It's The End of the Road for Windows XP, Office 2003, IE8

[beetlejuicegr]

To all those with old laptops of core 2 duo, really? i have done service to such laptops, suggested to my customers to just go 2 gb ram for win7 32b or 4gb ram for win7 64b (or win 8) and replace their old hard drive with ssd, whoever did it has a brand new machine working. Especially if i also cleaned it and reinforced their gpu heatcover with copper shim and good thermal grease. If you want to dump those core 2 duo laptops plz send them to me lol

 

[St0rm_KILL3r]

thank you microsoft.

 

[danwat1234]

It's intriguing that the UK government has convinced Microsoft to continue Windows XP/ Internet Explorer 8 / Office 2003/ Exchange 2003 critical updates past the April 8th 2014 date (to April 7th 2015). But they had to pay Microsoft a lot of money to do so.
So no updates for any consumers from now on for those products, so new vulnerabilities (and their fixes) found in newer software can be used on those older products such as XP. WIll consumers have a choice of paying some money to continue getting updates?

Maybe the updates will be leaked?


http://www.pcworld.com/article/2139929/windows-xp-support-will-be-available-after-april-8-just-not-for-you.html
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/07/uk-government-microsoft-windows-xp-public-sector

 

[dextermat]

Xp will be as secure as it was, supported or not. Their will always be zero hour vulnerability and risky 3rd party software anyways. The best security is the user.

 

[Soda-88]

"but I really doubt that anyone NEEDS XP"
nobody "needs" anything. I can get by without computers once they've become inconvenient/annoying enough. It's just that XP still has the least of what I really don't need. I don't need UAC, slow USB transfer speeds, insane memory usage just for opening an image in photo-viewer, unproductive touch-screen type explorer (win7). I don't need frozen ribbons, nor false formatting warnings trying to scare me not to save older file types that'll open for all users who have office-97 onwards (office 2007+). I don't need an internet file download dialog that takes 3-steps to save-as, instead of 1-step (IE-9). I don't need fake graphics "features" that are so insignificant that it's hard to compare side-by-side comparison screenshots on die-hard forums (Dx10+).
I guess I'm too old and ignorant on todays systems. I can't stand seeing 600MB of memory being hogged on and idle Win7 desktop vs 80MB for the same on XP, and not knowing where it's all going even after disabling similar services & background processes. I guess I'm too used to the old days when machines behaved like machines. I just hate it when I try to do some file delete/copy/cut/paste/rename work, and often win7 explorer denies access to some file, until I leave it idle for many minutes, as if it's doing a lot scanning or some such garbage in the background, even though I have no indexing, virus-scanning ... etc. or anything. It's a been a sad dark age for computers ever since you can repeat the same steps twice and not see the exact same results every time.

The amount of BS in this post is staggering, especially the UAC rant that takes literally 6 clicks to disable and your inability to see the difference between DX9 and DX11...

 

[alextheblue]

Windows Vista, 7 and 8, do application caching, so a lot [not all] of that 520MB difference [assuming you're correct, never had an 80MB idle XP myself] is actively speeding up the responsiveness of the OS.

I'm not sure why you got downrated so hard for stating the truth - is there a downrate bot on the loose? I'm tired of hearing people quote memory "usage" in a modern OS. Why would you leave the RAM empty, when you can use it as a cache? When you need to free up RAM for an active program, it happens automatically and instantaneously, as though the memory was free all along. There's no real downside, and it boosts performance!

 

[Master467]

On the note of security, woe onto the persons that wish to bury their heads in the sand and claim that all they have to do is change their antivirus and not go on certain sites to stay safe, you can only patch a leaking boat so much before it sinks. Ask yourself this question, if all of your online accounts or locally stored data were compromised right now, what would the cost be to get back some normalcy in your life? Weigh that with a new computer.

If you dont download stupid stuff you won't get a virus. If you download stupid stuff, you probably need at least a decent anti-virus program like KasperSky or Norton (etc...). If you have half a brain cell, and use your computer for WORK, not flash games or porn on www.TOTALYNOTFILLEDWITHVIRUSES.com, you will never get a virus. Ever. Email, YouTube, Quickbooks, word and other offline (Productivity based) programs are all most company's use there XP computers for.

Also the person with the $6000 plotter, your organization needs to but fire under HP's ass ,move on or, take those computers off the network and use it locally, last thing you want is those computers compromising your entire network.

6 grand is not something you just throw away when you don't need to. XP with anti-virus is and will be exactly as safe as it was before end of support as it will be after end of support. I've used my XP machine for 6 years with auto updates turned off and without a firewall or Anti-Virus. Just updated everything last night and ran a scan that came up with nothing. This whole thing is a Micro$oft marketing scheme to make suckers like you spend 100-300 bucks on a new OS you don't need.

 

[jase240]

On the note of security, woe onto the persons that wish to bury their heads in the sand and claim that all they have to do is change their antivirus and not go on certain sites to stay safe, you can only patch a leaking boat so much before it sinks. Ask yourself this question, if all of your online accounts or locally stored data were compromised right now, what would the cost be to get back some normalcy in your life? Weigh that with a new computer.

If you dont download stupid stuff you won't get a virus. If you download stupid stuff, you probably need at least a decent anti-virus program like KasperSky or Norton (etc...). If you have half a brain cell, and use your computer for WORK, not flash games or porn on www.TOTALYNOTFILLEDWITHVIRUSES.com, you will never get a virus. Ever. Email, YouTube, Quickbooks, word and other offline (Productivity based) programs are all most company's use there XP computers for.

