Win 98SE on XP Machine

[fisherman338]

I was given a DELL Dimension 8200 with Win ME loaded from DELL, with major OS/Software problems. This is a 2001 vintage machine. It says XP compatible on the case. It has a P4 1.7 with 256 megs of ram. One of the original problems was that it crashed at the drop of a hat. I formatted then installed Win 98SE with all appropriate drivers. It still crashes (freeze up), though not as much. Does ANY ONE have any ideas? I'd hate to buy Win XP just to load on this machine & not have that fix the problem? Another bit of info, it usually crashes when I get in a hurry & try to do 2 things at a time. As in stop a download & open a different folder. My original P3 450 never had this problem..
PLEASE Help.. I'm posting this thread on the XP thread also, in hopes of someone on that forum helping...

[degsy]

Welcome :)

If you loaded a fresh install of 98 and it still had problems then it would point towards Hardware issues.

What were the errors?

If it is hardware then XP would most probably have similar problems.

[fisherman338]

There are no errors.I've never had an error message on this system. It just freezes up. I have to power off manually. I ran a system diagnosis program & under system it said "system thermal protection: Warning" I don't know if that means it's running hot or that there is a system overheat warning system. This system DELL Dimension 8200 doesn't have a fan on the heat sink for the CPU. It just has large fins that sit in the air stream of the case cooling fan outlet. Just in case, I've ordered a CPU cooler.