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Windows XP SP2 Beta Reviewed
worm eater writes "Ars Technica has a characteristically thorough review of Windows XP Service Pack 2 Beta, with plenty of screen shots. In a nutshell, it's all about security fixes, including a seriously beefed up firewall. The final release is expected this summer." The review concludes: "Overall, Microsoft has made a step in the right direction with this service pack. The increased focus on security will be good not only for the average user who does not spend much time thinking about security her system, but also for 'power users' and those who work supporting end users."
Does it default allowed or denied? The screenshot shows it checked (allowed) but did it come that way?
Overall, Microsoft has made a step in the right direction with this service pack. The increased focus on security will be good not only for the average user who does not spend much time thinking about security her system, but also for 'power users' and those who work supporting end users."
We still have a couple of W2k and XP boxes that we'll probably keep, but the damage over the past couple of years with poor security has been done. We have been migrating many of our Wintel systems to OS X for a whole variety of reasons. I really hope that this service pack works as advertised as I still own some Microsoft stock, but I am afraid that Microsoft needs to completely re-engineer the OS like they are doing with Longhorn to resolve the security problems with Windows. Unfortunately that will be in what....2006?
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
Yes, but it is not good to combine bug fixes with new features! Also, we need those bug fixes now! There are hundreds of them.
Shouldn't these features have been part of XP from the beginning though? That's like saying the brakes on my Ford are a new "feature". I suppose......
All-in-all a good review. I wonder if this will raise any new "monopoly" charges though with everyone from Norton Internet Security to Pop-up blocker companies' business going down the drain - virtually overnight.
I work in tech support for an ISP, and quite a few calls come in where the ICF is blocking DHCP, DNS, HTTP, or SMTP requests. Does this mean that we will stop having calls about this? I doubt it, because most of the users will just assume that if they hit the 'Close' button in the alert about the app, it will be allowed automatically. Also, I'm sure that most users won't be able to figure out the 'Configure' dialog box that is there.
Crushing dreams at the speed of sarcasm
What I'd like to know is, are there any forced lock-ins -- such as "you only get these nice security patches which you need to avoid worms if you also install our new version of DRM, which locks you out of things you could previously do".
Not something you could easily tell in a first review -- but it's what I suspect will be more and more common, especially as MS loses the digital battle with ITMS/ITMS-wannabes
(and what's with the "wankerdesk" in the URL? :) )
Nah. There is always SOMETHING to complain about!
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
"power users', 'Windows'... in the same sentance.. what are you smoking?"
I use Windows XP on my laptop at home. I use Windows 2000 on my desktop at work. I also use FreeBSD, Knoppix, and have toyed here and there with a couple dozen other non-windows OSs. I am a 'power user' who also uses Windows. Believe it or not, we really do exist.
In the same token, there are plenty of completely and totally clueless users of Linux. I'm not talking about the annoying kiddies babbling on message boards; I'm talking about people who actually refer to their computer as a "hard drive" or a "modem". You'll often find these types sitting on Mandrake or Red Hat boxes, not to disparage either distro, nor their users.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
"A review of a service pack? What's next, A screenshot of RTPatch? I can see it now...
:), it let me know Outlook will be better in keeping viruses in check, and finally a firewall that will help keep viruses and spyware from running on my computer.
"Here we see the patch process at 37% complete. Note that the progress bar is roughly one third filled in with a nice blue color."
Please!!"
I laughed at this post until I RTFA.
The article was nice and informative. It let me know a pop-up blocker was on the way (I was SO going to get Earthlink
I suggest any Win XP user to read it as it will tell what you can configure when this comes out.
I see where you coming from, I never installed the service packs above 4 I think it was on an old NT server I use to run simply because it broke everything, these days though windows update does an OK job, its not 100% bullet proof, but its much better to be up2date than not.. for instance did you know blaster/welch will stall/kill a dial up connection without these updates(which is funny if you have ever tryed downloading the 150meg service pack 4 for win2k on a 56k dial up that stalls every 4minutes ;).. if anything you should install the patches as a mark of respect towards the rest of the internet.
moo
You, apparently, since you decided to reward us with your insight.
Several years ago mentioned that windows will look more and more like unix every version
Looks to me that Linux is looking more like Windows XP, but that's just me. As to "the backend", ideally Windows will continue to look more like what Dave Cutler intended it to be. We can only hope.
An example would be that there are several things that don't kick off or operate properly in windows until someone logs in
Whatever "group" you're working with don't know what the fuck they're doing. That's your problem. Unless you can tack developer/analyst/consultant stupidity on the OS vendor, which is relatively uncommon. But I guess you can do that if you want. I mean, it's a great anecdote if you want to make a point that "Windoze is teh sux". I think I'll start blaming RedHat or Debian every time my weekly Mozilla build fails, eh? It's so much easier!