Also the person with the $6000 plotter, your organization needs to but fire under HP's ass ,move on or, take those computers off the network and use it locally, last thing you want is those computers compromising your entire network.

6 grand is not something you just throw away when you don't need to. XP with anti-virus is and will be exactly as safe as it was before end of support as it will be after end of support. I've used my XP machine for 6 years with auto updates turned off and without a firewall or Anti-Virus. Just updated everything last night and ran a scan that came up with nothing. This whole thing is a Micro$oft marketing scheme to make suckers like you spend 100-300 bucks on a new OS you don't need.

1+ on that, Its true anyone with common sense not to download unsafe stuff, and look at un-trusted websites will probably be safe. And even then common AV software will protect most(not all). It really won't be much safer to use a new OS vs. XP so long as
you don't use IE and use a modern browser like Firefox or Chrome and have that AV installed and up to date.

 

[ya right]

Mebbe windows 9 will be what MS promised, An OS with no kernel and more "smart" features not requiring incessant reboots. DOS wth a GUI!

 

[Martell1977]

Mebbe windows 9 will be what MS promised, An OS with no kernel and more "smart" features not requiring incessant reboots. DOS wth a GUI!

I think it's safe to assume that like Windows 7 was to Vista, Win 9 will be a finished and polished version of 8.

 

[Belardo]

@belardo Your business has had many years to invest into a new and better plotter with support for the latest operating systems.

Really?! Lets see... go out and spend $4500~6000 to replace a plotter that is not supported correctly by one of the largest names in the computer industry?!

Since HP cannot make a functional driver, that should TELL you about the much smaller companies. Do they have a Win7 driver for our model? Yes, kinda. As they have their PLUS / 500 / Z models... but not ours and the sub-versions don't work.

You are welcomed to send us $5000 to replace a perfectly functional piece of equipment.

Hey, do you replace your car because someone else tells you? I drive a 2002 Lexus, looks almost new inside and out. I don't like the look of the latest models... I'm happy with what I have, its paid for... its 12 years old and is in excellent condition.

 

[Belardo]

Mebbe windows 9 will be what MS promised, An OS with no kernel and more "smart" features not requiring incessant reboots. DOS wth a GUI!

I think it's safe to assume that like Windows 7 was to Vista, Win 9 will be a finished and polished version of 8.

Willing to be money on that? Win8 sure as hell wasn't a polished version of 7. Win8 is now 1.5years old and MS still has their head up their own ass on why its a failure. Its marketshare is still SMALLER than vista.

 

[Belardo]

Mebbe windows 9 will be what MS promised, An OS with no kernel and more "smart" features not requiring incessant reboots. DOS wth a GUI!

DOS? You mean MS-DOS? If that is all you want with a GUI, then install MS-DOS 6.2 and Windows 3.11 and you are set.

MS-DOS was always crap. It was crap from version 1.0 to the last.

 

[edogawa]

@belardo Your business has had many years to invest into a new and better plotter with support for the latest operating systems.

Really?! Lets see... go out and spend $4500~6000 to replace a plotter that is not supported correctly by one of the largest names in the computer industry?!

Since HP cannot make a functional driver, that should TELL you about the much smaller companies. Do they have a Win7 driver for our model? Yes, kinda. As they have their PLUS / 500 / Z models... but not ours and the sub-versions don't work.

You are welcomed to send us $5000 to replace a perfectly functional piece of equipment.

Hey, do you replace your car because someone else tells you? I drive a 2002 Lexus, looks almost new inside and out. I don't like the look of the latest models... I'm happy with what I have, its paid for... its 12 years old and is in excellent condition.

HP has no obligation to support an older product, don't blame them for your dilemma. Comparing a car and a plotter is a poor comparison. You can easily have a vehicle repaired or modified even if the original manufacturer supports it no longer. A business should be able to plan ahead for future tech wise since this world evolves so fast. You can still use your plotter on a machine that isn't connected to a network anyways.

 

[Martell1977]

Mebbe windows 9 will be what MS promised, An OS with no kernel and more "smart" features not requiring incessant reboots. DOS wth a GUI!

I think it's safe to assume that like Windows 7 was to Vista, Win 9 will be a finished and polished version of 8.

Willing to be money on that? Win8 sure as hell wasn't a polished version of 7. Win8 is now 1.5years old and MS still has their head up their own ass on why its a failure. Its marketshare is still SMALLER than vista.

Actually I would. Read my comment again, I compared Win 7 to Vista, not 8. I was likening the relationship of 7 and Vista to that of 9 and 8. Win 9 will probably be a finished and polished 8 and the odds are I still wont buy it.
Windows 7 does everything I need it to do and does it well, until there is a compelling reason to upgrade, Windows 7 will stay on my machines.

I do find it funny how every other OS Microsoft comes out with seems to suck. Its like every time the do something new, they botch it. Then after the consumers scream at them, they fix it and end up with a good OS. 8 was a flop so there might be hope for 9, but it will take a lot more work to fix 8 than it did for them to fix Vista.

 

[Master467]

I do find it funny how every other OS Microsoft comes out with seems to suck. Its like every time the do something new, they botch it. Then after the consumers scream at them, they fix it and end up with a good OS. 8 was a flop so there might be hope for 9, but it will take a lot more work to fix 8 than it did for them to fix Vista.

Oh god, this is so true. Unfortunately, there is no alternative (inb4 linux, anyone who runs that crap knows nothing works on it.) other then the few versions of Windows that do work well. Closing XP support and hyping the crap out of this is a ploy to make you want Fail 8.1 I mean Win 8.1, nothing more.