Windows XP SP3 Postponed Until 2008

Rockgod quotes an article saying "With Microsoft now saying that its next major service pack for Windows XP will not ship until 2008, some Windows users are wondering whether the software upgrade will ever be released." and then later "Michael Cherry, an analyst with Directions on Microsoft, agrees that Microsoft may very well decide to drop XP Service Pack 3. "It absolutely could happen. Microsoft is under no obligation to produce any service packs, ever," he explains. "They feel that because these fixes are available through the auto-update that there's less need to create a service pack."

Comments

Personally I think they will kill it

[raitchison]

They killed Windows NT 4.0 SP7 in the ßeta process
They killed Windows 2000 SP5 in the pre-ßeta stage

Given this track record of killing off Service Packs shortly before they are released, as some (including me) might suspect in an effort to drive adoption of their newer software (which makes them money unlike a service pack) I'll be extremely surprised if Windows XP SP3 is ever released.

IMO, what they are saying now is just lip service/stalling and they have already made the decision.

It's obvious

[jackharrer]

Microsoft will not produce SP3 because of very simple reason: they want Vista to replace XP. It's cash, a lot of it.
Everybody knows that Win XP has more holes than swiss cheese. And it started to get Joe User. So they will upgrade just because of being scared of 'all those viruses, you know...'. So they'll be effectively forced to buy new system. And Miscosoft will be able to withdraw support for XP faster - which is good for them - they don't earn any cash from supporting it and it costs a lot.
I think they'll not make the same mistake like with Win2000 that is still quite alive and kicking because of good compatibility with XP and SP3 they released for it.
We can expect that Vista will quite fast become quite 'not exactly' compatible with XP. And without SP3 situation will get only worse. That's called strategy. On a big scale.

Re:Sounds sensible

[Lonewolf666]

The whole SP thing is a throwback to the bad old days of 28.8k modems and CDs by post. Now we can add the fixes as they come along so why bother with a monolithic chunk of code that must be a testing nightmare for MS as well as corporate end users?

Because you can read the SP from a CD and have the fixes installed before you connect the computer to the internet at all.
In the past, there have been some security holes that could be exploited as soon as your PC is on the net, making it a race between the malware and the patches which gets to your PC first. Loading the SP from a CD removes this problem.

Re:Available from autoupdate?

[theRiallatar]

I wasn't going to reply, but I kept seeing more and more of the same posts as I was reading through. Try a test. Connect a simple out-of-the-box router to a DSL/Cable connection with default settings. Connect an unpatched Windows XP SP0 machine to the router and make sure it has web access. Don't use that computer. See how long it takes to get rooted/malware. Answer? It NEVER will. Because the router blocks all unsolicited incoming traffic, unless you've monkeyed with the config to change this. The only way a computer can get rooted/malwared through a default-settings router is by stupid user tricks, or by another already infected machine on the NATed network.... which would have got infected by stupid user tricks.

Re:Windows genuine advantage

[tgd]

Except of course all those updates are available and can be installed without Windows Update.

Nice conspiracy theory, though.