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Microsoft Developing Windows for Low-End Machines
Jeff writes "According to the Washington Post, Microsoft is developing a version of Windows to run on old machines that currently run 95 or 98. It would be very similar to XP, but run faster on the older hardware. The move is to appease businesses and universities that don't want to scrap the old hardware. This is likely aimed at preventing Linux from gaining market share where MS is currently alienating their customers."
Nice that at the end of TFA, the exec still told people to buy new computers.
According to the Washington Post, Microsoft is developing a version of Windows to run on old machines that currently run 95 or 98. It would be very similar to XP, but run faster on the older hardware.
Wait, since 95 and 98 barely ran on the old hardware, how is Microsoft going to make XP, a system that normally takes at least 4 times the hardware compared to the old systems, going to run at any workable speed in this scenario? Microsoft really only has two code bases for their systems (the 95/98/ME code base and the 2000/NT/XP/2003 code base), so this new system must be a pared down version of the XP code base, especially since (according to the article) service pack 2 fixes are in place for this future system. So, if they can do this for XP on old hardware, why can't they do it for modern hardware? Is it that Microsoft is simply admitting XP has a load of unnecessary crap in it?
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The best thing about this is that they will be forced to make their code more efficient to work on slower PC's. They'll integrate that code into future versions of the OS and we'll feel that efficiency and increased quality. This will also force the competition to do the same thing, building a culture that leads to more efficient OS's. Best news I've read all day.
why not just make a 'faster windows' all around, that runs fast on both old and new hardware? /boggle
I think this is a good move for them. I have linux running on two machines that could otherwise run windows if an even remotely modern version of windows would run on them.
Sadly, since installing linux on them I've fallen for it and wouldn't change back unless there was some compensation involved.
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Folks, this Microsoft thing just isn't taking off. So many versions of Windows and code forks. For business reliability and maximum TCO, take a look at Linux!
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According to the Washington Post, Microsoft is developing a version of Windows to run on old machines that currently run 95 or 98. It would be very similar to XP, but run faster on the older hardware.
Umm.. Shouldn't improving performance always a metric for systems developers? Really. Apple manages to make new versions of OS X that run and perform better on the same hardware. Is it too much to ask that MS, who has significantly greater development resources, try to improve the performance of their OS?
Is this due out before or after Longhorn?
The OS will only run IE and Windows Media; everything else will be on an application server. I do not think this solves the actual problem. We have terminals.
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Still in the early stages of development, Eiger will run a bare-bones set of programs directly from the desktop. The list will include the Internet Explorer browser, Windows Media Center, a firewall and antivirus software.
Most other programs, however, will run off a central server.
so can this replace old stand-alone machines that aren't connected to any useable server?
Marge, get me your address book, 4 beers, and my conversation hat.
If it's made to run faster on old hardware, then why wouldn't I prefer this speedier system on my new hardware? Sounds like they could just take some of the bloat out of Windows XP and come up with an altogether better OS, rather than forking.
from TFA:
...
"SEATTLE -- Microsoft Corp. is working on a new Windows-based operating system designed to help companies make older machines run better."
bwa ha ha ha ha
I'm sorry, I just can't read any further; if I laugh any harder, I may rupture my appendix.
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If the former, then I don't see it being popular for the usual reasons (see any thread on Starter Edition). If the latter, then why don't they just release a new version of Windows XP that runs more efficiently for everyone? It seems stupid that a (presumably) cheaper version of windows would run faster than the full price version.
Check out the specs below. What, are they going to make another "thin client" or just a version of Windows XP that runs on something slower than a Pentium 233? These are the requirements for Windows XP Pro, from Microsoft's own site. They say it'll *run* but what they don't tell you is that it'll run slower than cold syrup trying to flow uphill (both ways) in December in Minnesota.
It'll run, but once you try to open an application, you'll wish you hadn't.
"Here's What You Need to Use Windows XP Professional
PC with 300 megahertz or higher processor clock speed recommended; 233 MHz minimum required (single or dual processor system);* Intel Pentium/Celeron family, or AMD K6/Athlon/Duron family, or compatible processor recommended
128 megabytes (MB) of RAM or higher recommended (64 MB minimum supported; may limit performance and some features)
1.5 gigabytes (GB) of available hard disk space*
Super VGA (800 x 600) or higher-resolution video adapter and monitor
CD-ROM or DVD drive
Keyboard and Microsoft Mouse or compatible pointing device"
What will it come bundled with? I hope it comes bundled with atleast IE so that as soon as people install it they can get on the web and download FireFox ;)
fuvoo: watch something
I have successfully run WinXP Pro on a 350Mhz Pentium 2 with 96MB of RAM... that is below the specified requirements, but it ran just fine. It even played DVDs and some (albiet older) games. I would think that if they just used XP Pro, maybe with some customized pre-set registry stuff, it would scale just fine down to 200-250Mhz machines. And I'm sorry, but if you are using a sub-200Mhz machine still... ouch. Ouch. And did I say OUCH? Get up to speed.
