World's First XP System Sold

A reader writes "New zealands largest OEM PC Manufacturer, The PC Company sold the worlds first Windows XP system. Details can be found at this article on NZoom" And so, it begins.

Comments

EULA will be violated

[epsalon]

Most legitimate users will violate the EULA, by connecting to more than 10 computers (somebody said Internet?), or by installing VNC (which is explictly prohibited - but works great nonetheless) or by doing of the many things M$ says you cannot do.
In short, you're better of pirating it.
[Disclaimer: This message is for humor only and does not encourage piracy in any way nor does imply any resemblance to real facts.]

Is it only me then?

[Troed]

... that can't understand why I should upgrade from Win2K to Windows XP? I admit to not being a Microsoft-follower, but so far I've completely failed to see what's so special about XP? It's got a new ugly look, that I've seen, but is there anything else?

I'm actually serious - anyone? :)

Re:Is it only me then?

[Osty]

nothing much has changed except for the fact that normal users have access to raw network sockets.

Uh ... you'd be correct about the raw sockets if the original poster had mentioned Win9x/ME, but since he asked about upgrading from Win2k, that's a non-issue -- NT has always had raw sockets.

Anyway, aside from the obvious GUI enhancements (which can easily be disabled by simply choosing to use the Classic theme, which also has the property of not really being a theme, and so doesn't use the resources other themes would), there are other niceties, like fast user switching (logout or switch to another user, but let your current user's applications continue to run), enhanced Terminal Services (aka, Remote Desktop), advanced video and imaging support built in, built-in firewalling (Win2k had packet filtering capabilities, but needed code to take advantage of that), enhanced file system encryption, better app compatibility (nice to have for those games that expect a user to be running win9x), better group policies, Cleartype (if he's using a laptop or LCD display), and more. Check out this feature chart for a better idea of what XP has that 2K doesn't.

Re:New worms coming in the next years ...

[_xeno_]

The users created when XP installed are automatically "root." And no, at install time, you are not given the option of making them "regular" users.

(Specifically, it lists five text fields into which usernames are entered - these users do not get passwords unless you change the way in which login is handled. This is for the Windows XP Professional install, and not Home Edition - Home Edition probably does the same thing, though. I haven't really found there to be a big difference between Home Edition and Professional. (Although admittably this was RC2, but feature changes were not slated at that point, so it probably holds true with the release builds.))

Which probably means that unless the OEMs take action to make sure Joe Consumer's XP box doesn't create Administrator (root) accounts when they first start up their new PC, the average consumer will be running every program as root.