Slashdot Mirror
Final Windows 2000 Update
Ant writes "An article on eWeek discusses Microsofts plans to ship a Windows 2000 Update Rollup, the final security patch for the 5-year-old operating system. The Update Rollup, which replaces Windows 2000 SP5 (Service Pack 5), is a cumulative set of hot fixes, security patches and critical updates packaged together for easy deployment. The Update Rollup will contain all security-related updates produced for Windows 2000 between the time SP4 was released and the date the update ships. It will also feature a small number of important, non-security updates. The Update Rollup comes just one month before mainstream support for Windows 2000 client and server releases expires on June 30."
Why not go over there and tell them how you feel? This is the post in question, this is the direct link to leave a comment which they've deliberately made subtle.
Given that lots of people find W2K appropriate for their needs and won't switch over to a supported Windows, I expect malicious exploit hunters will be paying closer attention to this platform soon.
How big a mess would there need to be to convince Microsoft to continue supporting this?
Remember RFC 873!
Besides all the "eyecandy" of Windows XP, what is the difference between this and 2k? I mean, they use the same kernel don't they? So if they are pretty much the same system, one "better" for desktop users and the other "better" for more experienced users, why discontinue support for one?
Alot of companies still have Win 2000 servers. Heck I'd say most windows shops still have a majority of their servers on windows 2000. Heck, many even still have NT4.
Then here comes Microsoft saying, "OK, you're done. Either upgrade your machine (and give us money) or you are going to be vulnerable to a slew of attacks that we won't patch"
Well, so they have to upgrade anyway, we need to get the message out about Linux, and how support for linux will not "expire" like this.
And this on the heals of Novell's big announcment today...
Don't Tread on Me
The Windows 2000 'operating system' includes Internet Explorer, the Java Virtual Machine, Media Player, DirectX, etc...
There are good reasons why Microsoft will want to keep these components updated. Win2K is the most-used operating system among enterprise customers.
If (inevitably) new bugs are found in these bleeding-edge Internet technologies, would Microsoft be willing to let them stay unpatched for evermore?
No thanks, MS. I'll use 2000 for compatibility as long as it works, and then I'll go to linux 100%. Or maybe I'll get a Mac? Never thought I'd even consider it, but who knows.
On a practical note, did anyone bother to read TFA? What do I need to make sure that I have on hand for future 2K installations - just this rollup or rollup+SP4? Bah, I guess I should investigate it myself.
[javac] 100 errors
I've run windows 2000 since it came out, and it's by far my favorite version of Windows. I've tried XP and had some significant problems. I went back to 2000 and didn't miss any of XPs features. I work with small businesses and always advise them to use Windows 2000 over anything else. XP basically offers nothing in features over 2000, and tends to have more problems in my experience.
The sad thing is that Microsoft hasn't come out with anything to make anyone really want to upgrade. Windows 95 had so many advantages over 3.1 I can't begin to list them, Windows 98 had USB where windows 95 had very limited USB support, NT4 had great stability, Windows 2000 had all the features of windows 98 plus great stability (and a slew of other things) ME.. well ME was a piece of crap. XP has.. user switching? A playskool like interface?
With Longhorn still in the distant future, and Windows 2000 support starting to dry up, who wants to make a crappy pit stop at XP waiting for Longhorn?
AccountKiller
Having said that, I, too, regard W2K as the best OS Microsoft has produced to date. However, they have a marketing cycle that, in the absence of real competition, requires that they produce a couple of years of garbage so that at some point they'll produce a good one they can really market. W95 was like that, and W2K. I'm doubtful that Longhorn is the real one, actually. I think they're still retrenching and they won't actually need another good product until around 2009. Then again, maybe Longhorn will be delayed that long...
I still think Word XP is still a deeply offensive product compared to Word 2000...
Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
Longhorn changes we do know about seem more desktop related than server - like UI changes (red instead of blue screens of death) or human-frendlyness changes (like acknowledging that it's no longer "My Computer" since they want to control it).
Yet Microsoft claims it's better for servers, more secure, etc. than XP.
This leaves me with only one possible conclusion. Microsoft already has a better-than-XP-for-servers OS in house, and that's Win2000. I bet the real longhorn strategy is to simply rebrand Win2000, but surely they can't do that while W2K is still supported or people would notice. By ending support now we'll all forget how great Win2K was by the Longhorn ship date in 2009.
I used Windows 2000 for years. It was a vast improvement over Windows 95/98. Then again, chalk on the sidewalk is an improvment over Windows 95/98. And, while Windows 2000 isn't quite as stable as chalk on cement, it also doesn't wash away in the rain. Probably an artifact from having been developed in the Seattle area.