One simply needs to remove all the eye candy.
This is true for XP.
This is *especially* true for Linux.
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
Puh-leaze. Yes, this announcement is obviously aimed at preventing adoption of Linux on low-end hardware. The real question is whether or not a product will ever emerge from the vapor. How many times has Longhorn slipped? And what kind of bleeding edge hardware specs does it have? Microsoft can't build an OS with a blank check for hardware specs, so how are they going to do it on a budget?
I am not your blowing wind, I am the lightning.
Does anyone else smell what I'm referring to in subject!
I wanted to say positive but all I see is a central server controlling our desktops more than ever before.
Microsoft is developing a version of Windows to run on old machines that currently run 95 or 98. It would be very similar to XP, but run faster on the older hardware
Hmm... I think I saw this once, and it was called Windows 2000... I can run Win2K just fine on my 233MHz PII laptop w/64MB of RAM.
So... why upgrade them? If doesn't make sense to me other than MS is trying to sell more software to an already_tapped_once market.
This comment does not necessarily represent the views and opinions of the author.
while im not a fan of their practices, but from a business standpoint, its a great idea if they can actually pull it off. its a market that they have never tended to and has been a feeding ground for linux. the company i work for deals with places that have 'old' computers that dont run linux. so they end up with these systems that chug through win98. if MS can make windows XP efficient enough to run on older systems then good for them. i really dont like the fact that they are basically saying 'we loaded useless crap onto XP and we are just now getting around to it' but hey, better late then never. toNt0r
They aren't really making a faster version of XP for old machines. They are making old machines into dumb terminals that run things off a central server. It will look like XP in terms of interface, but isn't anything close.
My guess is that this won't work especially well with older apps anyway. That central server would also have be orders of magnitude faster if you want to allow multiple people the ability to run their apps at the same time.
What you might see is a situation in which small offices could either upgrade each machine for $500 and get way better performance, or purchase some high end server for tens of thousands of dollars and still be limited by the junk machines you have around. Also, any PC that old has to be near the end of it's life anyway. Any money you might save by converting these PCs will probably be lost when you have to replace all of the parts over the next year.
/. ++
Will this version of Windows be the hardcore gamers OS of choice?
A stripped down, bare bones version of Windows XP is what the gamer masses have been claiming for since years. As long as there is the latest DirectX, this means more horsepower for resource intensive games without the hassle of tweaking Windows till it bleeds in order to acheive the maximum horsepower for resource intensive games.
Hell yea, bring it on! Since I do all my work on other operative systems, I'd be willing to part with some dough to add it to my multi-boot as the gaming OS of my rig, at least for those games that don't run well under the latest Cedega.
If Microsoft really cared about it users, this version would be available free of charge for registered Windows XP Home and Pro users.
Hack your mind out of its sandbox.
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Have you tried running KDE on a low-end machine lately? Or Gnome? And I mean a 100MHz pentium here with 16M of RAM. Modern Linux desktop is certainly not much of a competitor with Windows 95 on that hardware.
You are forgetting Windows CE. Should perfectly run on old hardware. Already has IE. Some tweaks and a citrix client....
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
You mean there's a major popular Linux distro that runs (with GUI) fast on older hardware? Where can I get this marvel of coding technology? Obviously we're not referring to the latest versions of Redhat, Mandrake, Suse, etc. as I've NEVER seen them run responsively on older hardware.
I get so sick of the "WinXP is a hog!" whining when there's no "real" alternative that requires substantially less RAM/HD space, and runs as responsively as WinXP on newer hardware.
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EIGER was a version of Unix being reworked by SCO when they bought whatever it was they bought from Novell. It's dealt with specifically in the contracts.
Let's see...MS needs something that runs on oldder machines and is more secure than Win95/98...yep, sounds like a version of Unix would work just fine.
Maybe that's what MS bought from Caldera/SCOGroup for $50M...?
This is likely aimed at preventing Linux from gaining market share where MS is currently alienating their customers.
