Windows XP Will Live Until 2010 or Even More Because of Low-Cost Laptops

The fans of Windows XP should thank Asustek because of its brilliant idea of making low-cost laptops. Because low-cost laptops ( like the Eee PC 900, MSI Wind PC and ECS G10IL) come with smaller RAM, hard drive and slower processor, they can not accept heavy OS like Vista but they can only run either Linux or Windows XP. Because of this hardware limitation and existence of Microsoft’s rival “Linux”, Microsoft has accept to sell Windows XP Home for low-cost laptops till 2010. Even Microsoft has mentioned that it will keep XP on the market even one year after releasing the next version of Windows (Windows 7). It means that windows may even stay in the market after 2011 or 2012.

AP Associated Press wrote:

The software maker said Windows XP Home will be available at least through June 2010 for computers like Intel Corp.'s Classmate PC and ASUSTek Computer Inc.'s Eee PC. But Microsoft also vowed to keep XP on the market for those machines for a year after the next version of Windows is released, which could mean 2011 or later.

The low-cost machines have smaller hard drives, less memory and slower processors than most Windows computers sold today, and most would have a hard time running the bulkier Windows Vista.
The Classmate PC is currently marketed with Windows XP Professional, and the newest editions sell for between $300 and $500. The Eee PC, which costs around $400, comes with a Linux operating system.


The interesting is that low-cost laptops considered to be perfect laptops for developing countries but so far the developed countries have shown that even they need these kinds of laptops badly. Also this high demand in the market shows that many people yet use cheap or budget desktop computers even in developed countries and they need windows XP yet to run their computers. I hope that the high demand for low-cost laptops could become a good prove for Microsoft that Windows XP is useful yet, for many computer users and I hope that Microsoft delay more the deadline (on June 30th)of stopping sale of XP.


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Microsoft Makes Its Own Vista SP1 vs. XP SP2, Leaves XP SP3 Out

Ever since the advent of Window Vista, at the end of November 2006 for businesses and in January 2007 for the general public, Microsoft has virtually invited the comparison between the two operating systems.

In this context, it was only natural that the Vista RTM vs. XP SP2 smackdown would evolve and survive with the growth of the two operating systems. The comparison continues to be an inherent accessory of the two platforms even after the launch of the latest service packs for the two products, namely Vista SP1 and XP SP3. Michael Kleef, Microsoft IT Pro Evangelist is the author of the latest face-off between Vista and XP, using a copy of Vista SP1 and XP PS2, but ignoring XP Service Pack 3, released to manufacturing on April 21, and to the public on May 6.



Kleef's demonstration involves a copy of Windows Vista SP1 and one of XP SP2 in a scenario designed to test the two operating systems' file copying speed. Kleef copied a 600 MB ISO file in both Vista SP1 and XP SP2 running as guest operating systems in virtual machines and connected to the same server. From the get go, Vista SP1 has an advantage over XP SP2, with a difference of approximately 20 minutes between the two copying processes. The conclusion is that Vista SP1 simply handles copying more efficiently than XP SP3. The entire demonstration can be accessed via this link.



"It's interesting that people seem to think that Vista underperforms in every area of the system which is quite an incorrect perception. In this demo I show how Vista outperforms Windows XP and I show the under the covers process traces of just how it achieves it. Demo environment consists of two images. One Vista SP1 and the other Windows XP SP2 both on the same HDD IO and communicating across my home wireless network to a Windows Server 2008 box on my main LAN. Once the two images get going latency gets introduced and things start to slow down... except Vista doesn't slow down," Kleef stated.

Source: Windows portal

Vista as insecure as Windows 2000

Good news for users of Windows Vista. According to figures compiled by PC Tools, the OS has experienced only slightly more vulnerabilities than Windows 2000, which appeared eight years ago when malware was far less common.

Or is that the bad news? Despite having a reputation as the least vulnerable of Microsoft's operating systems, Vista still managed to record 639 unique vulnerabilities over roughly the last half year, which puts it in a worse position than the aging Windows 2000, which experienced 586 over the same period.

Windows XP, which still accounts for the overwhelming volume of the Windows user base, had 1,021, with Windows 2003 Server reaching 478.

The Australian security company collected statistics on the number of infections by analyzing figures from anonymous users of its ThreatFire community, with vulnerabilities double-confirmed by third-party anti-virus engines. The numbers are per 1,000 machines on each platform.

"Microsoft has invested a great deal in making Vista more secure, by providing a number of security enhancements which were not in prior Microsoft operating system releases," concluded PC Tools CEO, Simon Clausen. "But industry experts have been reluctant to confirm its improved resistance to malware with good reason."

"Since its launch, Microsoft has flagged the increased level of protection Vista provides as one of the key reasons why consumers should upgrade from Windows XP to Vista. If Microsoft's forecasts for the operating system are correct and Vista's market share increases significantly, we could expect infection rates to increase further on Vista," he added.

The problem with these bare statistics is that they make no mention of how serious these vulnerabilities were -- Vista has recorded few that come into the 'most serious' category by comparison with XP. They also don't specify where the vulnerabilities were uncovered. The majority of vulnerabilities are not in the OS itself and are traced to problems in browsers, for instance, and can even apply across platforms.

Microsoft would also point out that the user access control (UAC) feature of Vista stops malware from exploiting the OS without the user at least being aware that something is happening. Windows 2000 and XP lack even this basic level of protection.

On the other hand, Vista has had its embarrassing moments, securitywise. Only weeks ago, Microsoft had to explain how the .ANI animated cursor bug was allowed to find its way into Vista code without being patched as part of the much-vaunted Security Development Lifecycle (SDL).

Techworld is an InfoWorld affiliate.

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* Runaway 2 - The Dream of the Turtle
* Sacred Plus
* 10 ways to ensure your site does not get indexed on search engines.

Don't slipstream XP sp3 on Windows Vista!

So I build a new Windows XP ISO with SP3 integrated, this is a Volume License editions (VOL) which only accepts Volume License Keys (VLK).

When I want to install it on a clean machine, I noticed that setup prompts for a product key and it does not allow me to continue, which should be a new feature in XP sp3. OK so I fill in the VLK but it does not accept it, I try another one from a customer of mine, does not work either. Angry



I found out that the problem is when you do the XP Sp3 slipstream process on a WIndows Vista machine, the API gives a different response and screws up the PID process. This is a bug and Microsoft knew about this in December, still the bug remained and made it all the way to RTM, nice work Microsoft.



So XP SP slipstream only on XP or 2003 machines!!!



See the dicussion thread here: Key not working after SlipStream

Source: Windows portal