There are two
different packages for Windows XP -- Home and Professional
Windows XP/Pro contains
everything in Windows XP/Home, and a little bit more. Personally,
in almost all cases, I don’t think the additional features in Pro
are worth an extra hundred bucks (which is the current difference
in street price), but your mileage may vary.
Here’s what you will find
in XP/Pro that you won’t find in XP/Home:
- Heavy-duty security. XP/Pro
includes everything from Active Directory integration to the
Encrypting File System, which lets you scramble all the data on
your hard drive (a big plus for people who are afraid of having
their portables ripped off). If you need beefy security, you
need XP/Pro.
- Offline Folders. XP/Pro will store
copies of shared network files and folders on your portable’s
hard drive, so you can schlep the files with you when you take
the PC off the network. XP/Pro also synchronizes the files when
the portable gets hooked back up.
- Roaming Profiles. So you can take
your settings with you, no matter which PC on a network you
happen to be using.
- Remote Desktop. Allows you to take
over your office computer and control it while you’re on the
road.
There are a few lesser
features: dual processor support, Personal Web Server,
Multi-lingual switching on the fly, Remote Installation Services
(so a server can “push” software onto your machine), and the like.
See Also:
Why pay more
for Microsoft Windows?