Microsoft Worried About PCs Still Using Windows XP

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Still using MS-DOS to run a series of executable files using batch files for product testing.
Still using Win 3.1 for an industrial thermal label printer
Still using Win2000 to run a eeprom programmer terminal
Still using about 10 XP terminals to connect to an inventory application server that is licensed for only XP clients and will do so until the wheels fall off. New license is more the 30K. I will just move the XP terminals to a subnet without WAN access.
 


How difficult can it be for a company the size of Apple to keep their OS security up to date for more than a couple of years?

See what I did there? I could've taken someone else than Apple as well. MS is the one that kept at least that OS alive the longest, and they didn't force you to upgrade every other year to keep a secured system like Apple does, on top of having to pay double the price for the computer. Just using Apple as an example here as it is another big company, you could base this on some Linux OSes as well, where only some versions have long term support.



Could pretty much use the same example with this quote, but the win 8 interface looks counter intuitive, but it isn't all counter intuitive. You just need to learn to use it. Anyway when I use windows 8 I pretty much never use the metro interface, only when I need to start a program or search something do I go to metro interface just to write the name of the program (autosearches). Other than that, Win 8 performs much more than Win 7.
 
@ egilbe You make a very general assumption that those who are forced to upgrade to Windows 8/8.1 hate it. I do tech support for a large retailer, and most of the calls I get are from people who were forced to upgrade to the latest OS, and I would say that 1 in 5 calls hate it. I am one of those who hated Windows 8, mainly because it looked too much like a tablet OS and has Multiple personalities. After Using Windows 8, and supporting it I rather like it. It does have a very high learning curve, but it is at times more efficient to use than previous versions of the OS. As for Windows XP it's time for it to die, you had 12yrs, and MS only supports an OS for 10.
 

Some people, like me, got a bunch of free software from MSDNAA and other similar initiatives node-locked to the computer they used during their undergrad/postgrad studies... I probably have something like 30k$ worth of engineering software licenses from academic programs locked to my old P4 running XP. I cannot afford wasting that much money on software for occasional personal use so whenever I need it, I fire up the oldie and hope it doesn't blow up.

So count me up as one of those people who own a PC they cannot upgrade even if they wanted to... both OS-wise and hardware-wise.
 
I can understand people being upset over Windows XP losing official support but, simply put, the writing was on the wall. If you bought the OS on day one, you signed an EULA that guaranteed 10 years support - so it's not like the end of support was some surprise. The thing is, 10 years would have had it ending in 2011 - and here we are in 2013 with support promised until 2014.

It sucks that support is ending, but this is hardly unprecedented in the computing software world. Heck, 13 years of support for a piece of software - OS's included - is what's nearly unprecedented, as most companies put software out to pasture in just a year or two.

It's unfortunate, and for people like Invaliderror above, it is *really* unfortunate - but I really don't see how you can blame MS for this in any substantive way. If so, there is a *LOT* of blame to throw around in the computing world in general, well beyond just MS since most companies support programs for far, far less time than MS has supported Windows XP.
 
People need to stop complaining about Microsoft stopping security updates for Windows XP. Look at ANY other OS and you will see that they stop being supported LONG BEFORE 12 years. Apple's oldest security-release supported OS is currently Snow Leopard, which you might notice was released in 2009, the same year Windows 7 (which is still on mainstream support for 14 more months before a 5-year stint on security updates). Even Apple's most used OS X version, Tiger, was only supported on a combined mainstream/extended basis from 2005 to 2009, a mere 4 years (shorter than Windows XP's extended support period alone and 3 times shorter than XP's total support period!). For those that claim Linux supports their OSes longer, remember they only do 5-year support for their LTS releases, and that is only with the more recent versions as it used to be just 3 or 4.

