Is XP worth it

It depends. Cost wise Win 2000 makes more sense since it falls under the old licensing agreement and WinXP if my sources are right you will have to buy new licensing every 2 years. XP and 2000 use the same Kernel. XP does have a few more tools specially the remote access tools.

My vote is Win XP Pro. A very stable environment. Since you are back at O97, I would recommend Office XP. The learning curve is not that high and the improvements, especially stability are worth it.

As to Office, it's your call as to features.
From a cost stand point, I recommend that you review Star Office from Sun.
This is a "semi" open-source program, in that Sun is now offering support.

As to OS, I would skip W2K, and go straight to XP.
Why?
MS has already announced an end of life date for W2K.
If you switch to XP, you will skip over one round of upgrade costs.

As to the 2 year license, MS is trying to overcome the resistence to selling software by subscription. Their end goal is to collect annual revenue for all installed software.

One thing to check either way, is hardware compatability for either upgrade.
Don't forget to check periphials.
Many users who have upgraded to XP have found that their scanners are not supported, and many printers(HP) that are past warranty life do not have all features supported by the XP drivers. (double-sided printing, large paper sixe)

Chas

I am partial to Windows 2000. It has the stability improvement of XP but not the cheesey interface. Even though some people like the XP interface it is just something else for them to relearn. THe interface doesn't make the OS better just different. I think it is a "home PC" interface and that the Windows 2000 interface is more of a no nonsense business machine operating system.

You "skip" an upgrade by getting XP but to what? I think newer is not always better. Another example is Win98SE vs WinME. Win ME is terrible but it is newer(Not to compare XP to ME). XP is good but I don't think better than Windows 2k for business machines.

XP IS GREAT for home users.

The newer the Operating System the better,

So eXPerience....

....but the new OS needs more System Resources.

So if you have a 300MHz system stick with your NT and Office 97. Once you upgrade your OS,.. Also upgrading a Hardware happen to make it compatible with your new OS

Pinoy_Teknik

The first thing I would ask is "Do I really NEED to switch from NT4?" Quite a few of my clients run this in various office scenarios and it remains solid and easy to deploy and back up (because its so much smaller codewise). We mostly run Office 2Kon the NT4 platform with no problems whatsoever. Star Office makes some sense also.(see below) If the answer is that you need to upgrade, then I would go to Win2K. It isn't as much "code overload" as the XP and as was pointed out above, there is alearning curve to the GUI that will really mess up a lot of users. (you know, those people who have trouble dragging and dropping etc...). Win2K - when installed and maintained correctly - is extremely solid. As far as which Office suite, I guess that depends upon your needs. Again, we stick with what works. Why upgrade for the sake of upgrading?! We have been testing many other Office alternatives with great success (as far as conversions for example, converting Excel files). Choices are Star Office, Open Office, Easy Office and others. They are worth checking out rather than always running to MS for your software needs.

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