I am just curious if there is any advantage of using XP Professional over XP Home with either Poser 4 or 5. Also, is XP Professional that much more useful over XP Home for uses other than Poser. I know this was discussed exhaustively some time back, but I don't remember the verdict. Thanks for the help! Jay

im using xp home,and professional has only the better network support. i bought xp the day it was released and never had any problems with poser

If your system must log into a domain, or run a network or act as a server in that network, then Pro is what you need. If not then go with home. Thgeisel is 100% correct. I use poser on win2K pro and Xp home and niether seem to mind much.

pro also supports dual processors while home does not,if you don't have or don't plan on upgrading to a dual setup this means nothing at all...

Pro also supports such things as an encrypted file system, and CD-Writing via the OS, but I got Nero with my writter so I use that instead :)

the cd writing via os is also in xp home,but i also use nero!

XP home does the cd writing via the OS too, ok maybe it's just mine then.

I just upgraded from WIn98SE to XP home and(Crosses my fingers,and prays to God)it has been faster,stable,and a joy to use.I only wish I did it earlier.

Artist that's exactly what I said when I got it too ;)

The Backup utility comes with both versions, but it is only installed in the Pro version. And the Automated System Restore ability is only functional in Pro. I guess the Home version will let you make a ASR set but at the end, it will tell you it can't complete it. Kevin

I prefer the Pro version. Many of my ancient games won't run under Home, but perform flawlessly under Pro. Compatibility is better, and it's more stable.

Thanks everyone for the feedback! It sounds like XP Home edition will meet my needs, though I want to know more about Pro's Backup utility and ASR that MeInOhio mentioned. Also, hmatienzo, could you tell me how much better Pro is than Home in terms of compatibility and stability? Is there software that you have used that functions better under Pro than Home? Thanks again! Jay PS In case anyone's interested, I am getting a new system. I am VERY excited about it. I try to be frugal and not upgrade too often, so when I do, it always feels like Christmas. I have been using Windows 98 with a 700 megahertz Pentium 2 and 255 megabytes of RAM. It looks like I will be buying a Dell running XP with a 2.5 megahertz Pentium 4 and a gig of RAM. Quite a jump. Did I mention I am really excited about this? :)

I have a book called WindowsXP Inside Out which tells you how to use the Backup Utility and what it can and can't do. It's a good book. The backup utility is in a folder on the Home edition. It is not part of the default installation in the Home edition. And the book says that it's a little confusing as far as how the Backup is implemented in the Home edition. They say that the Home edition will let you create a ASR set, but there is no way to restore it, if you need it. For that you need the Pro version. You can use the backup utility to do general backups on both versions. I've used the ASR wizard in the Pro version, but I've never had to restore yet---thankfully. I guess you have to put the windows disk in and boot up and press f2 at some point and follow the instructions to restore. I just got Ghost2003. It allows me to create a drive image to an NTFS drive and you're suppose to be able write on to a firewire or usb drive as well, although I haven't got that part to work yet. (None of the earlier versions of Ghost can do this.) Ghost won't let you make incremental backups however. It's either all or nothing. If you want to know anything else, I'll fill you in on what I know. I've also tried Backup MyPC and DriveImage so I can tell what I like and don't like about each of them. Except for DriveImage. I couldn't get that one to work at all. It told me I had a CRC image and failed everytime I tried to run it. I ran a low level scan like it said, but no errors were reported and Ghost 2003 and windows Backup both run fine, so I think it's something about that program and XP.