XP will not simply "stop working" come April 2014, but by continuing to use it, users are putting themselves and possibly even others at risk. You didn't buy something that will "expire" but will become unsafe to use. The same is true if you run ANY OS from 12 years ago. Considering you probably paid next to nothing for XP (or $300 at the worst, which comes to less than $2 per month over the support lifetime of XP), I would say people got more than their money's worth. It costs a LOT to continue to patch 4 different OSes for security updates (XP, Vista, 7, and now 8), and Microsoft stop receiving money on XP 7 years ago. If you were to expect all companies to support their programs and operating systems for 12 years, Google would still be supporting Android 1.0, Apple would still be supporting Puma and iOS 1 (and will be for 8 more years), and Adobe would still be supporting Photoshop 7.0 (the release BEFORE CS1). In the hardware department, Intel would still be supporting Northwood Pentium 4s, nVIDIA would be providing driver updates for their GeForce 3 series graphics card, and AMD would be providing driver updates for the Radeon 7000 series (not the HD, but the original 7000 series). Remember the ancient Motorola RAZR? I'm sure Motorola isn't thinking about that phone at all anymore, but it was released in 2003...well shouldn't they still be supporting that phone? The point is Microsoft has supported XP for twice as long as most companies support their products. Just because people are still using it doesn't mean Microsoft has to continue to provide updates to a dated, difficult to maintain operating system that frankly shouldn't have been supported this long in the first place. Consumers had their chance to get windows vista, 7, and 8 for upgrade pricing, and 8 had a sale for $15 or $40, and customers knew XP support would end soon. MS did everything they should be expected to do in order to help consumers upgrade shy of providing a free OS (which you cannot expect from them).
 
While they're at it, they should upgrade their Windows for Workgroups 3.11 machines as well. It is also advisable they stop relying on MS-DOS on their other machines.
Click to expand...
Win 3.11 has security through obscurity 😉
Not many pieces of malware will run on an old 16 bit OS.

Actually it works pretty well, I have a 486 with WFW 3.11 setup with network file sharing with my vista machine.

But XP is getting a bit long in the tooth for a mainstay. The safer choice for microsoft is still to keep supporting it until it the market share drops off more though.
 
The college I go to tried upgrading to windows 7, but went back to XP because the systems were slow on windows 7.

When you have a bunch of computers with 2GB ram and a pentium D (or at best, an entry level core 2 duo (still with 2GB of RAM), things run slow.

The problem is that for most windows XP users, upgrading to windows 7 also means buying a new computer which is a hard sell if their current computer is doing everything they need right now.

If you don't need some of the newer features such as direct x 11, there is not much of a true need to upgrade.

On a modern low cost system, windows XP can offer SSD like boot speeds on a standard hard drive. menus and other OS assets perform with SSD like performance also. It is just a lightweight OS that uses less RAM that uses a fraction of the RAM that even android uses (on a clean boot windows XP can use as little as 40MB of RAM, and it really only has to load that amount of data to get to the desktop.

In a quick video I did a while back I showed the boot process of windows XP on a clean boot, on a virtual machine (which adds a performance overhead)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLsNxKjp9L8


Now lets take a look at the system requirements for windows XP

Pentium 233-megahertz (MHz) processor or faster (300 MHz is recommended)
At least 64 megabytes (MB) of RAM (128 MB is recommended)
At least 1.5 gigabytes (GB) of available space on the hard disk
CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive
Keyboard and a Microsoft Mouse or some other compatible pointing device
Video adapter and monitor with Super VGA (800 x 600)or higher resolution
Sound card
Speakers or headphones



The OS was very IO friendly (it had to be, as this was the type of storage world it was entering)

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/storage/display/wd400ab.html



Fast forward a couple years where hard drives are doing 120MB/s+ and massively better IOPS and 4K performance, and you get a rather speedy OS if you can avoid bloating it.

If windows XP supported trim, 64 bit (properly and not the crap implementation on windows XP x64 which has an insane performance overhead when emulating support for 32 bit applications), and the latest direct x, I would still be using windows XP


On top of all of that, for businesses, they may be using older software that may not be properly supported on windows 7. So being realistic, how convincing will it be for a business to buy copies of windows 7 or 8, and likely buy new computers to handle the OS, lose compatibility with some old applications that are no longer updated, all to do the same thing that they were doing before on their old systems.