...Center is the worst piece of garbage to spew forth from Redmond since Steve Ballmer's last speech. It can't be removed or disabled, only the individual features can be disabled. And if you remove a replacement feature (McAfee Antivirus for example) it reenabled the Microsoft feature...and I trust Microsoft to protect my system about as far as I can throw Bill Gates. I don't know how far that is, but I am willing to spend the afternoon finding out.
Of recent, I have been using XP Pro. If you immediately change the Romper Room interface back to "Classic", it is an improvement over 2000. The problem comes in when you update to SP2. The Windows Security... and I type those words realizing they are as compatible as two dogs with their tails tied together
XP, like most of the current software from Microsoft also tries too hard. It thinks for you and you are just suppose to sit there and except its defaults (faults?). "My Documents" for example. I don't want to use that name. Changing it isn't so easy, but it can be done.
I would still go from 2000 to XP, but I might not install SP2 so quickly again.
PS: If you want IE7, which will no doubt be the greatest browser ever produced by a Redmond based company, it will not be available on 2000.
our school gave us craptops with win 98 to use for school work. as long as we did our work and stayed out of trouble, they didnt really care what we did with the laptops.
we immediately started tweaking with them trying to improve the preformance and stability.
removing all the novell software was a great boost to the preformance.
upgrading to windoes xp expontntialy increased the stability, but with only 128mb ram, the preformance on xp left something to be desired.
then one of my pals tried windows 2000. it was perfect. stable, but not a ram whore.
redhat also ran prety good, but one of our classes required that we had M$ visual basic, so dual booting was the only choice to run *nix
"What does slashdotting mean?"
"You've never heard of slashdot?"
"I know it makes websites not work."
My organization has about 80 Windows 2000 Professional desktops and no plans on upgrading yet. We are very good about getting all the updates as soon as they come out, but still see no reason to switch. I am honestly not trolling here, but what incentives besides "MS won't fix any further bugs" do we have? Is there anything that you found being worth the switch? We have roaming profiles and, up till now, very homogenious installs. The other side of the coin is how well XP behaves in Samba3 NT4-like domain. If it's any flakier than 2K, forget about it.
I felt the same way, but it appears Windows 2000 users still have 2 more years of security updates.
W2k is leaving the "mainstream support" on June 30, 2005 and entering "extended support". According to question #17 of Microsoft Support Lilfecycle Policy FAQ:
The caveat is that the above is for "Business and Development software" and not for "Consumer, Hardware, Multimedia, and Business Solutions products". I would assume W2k is business software, but I'm not 100% sure.
One key reason for the Windows 2000 retirement may be that Windows 2000 does not require an online activation within 30 days, only the entry of a standard product activation key. In contrast, Windows 2003 Server requires an online activation within 30 days. By ending support for Windows 2000, Microsoft will close the loop on a stable OS that can be shared and reinstalled at will.
I run Windows 2000 Server at home and appreciate the fact that I can reinstall at any time if needed. I will run Windows 2000 as long as possible before switching.
p.s. I also run Apache and Firefox on my Win2K machine. Not worried about IE7 or IIS fixes.
1) Non-security hotfix support unless you buy an extended contract for this.
2) No-charge incident support
3) Warranty Claims
4) Design changes and feature requests
Here's a link to the dates on their site. Click ont he link towards the top of that page for the FAQ where they explain what all this means.
They released security updates for NT4 well beyond when its extended support phase ended and I imagine they'll do the same for 2000. Even if they don't, I'm of the opinion that this is a very agreeable support lifecycle.
-Lucas
I think that once software is "retired" that source code should be released for fans to support it.
If I wish to win 2k because it works for me - then I should be given the source to be able to code it to keep working as the net evolves.
_ _ _ Go for the eyes Boo! GO FOR THE EYES!
This is similar to what they did with NT4 SP7. Just before SP7 was to release, they went to a hotfix and nixed it.
W95 was like that, and W2K.
.ini files, which wasn't that bad once you knew what you were doing. I'd rather deal with those than the mess known as the registry that we have been stuck with ever since. Windows 3.11 was fast too, it would fly on a high end 486, whereas Windows 95 would crawl on the same computer. And call me strange, but I kind of liked the GUI in 3.11 in a quaint kind of way.
Windows 95? I thought Windows 3.11 was a better OS. Sure, it lacked a lot of features that pretty much made running it after about 1997 impossible. But 3.11 was a lot more stable, and lot easier to configure and tweak - sure, lots of hacking of config.sys, autoexec.bat, and various