No, I don't think that's it. Though Linux advocates will be more than happy to try and lay claim to any victory over marketing opportunity, I doubt Linux had anything to do with it.
I think this better characterizes Microsoft's train of thought:
==> Any business that isn't growing is downsizing, and downsizing does not bode well for stocks and outlooks.
==> For Microsoft to grow, it has to sell software.
==> Microsoft's greatest profits come from two sources: Windows and Office.
Therefore, Microsoft has to keep selling Windows and Office. But therein lies the dilemma: how can you sell a new version of Windows to someone who's content with their current version of Windows?
This has long been a thorn in Microsoft's side. Developers still (for the most part) support Windows 98, and everybody supports Windows 2000. These are versions of Windows that are now seven and five years old, respectively. Now, think back to the year 1997, when Windows 95 has been out for a little more than two years. Was anybody back then still supporting Windows 2.0 (seven years old at the time), and how much support remained for Windows 3.1 (five years old at the time)?
Microsoft is trying to find a way to make upgrades look important and desirable again. I personally think that Microsoft won't find any takers, but who knows...
Depending on what your problem is. If you need to run XP apps and XP drivers then yes, this might be a good thing. OTOH, if you need Server 2003 active directory support for your old win98 box, just download Active Directory Client Extensions and install it. Microsoft obscures it's existance to encourage new boxen and OS sales, but it's there and it works.
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
The best thing about this is that they will be forced to make their code more efficient to work on slower PC's.
Sorry that won't happen. This new lightweight XP is gonna be the barebones OS, with IE/OE, Media Player and probably a terminal services client. That is ALL it is. They are cutting out features and doing nothing at all (or the barest minumum) of code optimisation. This is MS we are talking about here--they haven't done anything radical with their OS since NT 3.1 came out. Innovation might be BillGs favourite word, but MS rarely does that--they mostly just evolve.
Other apps could probably be installed, but then those old machines would be bogged down just as before. MS' strategy is to try and entice cash-strapped enterprises to keep their MS infrastructure: Instead of buying 30 new workstations, just buy 30 licenses of "barebones XP" and a $5000 server to handle the apps. I don't see much there forcing MS to take the bloat out of their software.
Problem with that idea is that there isn't much cost savings up front (perhaps none at all) vs. upgrading the workstations, because the customer still has to buy a big app server and most likley upgrade ther office suite software, etc. too...in addition to licenses for the barebones XP (unless they give that away with server CALs).
Any admin worth his salt will figure out he could just get the application server and run terminal services on the Win98 boxes without upgrading them...or better yet just convert all the terminals to Linux...and save up front and get all the same TCO benefits in the long run. I don't think this dog of an XP distro will hunt.
Want thin computing? The future is here.
For most people, almost all work can be done on a internet terminal. Although I prefer Gmail, Yahoo! mail has a few nice features that Google has yet to offer including calendar tools (events, tasks, birthdays) and a notepad (though you could use the drafts feature and spell check for a "notepad"). Beyond that, there are PHP applciations such as Horde that offer similar and even extended functionality.
Even special applications are making thier way to the web - think of doing your taxes online, or even diagnosing health problems. You can share pictures online, and do a further multitude of tasks.
There was even a push several years ago (6 maybe?) to put the desktop paradigm onto the web through DHTML. The idea never took off, but the portal functionality has always continued to develop.
Now if only I could open a window to Slashdot within my web browser!
I know this is slashdot, but please RTFA.
This isn't about making a custom version of windows that is more optimized so that it can run on old hardware. What they are doing is running the slow applications remotly, probably using citrix like technology (MS has their own version but I can't remember the name).
So what this probably is is a version of windows that cuts out a few OS features that affects performance, and then preconfiguring it so that it will run a pile of applications from a central server.
Of course, this is something that's always been easy to do on unix. Linux sounds better and better with every announcement comming out of Redmond these days...
Failing to learn from history dooms you to repeat it.
This is an historic development. Like when detroit actually started making smaller cars with better mileage, and stopped encouraging greater consumption of petroleum. The interests of Microsoft and Hardware makers are diverging. It was once coincident that when a firm upgraded their software, they bought new hardware, and vice versa. But with the economic slowdown in IT, many firms can no longer afford both. And since less than 1% of the resources of a typical CPU are used by most office tasks, Microsoft can easily sway companies to believe that a software upgrade provides the biggest bang for the buck. But if they are too greedy and stupid though, Microsoft may really be cutting their own throat. If they establish that new software can run on old hardware at imorived performance, they will break the 3-year upgrade cycle for PCs, and since most copies of Windows are purchased simply because they come installed on a new PC, customers may begin to think of hardware and software as separable purhcases again, which may very well lead to wider-spread use of Linux.