Keep in mind that old is not a reason to upgrade. Old is a justification for a lack of something. For example, why doesn't Why don't cameras from the 1920's have an LCD screen? because they had not been invented yet and thus the device is too old to have had one.

Most arguments that claim that XP is too old, have no way of justifying how it is too old. The wheel is old but we still use it.

Windows XP is also largely just as secure. Virtually all security based patches are released for windows xp, vista, 7, and 8

and that is due to the fact that programmers of these operating systems, do not intentionally design it to be exploited. Meaning exploits will impact multiple versions of the OS. To see for your self, look at the security updates for for the patch Tuesday for windows 7 and windows pretty much more than 90% of the time the same security issue will be on both OS, the vast majority of the rest will be security exploits unique to vista, 7 and 8 due to new features they added which are being exploited.

And many security issues unique to XP are unique because a feature that was present in XP but not vista and up, was exploited.
 
As for XP going away. It will never go away because hate to say it but Microsoft got it right that time. XP had its bugs when it came out but it was a rock solid OS. It can be used on older PC's where Windows 7 or 8 will not run on.
 

Thats called being screwed by the software company.

 
This stuff is pretty simple. Let's be real, Microsoft peaked with Windows 2000. XP was bloatware, but only because Vista, 7 and 8 were even worse, we didn't view it that way.

I still haven't seen a compelling reason why these newer operating systems are better. They don't offer anything I couldn't do there, and minor updates would have fixed it.

Having said that, I don't mind Windows 7, although it's extremely bloated and slow, which is fine because modern hardware is so fast. Windows XP is simpler, easier to use, and does everything, so that's why people don't want to leave it. And so much faster.

Windows 8 flat sucks. I've tried it, and I can't get used to it. I'm fine on Windows 7, and don't mind using it (my two machines are XP and 7, and I only slightly prefer the former), but Windows 8 is horrid.

For the dolts that say if you don't like Microsoft products, don't buy them, some of us don't have a choice. Get a job in IT, and you have to work with what other people are using, and it's not your choice. Luckily, Windows is dying, and we're seeing much more uptake in Android and Chromebooks. The future belongs to them, as the free OS model is just much more attractive to consumers. Businesses will take longer, of course, but the handwriting is on the wall. The skills for the new generation don't revolve around Windows anymore. It will be like IBM mainframes - there will still be places that use them, but it's not going to mainstream for too much longer.

Windows 8 didn't make it happen, it just accelerated it. The whole model of paying a good amount of money for an OS, when there are other viable options that are essentially free, doesn't work, and never has. It's just there were no other free viable options before. Now there are, and that's why Windows continues to lose market share month after month.
 
People are now arguing that W8 is the same as XP.. or that if they love XP then they'll upgrade to W8. I know many people hate W8 and W8 has been hyped up and overrated.

MS doesn't have to drop XP but to me this campaign that XP is no longer being supported is all about getting users on W8. Everyone i have talked to in person doesn't like W8 and will be staying with XP. They don't even want to get W7 because then they have to get a new computer. Not to mention there are a few people i know want to use Linux and ditch Windows because they don't like W8. I see even a few people on here trying to convince that W8 is better than W7. XP users are staying on Xp because it works for them and they don't want to waste time and money on upgrading. W8 has a terrible user experience compared to earlier Windows and W8 isn't any faster than W7. I applaud those sticking with XP.
 
I suspect that a significant component of the XP love is found in the fact it is the last OS that can be easily pirated. Vulnerable PC's can be conscripted into Botnets and that means DDOS and Spam amongst other things. These things effect the wider PC community.
 


I don't hate MS or the products i just hate Windows 8.

