Stability (Do PCs still crash?)

Mikuro

Mikuro

Crotchety UI Nitpicker
I feel sort of silly asking, but I'm honestly wondering: Do PCs running Windows XP still crash frequently?

I just watched Apple's new commercials. When I first saw the one with the freezing, I thought "Stupid Apple! Get with the times! Crashing is a dead issue! It's not 2001 anymore!" But now I wonder, IS it really still an issue?

Now, I got onboard the Mac train with System 7, almost 13 years ago. And my first system didn't have an FPU. So I certainly remember crashes. Even OS 8/9 crashed a few times per week. Back then, crashing was the bane of the computer world. But OS X really never crashes in that sense. Applications unexpectedly quit now and then, sure, but that's a whole world away from a "gotta force-reboot" kind of crash. In regard to OS X, the very term "crash" has been redefined, because the old-world definition just doesn't apply.

In all my time using OS X, I've had to force a restart an average of two or three times per year. It's currently been over 20 days since I rebooted (tip: to see how long it's been for you, launch /Applications/Utilities/Terminal, type "uptime", and hit Return). This is typical; I rarely reboot unless a software update requires it, which tends to happen once a month or so.

I've come to take this stability for granted, and I've just sort of assumed that Windows has come a long way, too, just like the Mac OS has. Have I been giving MS too much credit?

So, for those unfortunate souls who work with Windows, what is your experience? DOES it still crash, even after all these years? And are you laughing at me for even asking such a question?!
 
PCs with Windows XP _do_ still crash, although I'd say far less frequently than in the days of Windows 3.11, 95 and 98. Basically, Windows 2000 brought the Windows world stability. (I know, Windows NT was, but while Win2K was bought by consumers, too, NT wasn't really...) However: Just remember that worm. What was it: Sasser? Boot your Win XP PC, play for a few seconds, there's a message that says it's shutting down your PC. Erh... While not a crash, the image of the PC falling to the floor certainly fits... :)
 
My father's PC has Windows XP. It crashes weekly. I suspect software incompatibility in his case.

The PCs in our hospital (which mostly run XP, with a few exceptions) are 45% reliable according to the latest poll.

I estimate I lose up to one hour a week (2.5% of my productivity) though poor IT&M performance, bearing in mind that patient contact time makes up 70% of my workload.
 
My Windows PC actually hasn't crashed in a long time. And I mean a LONG time. Of course, the machine is well protected, but even still....it's a rarity in my case. Sometimes it's more of a PEBKAC error than anything else. I know people who would probably be better served with Macs but prefer Windows PCs, and they're always complaining about issues with their computers. Of course, they're also downloading from Limewire and using Internet Explorer on their unpatched computers.

The only problem I've experienced with Windows is the familiar "Windows Arthritis" that tends to affect PCs that have had software installed and removed quite often, and with time the operating system tends to slow down. It's never like it was when Windows was first installed. Of course, I have yet to experience this with my iMac G5 running OS X even after a good number of updates. :)
 
My office PC (IBM) with XP Pro crashes frequently. I use psychology programs, that I enter numbers in for calculations. The computer freezes 3-4 out of 5 times. This causes me much frustration as I have to do the same work twice.
What our tech guy does not know is that I burned copies of these programs that have Mac support. These programs run flawlessly on my PB.
 
My work laptop doesn't crash that often and is running XP. It crashes maybe every couple of weeks. However, the bigger issue is if software crashes, and the only way to recover is to recycle. That is still a major issue.
 
My mom's alienware has been crashing, freezing and randomly shutting down (not a virus) and now the Hard Drive is dead. so IMO it is still a frustrating problem.
 
Yea... I don't like that ad because I haven't crashed my laptop... ever I don't think. I beat the crap out of my work machine on a daily basis (by beat the crap out of I mean running a ton of heavy apps at the same time) and I have never crashed it. I don't think I ever managed to crash my win2k box at my last job either.

I'd say my PC crashes about as frequently as my Mac does.
 
I have been running XP since it came out and since then the crashing issues just went bye bye, kind of a mute point now. Spy ware is still the real killer of Windows machines now.
 
i have to say that after going to xp from 98, it was a while since i saw the bsod. but it does still crash more often then my mac does. the main thing with win is that it can't be left on as long as os x. i have too many problems with it getting really sluggish after about a week, and the only way to fix it is to reboot.
 
I use Windows XP on my work machine, around 40 hours a week. It crashes for me completely about once every week. Program freezes that don't cause a complete crash occur every three or four days.

I don't have virus or adware problems because I run two firewalls, AdAware, Firefox with AdBlock, and an antivirus package - and I'm careful with my web browsing.

At all times I have the following open:
- An in-house problem management tool.
- Crazy Browser (MSIE with tabbed browsing) running eight MSIE only pages.
- Internet Explorer (for that one annoying page I administer that won't work in anything else)
- Firefox with Adblock for all other pages
- Lotus Notes 7
- IBM Personal Communications (a 3270 terminal emulator)
- IBM Community Tools (an instant messaging suite)
- A Unisys terminal emulator
- A few SSH sessions.
- A VPN session
- Firewall & antivirus software

So yes, I'd say PCs are better than they were 5 years ago. A well-managed PC with a tech-savvy user is fairly stable. But you will still have regular crashes.

And I'd still much rather be using my Mac.
 
A good clean XP machine won't crash on you unless you're at fault (99% of the time anyway). The main problem I have is HOW it crashes. BSOD isn't a good thing. I've only ever had one Kernel panic (while playing with System files), and even THAT had the Bezel appearance and explains what you have to do.

How is it ever good news that Xlkjfljlsl.dll has caused an exception of type 0x792F33? Who cares? That's what the console is for; you can find out specifics if you care, but are told useful things when (if) they happen to you.


I think that ad really played on the freeze idea because:
a) most people's computers aren't clean and DO freeze; regularly.
b) it's very comical to see someone fall over mid-sentence.

The main issue that it presents is the need to restart all the time. I work as a PC technician to earn a living and the first rule in every situation is to restart. If you can't explain a problem; restart. Even if you're not experiencing problems, you should restart. Before we leave each and every job, we restart the computer, and people always tell us that their machines seem "snappier" when we visit (even when we didn't do ANYTHING speed-related besides that).

The only time I restart OS X is for System Updates.
 
XP learned a lot, in that the red cross button will always works now, (well, 90%), right-click on the taskbar is the same (to quit), and ctrl+alt+del is now bloatware.
 
My brother has an XP machine that is not on-line and it crashes regularly. No spyware, adware, or malware of any kind. Only a plain vanilla XP SP2 install and lots of games. Oblivion sometimes freezes up the whole machine on launch. Now we could blame that on Oblivion, but I only remember app freezes that locked up the entire machine from OS 9. If something crashes in OS X the other apps are not affected, never mind the OS itself. Windows should not allow single apps to crash the entire machine. No error screen, no BSOD, nothing, just frozen just like in the ad. Reboot and try again, you might be luckier next time!
 
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