It may also take some of the economic incentive out of new chip design for AMD and intel. With slower hardware sales, they will have to raise the price of new chips to recover their plant costs. Which will slow new hardware sales even further. Here's a marketing idea for some enterprising soul- hard drive upgrade kits for older PCs, that come with Linux pre-installed (because there's no where to hide the $100 price of windows in a $69 disk drive.)
The reason they're doing this is so they can sell software upgrades to schools who can't afford new computers. They couldn't care less if the schools bought more hardware, but for them to stop buying software? The horror.
There are better thin client applications out there than Windows. Apps that will run with fewer resources, less psychotic licensing schemes, and which cost a hell of a lot less.
And Microsoft's never been known for "thin".
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Applications.
You might have a very very thin XP that'll run on a Pentium II, but who cares? As soon as you load Office on it, the only thing it'll do quickly is take a nosedive.
Although the Windows OS is a famous place to look for software bloat, it's only half of the problem. With the API being the way that it is, and the application developers for that platform pushing for more and more useless features as a revenue stream...99% of todays apps will still bomb on a thin XP machine.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
I could see using a Windows box like this as thin client for a UNIX server running X11, because X11 uses the user's computer for the actual drawing... it doesn't maintain and render a local copy of the screen, it just sends drawing commands to the client. A Windows Terminal Server doesn't do this, every session has to maintain its own *unaccelerated* screen image, locally, and send bitmaps containing changed areas. Much higher load on the server, so if you have a room with 10 low end PCs in it, buying a server that could support 10 concurrent terminal server sessions would set you back WAY more than 10 new PCs.
We ran into this. When we got our first WinDD servers (Tektronix' version of the Citrix software that became Windows Terminal Server) I sized them based on our experience with UNIX servers... and thought doubling the per-user RAM and CPU was pretty conservative. Boy was that a shock... and the requirements have only gone UP since then.
The Eiger is also one peak of 3 mountains in a mountain chaain: Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau, which have an interesting story to them.
The names Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau roughly translate to Ogre, Monk and Young Woman (Or Virgin).
The story as told to me is that The Ogre is attacking the Virgin, but the Monk is standing betweee the Ogre and the Virgin.
Should Microsoft name their product after a monster & rapist?
94% of Repubs and 21% of Dems voted to renew the Patriot Act
The difference is that you can run a current, maintained Linux distro on old hardware (hint: use a light window manager). But the equivalent Windows version will be obsolete and non-maintained. Security updates are good, yes?
And as far as drivers go, Windows drivers tend to disappear (or become hard to find) after several years, and will probably never be updated. I'd much rather deal with open source drivers, once a driver is written it tends to be included with the Kernel source.
Microsoft's solution is thin clients. Well, I have run a 100MHz machine with 16M of RAM as a Linux X server with a relatively unimpressive desktop as the application machine which does run KDE and it's quite nice.
You can even play quite a few games as it turns out; stuff like LBreakout work fine. The fact is that an X terminal runs a much smaller footprint than the one proposed for Eiger.
Lacking <sarcasm> tags,
[from the "It's not a troll if it's true" dept.] ...Microsoft announces it's trying harder to keep breaking software sales records by selling software to people that a) don't WANT it, or b) don't NEED IT.
Oh wait, this isn't 'other news', it's this news article too.
No one needs to ask why micrsfot does ANYTHING. The end game is always to make money, everything is justifiable, so please don't be surprised when they announce another way to sell the same thing.
While on the topic of MS OS's, I want to say personally and professionaly, I like Windows 2000 due to its stability and reliability (as I sit here at home with nothing to do). So much so, that I've recommended only it (as opposed to WinXP or Win98 etc) to all of my clients.
When Longhorn hits, I will evaluate it and make recommendations, though I am sure I already know my answer (seeing as though WinFS alone consumes over 30MB of RAM, and the advent/prospective incorporation of TC/DRM).
My point is that I wish MS would quit with the trinkets and toys for business OS's and give me predictability, stability and reliability (== the most important attributes an OS can have).
Windows2006 should be Win2k SP5.
Inject.
Linux actually has pretty amazing support for some legacy hardware, although configuration can be kind of opaque and most newer distributions don't know what to do with it. There is support remaining in the kernel for ancient ISA cards that haven't been properly supported under ANY Microsoft OS since MS-DOS.
