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Survey Shows Admins Avoiding SP2
bonch writes "Tom's Hardware Guide is running an article about Windows XP Service Pack 2 and its limited acceptance by IT administrators. AssetMetrix is cited in the article as reporting that fewer than 24% of over 136,000 Windows XP PCs in 251 North American corporations even had SP2 installed. THG goes on to describe the reasons given by admins and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of installing SP2."
I heard most of the admins weren't available for comment...because their email program was busy sending a lot of messages to people they don't know..
No way It cannot be..I feel special now. I use SP2 and have no problems. When I first installed it the thing went wonky...and I just ignored all the problems. Then they magically went away.
Give them some time, then the malware authors will start writing SP2 dependant stuff and we'll all be much better off.
I can't imagine what a sad life it must be to have to wake up and support Microsoft products every day.
There must be a constant and relentless amount of rationalizing with the usual "things are getting better" "all software has problems, not just MS" and all the other MS mantras.
Nothing but pity.
As long as your internet connection is secure, ie, you have a good firewall or router (as you would have in a large corporate environment), then the negative effects of SP2 outweigh the positive ones.
SP2 breaks network connectivity by limiting the number of connections you can make in a given amount of time.
SP2 creates a bunch of annoying and useless popups and warning messages, with no real extra security (compare vulnerabilities found before and after SP2 on sites like Secunia).
The only thing SP2 does that's any good is fix up a bit of XP's so-called "firewall".
I don't blame these admins and I wouldn't be installing SP2 either.
... and then use a time machine and sue the cornflakes company for stealing that sentence.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
Got it when it became available through Windows Update. No issues, but then, I don't have a lot of weird apps, and Virtual PC doesn't emulate weird hardware, so oh well.
I hardly ever use it, though... except to run Windows Update when a new batch of patches come out.
Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
If you have a Windows XP laptop with WI-FI and if you go to conferences where there are wireless networks, then you HAVE to get SP2: it's a crime not to.
The bug mentioned in the article, where Windows sets up an ad hoc network on a preferred SSID it can't find, is lethal in a conference network. One fuckwitted XP box stealing the SSID for its ad hoc network can disconnect hundreds of delegates. Any time that you're nearer the XP box than the access point (s.t. the XP box has more signal), your net access is toast, whether or not you're running windows.
I've been at conferences where there were hourly PA-broadcasts begging XP users to turn off their ad-hoc networks. If you have XP SP1 on-line at a conference, then you should expect to have your laptop pounded into fragments by angry geeks. They will be justified.
Did the Microsoft grammar checker help you with that sentence?
And therein lies SP2's solution to improving security.
Now only if an IE update would install Firefox.
Every move up the progressive OS cycle leaves programs behind that don't work. I sometimes spend hours on google trying to find workarounds to get old games working. You won't believe what you have to do to get System Shock 2 working on XP.
Some administrators take every opportunity to whinge and moan when Microsoft products have a security vulnerability. When Microsoft do the "right thing" (such as XP SP2), there is more whinging and moaning .
Some administrators whine and moan whenever they have to do work.
I know I'm avoiding installing SP2. After all, I have no idea what it would do if I installed it on any of my Linux or Mac OS X boxes here (nevermind my single lonely OS/2 machine)!
I mean, it could actually cause me to waste hard drive space on those machines, and I need that space for pr0n!
Yaz.
The typical home user installs XP with themselves as the "local-ADMIN"...
;-)
therefore, "Survey shows EVERYBODY Avoiding SP2"
----- Concentrate on promoting more than demoting.
A heck of a lot of admins are NOT certified for sp2
This just demonstrates the problem Microsoft faces, they want to lockdown the OS and make it more secure, but the pain level associated with it is too high for some Windows users who don't want to fool around with port numbers etc.
It's always easier to design something well from the start than to try and polish a turd.
If you've got a system plugged in to the public internet and you aren't using something similar to the subject line to update
I'm a bit more forgiving for desktop use - I can type 'yast' on this machine and begin changing things. One day soon, when I take the time to make vmware run on FreeBSD 5.3 I will again experience holy homogenous happiness and life will be perfect.
I have heard of this SP2 of which they speak, but I have no fear, because I am far away from the blasted lands and their filthy start button virus infested machines
Climb, brothers, climb! Go higher and higher, until no flabby, graphical interface only OS with an incontinent TCP/IP stack can follow. Dwell in the land of headless awareness and be at peace.
Namaste.
I am very easy to get along with, but I don't have time to waste being nice to people who are being stupid. -Theo