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."

Comments

Re:A review of a service pack

[Metaldsa]

"A review of a service pack? What's next, A screenshot of RTPatch? I can see it now...

"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 :), 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.

I suggest any Win XP user to read it as it will tell what you can configure when this comes out.

Re:New "features"

[glesga_kiss]

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......

Oh dear gawd. Wait a minute...people complain because they include a free web-browser and it goes to court.

Now they add more bundled software, and a highly modded user pipes up "should have been there from the begining"? Jesus. Which is it then?

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.

My point exactly. They just can't win, can they?

Re:if it ain't broke . . .

[DrZaius]

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.

Re:Why no rendering engine updates to IE?

[Alan]

"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?

Pop-up Blocker

[ackthpt]

It let me know a pop-up blocker was on the way (I was SO going to get Earthlink :),

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.

Re:A review of a service pack

[oogoliegoogolie]

If the free anti-virus you're using is AVG, you're asking for trouble.

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.

Re:Inexperience of posters on here with XP.

[Shanep]

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.

Windows XP is marketed to the average Joe, who will not fit your definition of "real users". When these average Joes connect to the internet with XP's out of the box settings, they get worms, viruses, spyware, etc.

XP can be hardened, but not with the knowledge of the users which it is marketed for.

I agree with one of the other posters, when he says the Joe average users who are happy with XP are actually oblivious to the reality that their PC is actually on a rampage infecting other peoples computers, sending SPAM and their credit card information. So many times I have visited client sites, only to find they have spyware, etc. And don't blame me for these problems, my introduction to these people is usually due to them having security problems in the first place.

I come home to my mostly OpenBSD network (plus some hardened Wintel) and relax. But then, I'm not your Joe average XP user.

I do hope XP SP2 helps and XP/Win2k are certainly leaps and bounds ahead of the Win9x abominations. But please don't try to claim that XP is great and the ignorant users are to blame. Microsoft claims to provide a stable, secure product for the World at large? Then this is a lie.

Apple's Mac OSX is much closer to delivering that claim.

BTW, relying on automatic updates is a dangerous game. Does XP use crypto and authentication by default for automatic updates? I would hope so. Sometimes patches are retracted, because they cause more grief than they solve. I call that a lottery. I prefer to firewall then wait before deploying patches, where ever possible.

PS, I'll leave you with this... do you run a firewall? Do you ever watch the logs? I'm running an OpenBSD pf firewall for my home network and I tell you, watching the attempts at typical Microsoft ports coming thick and fast is scary. If you don't, I suggest you do and then come back here and tell us that "most [XP users] have no trouble with Blaster or random spywares, or indeed security hacks".