XP is simple, easy and it doesn't take many resources to use. People don't like W7 for many reasons and i haven't heard anyone who likes the W8 interface, i am sure most download 3rd party start menu and tweak it to look like W7. IMO Xp users should get Linux or W7. But some see no reason to get anything different if Xp is working for them. If it's not broken, don't fix it. Should be Microsoft's motto.
 
If m$ wants everyone to upgrade they need to make it work easy for everyone. Put the disk in, and it works. Most regular people don't know about all these driver issues compatibility etc. and all the problems with the upgrade and fixing it.. They need to make a product that works for everyone without all the BS and a product that will run the software, old or new, that they want, not what M$ wants you to use.
 
"Yes, XP users, time to move to Linux 😀 " That's basically my thoughts exactly if I'm forced to abandon ship on XP I'll probably just switch to Crunchbang Linux.
 

All the XP support discontinuation means to me is that I will have to be a little more careful about avoiding anything that might force me to re-install the OS on it.

Hardware failures that could invalidate my node-locked licenses would be much higher than OS support on that PC.

 
Windows 7 from a strictly OS perspective is a viable replacement/upgrade to Windows XP. You guys have to consider that a company that is running that many machines with XP, it is highly likely that the machine came with XP. Think of the system requirements for XP and the system requirements for Windows 7 or 8. Also, don't bother with the minimum requirements, those are feel good numbers that rarely if ever give you a good user experience. This means those business aren't just looking at forking out money for a new OS but also for a completely new system. It is the same for the single users as well. It is no surprise that MS is salivating at the numbers. People that don't understand technology or companies who can't face the cost will stick with what works, regardless of the age. 10 to 15 years from now, if MS survives Windows 8. People will be holding on to Windows 7 as their OS of choice until someone tears it away from their cold dead fingers.
 
@Absentsa "How difficult can it be for a company the size of MS to keep XP security up to date?"

You really couldn't have put much thought into this. Do you complain to car manufacturers because the warranty is finite? Microsoft, like most other software developers, is a business. Unlike the fantasy world, reality dictates that businesses make decisions based on finances among other things. Going by your logic they should be held responsible for early versions of DOS. Your logic would also drown any company in so much litigation and overhead that they would never be able to release new products, only update old ones.
I don't know which is the more frightening; the fact that you actually think that or that people agree with that. Kinda enforces the phrase "I weep for our future."
 
Windows 8 is just fine, as is 8.1. I admit, I sort of like 7 a bit more, but it's really not critical. Both are great options.

These luddites need to get their act in gear, because I'm pretty sure users will be able to sue these companies if data is compromised and they're caught running something like XP. That's gross negligence.
 

It does not really matter what OS they are running. If people want to sue because a company's system got compromised, they will do so regardless of how or why it happened.

As stated by someone else earlier (and myself), one of the reasons production environments often take a very long time to upgrade is because they have a huge investment tied up in hardware-specific or node-locked software (ex.: my Quartus II, Protel, ModelSim 8.0, Xilinx ISE 8.1, etc. licenses) that cannot be migrated to a newer PC or OS.

Many companies run things like payroll on ancient VAX systems simply because they do not want to replace all their peripherals and software with all the associated risks. Same goes for PCs used in process control where newer OSes may introduce quirks that may require months of debugging to sort out assuming the people who are familiar with the ancient code are still available to help.

So, while upgrading an ordinary desktop may only cost something like $50, the cost of upgrading a system that has tons of software and hardware investments tied to it can have many extra significant digits on the left side of the period... about three in my case.
 
People/companies that have all they need in a XP machine are not "power" users who use new hardware/software, but imagine doing 3D rendering/ video editing/ photo editing into an XP machine... that`s plain stupid, you can`t blame MS for driving to newer OS and new needs. To blame is the lack of support for the software those companies use for not making newer versions available, want it or not, hardware and software will evolve.

Remember... there was a time when even Bill Gates thought that 640k ram was enough.
Click to expand...

Power users actually use XP x64 - on a top notch hardware, software runs at least 20% faster due to less overhead with useless processes.
 
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