Note: THIS is the new machine killer. Having cleaned a disturbingly increasing number of affected machines lately (including to a smaller degree, my own!), I think that this should be Microsoft's New Frontier. "Stealth" installations of crapware need to be stopped... Somehow.
After all, what good is your computer if it takes you 15 minutes to boot it up and crashes every 5 mins. thereafter?
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
A lot of people on here give XP a bad name.
Over 40% of the computer users in the world use XP, and most have no trouble with Blaster or random spywares, or indeed security hacks.
There are a lot of posters in here who claim to have had so many problems with XP. Obviously then it is a lack of knowledge and experience on your part. Just because you can't get it going well doesn't mean it is a problem with the OS. Lots of Joe Home Users are very happy with it. I am a very happy XP user, and have absolutely none of the problems that are bleated on about here. Turn into real users.
Not affiliated with Microsoft at all!! No doubt I will be called a troll by the Linux zealots in here!
Sweeping generalizations like this are bad. You shouldn't say "Never update your windows system," you should say "Only update it when the problem affects you," or "Only update after you've thoroughly tested the patch." Both of these use common sense. Never patching is not.
SP2 is probably going to break a lot of software. Especially the kind that is built with bad assumptions (pinging hosts, expected levels of access etc). Am I going to deploy it day 1? No. Am I going to what a month and see what everyone else says, then install it on a small test group? Yes.
-- DrZaius - Minister of Sciences and Protector of the Faith
from trojaned broadband users, is welcome with me. i have to deal with this stuff, and i know a lot of you do too.
:>
wait - we all have to deal with this. the level of spam sent from trojaned users using exclusively microsoft's more modern (you may permit yourself a slight snicker at this point) operating systems is over 50%. that's more than half, for the numerically challenged.
this is a serious problem. microsoft's inattention to security has literally destabilized the fundamental mechanisms of the Net.
ok, that's pretty dramatic. but whatever
Then you're part of the problem, not the solution.
When people get advice like that, they then blame Microsoft for "putting out a bad operating system" and causing all the problems like Blaster, Code Red, etc.
In actuality, many (I'm not saying all) of the problems had been patched months and months before... but people refused to patch, either out of fear or ignorance.
So by proudly flaunting your advice of "never updating"... you are admitting to cause more problems than you're fixing. If ever there were a time to be an AC, your comment would have been one.
Advocating ignorance is not something to be proud of.
"PC Load Letter? What the $@#% does that mean?!"
"But of course at about 95% of the global browser market share Microsoft see no need to improve that vital component of the browser."
That's exactly it. As scoble is constantly pointing out, changing one line in IE is a huge thing, affects thousands of users, hundreds of languages, blah blah blah. Why put all those man hours into updating and testing when you can do nothing and still keep your monopoly position?
Well, you know it only took 10 FSCKING YEARS!!
They didn't take this step in the right direction; they were dragged. Kicking, screaming and fighting every inch of the way!
I feel the way you do: No data loss is a necessary evil.
You of course realize that pop-up blocking becoming mainstream will just push sites and advertisers into another, equally or more annoying method of pushing unwanted crap in your face before you can get to the content you want.
I can just see it, you must view the ad for 15 seconds before you can load the next page and there's no getting around it, unless you want to spend your life picking apart javascript or whatever for code to load the next page.
What you got today is an annoyance, what you might have tomorrow is a headache. Time to get back to lynx.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
opinion is all well and good, but have you any facts to back it up ? why is ZA the "worst possible firewall" ? all i can find are glowing reviews
no really , what makes ZA so bad yet Kerio is so good ?
Actually if you're a coder you have LOTS of new features. :)
1. If you need a pop up blocker, here's a very easy one, DON'T USE INTERNET EXPLORER. Aside from the fact that Mozilla/Firebird can already do this, you'll have lot fewer problems with exploits installing spyware and trojans. Besides, Firebird is simply put, a better browser.
2. Outlook will keep virus'es in check eh? How, by doing what every other email client does, and not auto opening attachments as a default mode of operation? Outlook is like IE as far as windows stock software is concerned, it should be replaced by ANYTHING else. You can keep virus's in check by simply not using Outlook. Use Eudora, or Thunderbird, or fuck, use pine for christ sake! Amazing how that works isn't it?
