

Thanks everyone, Yeah I could get by with 64GB system drive but 128 would be better. To put it in context I'm only useing 24gig of my current system drive.
I'll need a bit more for a dual boot but as you can see I'm pretty frugal on system drive space as all my files and stuff are on another HDD.
'cos I had to already purchase a new HDD just a few months ago to keep me up and running I've now got something that should be pretty sound for a while now plus I have that handy cloning machine to make mirror copies of any drive I want.
If my older MoBo dies then I'll re-assess again but for now I'll stick with what I have.

I hope that the SSD's drop further in price in the next 6 to 12 months. They've been on the market long enough, I see the slow economy as being the problem, or part of it.

While 1TB mechanical drives are becoming standard, due to their low prices, SSD's have yet to see the same massive price drops. Once sales picks up, prices will begin to be more competitive.

Until then, a SSD will simply be on my wish list.

Cat

The main price issue right now with the SSD units is the price of NAND Flash memory chips. They're dropping in price compared to a year ago but still high.

The more SSDs sold and higher volumes will eventually bring NAND Flash prices down.

I know that 6 months ago a 60 or 64 GB SSD was going for about $180 and now some are around $130 or so. Hopefully the next six months will see a further drop in prices. Also the value of the US Dollar has a lot to do with this too as it continues to erode versus other world currencies.

I can't live without Windows 7 I get home, open up my comp, and about 3 seconds later, I can continue the work I was doing, without any performance changes. XP sure is good, but lacks simplicity. You'll be realy amazed when you upgrade.

About the SSDs... This is what I would do; have a 64gig SSD for the OSs and system files, while having a 2TB HDD for storage... Yes I have a lot of movies.

The annoying thing about this century, is that everything is always changing, getting newer, etc... I know this is a good thing as well, but how do you feel when you buy for a hefty price a HP laptop with 2 hours lifetime, 256MB RAM and a Intel Pentium processor, and that two years later you have Intel i7, 16GB RAM, SDDs and some awesome graphics comming out for half the price?

Ok, I'll admit I did exagerate a LOT, but you get my point

If you are not building or buying a new computer, then there's no need to upgrade to Windows 7, as long as you are very conscientious keeping your system updated and secured. That includes being at SP3 and the latest version of IE - even if IE is not your default.

But if you are building a new computer - that is, a computer with current hardware technologies, then it makes no sense to me to straddle the new hardware with an OS designed to support DOS era (20 year old) hardware.