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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?
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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
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.
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
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?
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
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.
And proper PNG transparency support for that matter...
Who doesn't like free music?
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.
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.