3. THIS IS NOT WHAT A FIREWALL DOES. If you think a firewall blocks spyware, then you are flat out wrong, and misinformed on the concept of a firewall. Again, we address the issue of spyware and virus's, which can easily be stopped by not using IE, or Outlook, and if your real serious about computer security. Take your computer, box it up, return it, and go buy one that doesn't come with MS windows on it. The only thing a firewall is going to protect an end user from is script kiddies hijacking their RPC server, which is probably the single most pathetic part of the windows platform. But wait, even the seriously pathetic firewall that comes with windows now can do some basic filtering on it.
Sorry if I came accross as rude, but uninformed people, or people who refuse to be informed because its too hard to make a switch, drive me nutty. Try out some software that didn't come pre-installed with your PC sometime, you might be very surprised how shitty computers DON'T have to be.
--Nuintari
slashdot : where an opinion can be wrong.
That's all well and good for a personal site or an informational one but for businesses people depend on the quality and consistency of the design as one of their internal metrics for how trustworthy a company is.
It doesn't matter much at this point, the damage has been done and it'll take years to undo, even if this service pack had fixed it.
at 222MB, they should consider sending every registered MS user a CD. I'm sure they could afford it. During the previous security fiasco, their defense was that the patch was available but people didn't bother upgrading their systems. Not everyone is on broadband, so it has to be easier to distribute the patch the same way AOL sends those coasters. Leave it to the user to decide whether to throw out the CD or not.
Umm.. that's part of the point of a Beta, dumbass.
No software company has the resources to test every possible combination and interaction of software and every possible application it is used for. Customers test Beta software in their own situations and report on any issues they see so they can be fixed by release time.
How about you download the Beta and do the same?
Mmmm.. Donuts
As you've probably ready a slew of posts by now about how "M$ still suxors!" and how MS will "never be as secure as *ix".
Keep something in mind. While a good portion of the m$ directed slings and arrows are legitimate concerns over the security of the OS, with good reason, the majority of slasdot users hate M$ because of a completely different ideal. M$ is huge. By nature, slashdot folks just hate corporations. All corporations are bad. They do nothing but steal from the public and rape their employees. They kick puppies and steal candy from kids.
What folks here would really hate most is this: Microsoft actually getting their OS into a position where the *ix folks would have nothing to complain about that didn't happen years in the past. The best they could do is say, "Well I don't trust an OS that is as buggy as Windows USED TO BE"
I use Linux and Windows. I prefer Linux however the apps I need to do work don't exist on Linux. Linux advocates need to put pressure on software developers to release versions for Linux (Starting with Macromedia IMHO).
Unless that can happen, more CEO's and CTO's (Who are mostly clueless) are going to read these changes Microsoft is making and remain a Microsoft shop.
Karma means nothing to me, so suck it...
And proper PNG transparency support for that matter...
Who doesn't like free music?
The last few email viruses infact did affect all windows mail clients(except outlook 2002) since it was just an executable attachment that contained its own smtp server and searched drive for email addresses. Outlook 2002 by default blocks executable attachments.
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
I don't know, maybe Grisoft's retail version may be good, but about a year ago I downloaded about a dozen viruses just to see how well the free AVG Antivirus version, McAfee, & Norton detect them. Although far from an exaustive test, AVG missed about a third of the viruses, but Mcafee & Norton caught every one.
Free is good, but sometimes you do get what you pay for.
I won't take any of MS' security measures seriously, until they start shipping a GOOD VIRUS SCANNER along with Windows. There is a long history of Windows virusses. The fact that Microsoft is bundling all sorts of stuff into their OS but don't include a virus scanner makes them the criminals, and not the virus writers. Microsoft does nothing to prevent this.
And you need a few million dollars to litigate the patent. Of course, some attorneys may be willing to do it on a contingency basis.
There is a reason patents are referred to as the "legal sport of kings."
When I (and most Open Source writers) write something Open Source (granted my stuff is rinky-dinky) I just write it in my spare time with no desire or capability to invest money into it. I just can't afford to patent things on my own. That is why most patents are assigned to a major company. You need money to get patents.
I don't know what the financial situation is for the major projects (Linux kernel, Mozilla, KDE, etc.) but they'd have to make a serious commitment of money and time (as it takes ~5yrs to get a software patent now a days) to get patents. Until recently, the majority of MSFT's patent portfolio was in keyboards and mice! It wasn't until they got scared with the recent patent attacks against them that they started to build their software portfolio.
Another small problem for the Open Source community is that many countries bar you from getting a patent if you have published the idea before filing the application. Given the open nature of Open Source, you might run into a statutory bar on your patent if you put the code in CVS before you file the application.
And as a side issue...
A good example would be the pop up blocker (It probably isn't patentable from proir-art but for argument sake).
A good patent attorney should be able to find a way to patent MSFT's implementation of the pop-up blocker. It'll be a narrow damn near worthless patent I'll grant you, but it can be done.