I agree that modern desktop Linux is not the best choice for older systems, but I think the reasons have to do more with software bloat than hardware support.
Support for new hardware that the manufacturers are loath to release specifications for is IMO much more of a problem.
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What will happen to geek dumpster diving if businesses don't have to buy new hardware every few years? That's where I get most of my computers!
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Presumably if Joe Bloke has an old PC running Windows 98 then he's probably never going to upgrade to Linux anyway. The only reason he might want to install Linux would be to run maybe a web or mail server, something that he probably would not want to do on Windows 98 anyway.
Otherwise, if he has older hardware, he doesn't need the additional driver support (say for USB 2.0) that comes with Windows XP and today's games that only run on Windows 2000 or XP are probably too hefty to run on his hardware anyway.
Sure, Microsoft would love to get Joe to spend more money on a new OS, that's just plain business, but it has absolutely nothing to do with Linux.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
For a PC that's not constantly running, a tweaked version of Windows 98 SE works really well.
Plus if you mess about with memory management in config.sys and autoexec.bat, you get a machine that supports older DOS programs and games pretty well also.
Sure, if you leave it running for weeks on end, it slows to a crawl due to the poor memory management but it's nothing a reboot doesn't cure.
Even XP is a horrific bloated mess out of the box but once you turn off all the pretty rubbish and effects, you get an OS that looks a lot more like Windows 2000 and that runs pretty fast.
People that assume an operating system is just fine out of the box simply have no idea what they are missing - any OS, Linux included, can slow any PC to a crawl if not tweaked properly.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
I think you're imposing your own standards on everyone else - purely because something is "old" does not make it unusable to everyone.
Take the UNIX editor vi - a console based text editor that has been there just about as long as UNIX has yet is still the most popular editor despite many more modern editors, especially those with GUIs. Yet I and many other people can edit faster using keyboard-only vi than mouse and keyboard alternatives.
I still enjoy playing Duke Nukem 3D, original Doom and original Civilization - keeping a copy of MS-DOS to hand is great for that reason alone, whatever you may think.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Jaguar has VNC built into the system, you just have to enable it. Pretty painless to 'remote into'.
Try again.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
This is an unfair comparison.
If you're going for a fair comparison then around the time Windows 2000 was a new OS, you would be looking at RedHat 5.2 or SuSE 6.0 - both of these would have been equipped with older {=lighter) versions of KDE or Gnome which would run much faster than their modern counterpart versions.
For a school, non-profit, or church, you know the answer is "no."
And why is the answer "no"? Because you're not confident installing a lighter window manager? I've not used recent SuSE or RedHat versions but I seem to recall both of these had granular enough installation programs that allowed you to skip installing Gnome or KDE and install a lighter desktop.
I do agree that some applications might have a reliance on big Gnome or KDE libraries but then if you need older applications, you can always look at earlier versions of them - like Applixware if you want word processing, etc.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
I can't comment on the Mac (never used one) but please explain what you mean by "fast" when comparing Windows to X?
X is just the graphics subsystem, Windows is a complete desktop operating system - you are therefore not comparing like-for-like.
If you took, say, a Pentium II 450PC with 128MB of memory, the chances are that if you ran Windows 98 on it anc compared it to Linux with Gnome 2.x or KDE 3.x, then Windows would run faster - but that's because you're comparing a 7 year old OS with Linux desktop environments that have only come out in the last couple of years.
You can't make generic statements like this because you are comparing two different entities. Added to this, what about the fact that you might be using the proper graphics driver in Windows but a generic (not so good) graphics driver in X?
Simply looking at two systems side-by-side is not a fair comparison. I can guarantee that on the same PC, RedHat 6.0 will run a alot faster than Windows XP Service Pack 2 but it's a pointless test because one's 5 years older than the other.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
I do a lot of setting up machines for giving away to families that cannot afford a computer. The group I work with takes old business computers that have all software wiped from them - most at present are P3 500 to 600mhz machines. We now use Linux to get the job done. I can do a drive to drive install in about 30 minutes, Have everything a regular user will need. XP is way too slow -- 98 is way to hard to install a few machines at a time. Both would kill us on license fees. The only thing that makes this project even posible is Linux.
Just like MS to miss the mark again!
Telephony, VPN & Dial-up
No dail-up means that it wouldnt work very well for users just wanting an internet connection over 56k. It also means that connecting to remote app servers over a 56k connections. However i dont think MS would be able to get a remote app running ever 56k anyway.
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