There's a common thread
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| Ridcully Apr 08, 2012 6:23 PM EDT |
Okay, I'll stir just a little.......I suppose for many still running WinXP (especially in business), it's pure economics. If something does the job that you want and is running reasonably well, then it is far cheaper to keep it going than begin the expensive process of upgrade - and from all accounts I have read, moving directly from WinXP to Win7 can be difficult. Many businesses work quite well on the principle "If it ain't broke, why fix it ?" To illustrate that point, in 1999 while in Tasmania, I recall seeing (with utter amazement) a computerised apple grading machine in a local apple orchard whose operating system was......(drum roll please)........MS-DOS....Seeing my amazement, the manager said quite simply that it worked, they understood it perfectly, it was a stand alone system so it could not be compromised in any way, it cost nothing apart from power to operate and why change to far more expensive software when the MS-DOS software was doing everything they wanted ? And for me, he was dead right. But I think there is another aspect to this retention of WinXP, neglecting for the moment the facts that WinXP security wasn't really hot at all and WinXP could be unstable. The WinXP interface was simple to understand, traditional in layout, easily set up to give what you wanted, lacked all bells and whistles and just "did the job"; in short you were very comfortable in its operation and you didn't really have to learn anything new......It is at this point that my rather cynical brain cells said: My goodness, am I talking about Gnome2, KDE3.5, Xfce, Cinnamon, TrinityDE and so forth ? No, of course not........perhaps, maybe.......I'll think about it. But I do think there is a lesson for everybody. The rush to produce interfaces that work on pads and smartphones is understandable, but let's not forget that there remains a vast group of people whose daily work depends on mouse and keyboard inputs with a standard sized monitor and what works well, looks great and operates by finger touch on a small, hand portable screen just doesn't cut the mustard for the traditional user. I think this also is one of the reasons WinXP was so liked by its users. Me too, when I am forced to use it for contractual work. |
| tracyanne Apr 08, 2012 6:50 PM EDT |
I posted this on the Register.Quoting:Indeed, it is no problem. My company has already replaced Windows on the desktop and the server with Linux based Operating Systems, the final changeover date was January [3]1st 2012. The windows fanbois are doing their usual thing. |
| tuxchick Apr 08, 2012 6:56 PM EDT |
Ridcully, have you compared WinXP with later Windows versions? The difference in functionality that matters to the user is negligible, and whatever extra nuggets you can find in Vista/7 could easily have been added to XP, like nicer multiple sound card management and network management. Microsoft pulled off a genius accomplishment: adding 12+ gigabytes of code and increasing system requirements five-fold without adding actual functionality. There should be a special industry prize for the most expensive non-achievement of all time. |
| Khamul Apr 08, 2012 7:24 PM EDT |
It really depends on if your system is going to be networked or not. If the computer is entirely standalone, like that one in the apple orchard, it honestly doesn't matter what system it runs underneath. DOS doesn't even support networking after all (it has to be added on with something else). If there's no network, there's no way to compromise it, and as long as the system as a whole does what it's supposed to, it doesn't need updates from the OS maker. If the system is connected to the internet, however, everything changes. Every OS (meaning a real operating system with multitasking and a network stack) has compromises. So if you're using some old version that hasn't been updated, and there's known vulnerabilities, it's pretty easy for an attacker to gain access to your system. So running any kind of business-critical equipment on an OS that the vendor doesn't support any more is obviously a very bad idea, unless it's either a) not networked even if it has the capability, or b) stringently firewalled, which of course means extra work to set up and still a risk. And even b) is iffy depending on what network services you're using and relying on; if there's a compromise in any of those services, your firewall will do no good. |
| BernardSwiss Apr 08, 2012 10:51 PM EDT |
Quoting:Microsoft pulled off a genius accomplishment: adding 12+ gigabytes of code and increasing system requirements five-fold without adding actual functionality. @ tuxchick I'm afraid you're badly mistaken. That 12 GB includes, for example (just off the top of my head), absolutely vital DRM functionality to keep [strike]users'[/strike] [strike]owners'[/strike] [strike]customers'[/strike] consumers' computer usage under control, and networking (in)compatibility improvements cleverly implemented in a manner to functionally encourage XP users to upgrade to this more modern OS and the more powerful hardware to run it, which additional turnover is of inestimable benefit to the economy. And to really, properly appreciate the magnitude of this achievement, remember that (using the Hyper-V code as a representative example) this increase in the code-base could probably have been made with a mere 4 GB, if Microsoft had chosen to be stingy with its largesse... |
| Ridcully Apr 08, 2012 11:09 PM EDT |
Hi Tuxchick......I'm not surprised at your comment on the fact that Redmond could have readily upgraded WinXP to become something rather nice......sort of like Win98 became the much better Win98SE - but then my cynical perspective suggests that Redmond isn't in the game of producing software that runs for ever - it wants to sell you more and more and (usually) far more expensive software upgrades and a new version is the best way of all. "Everything gives way to Profits." I never had the misfortune to touch Vista and I have had only the briefest moment with Win7 - it wasn't pleasant. My daughter purchased a new and rather lovely Toshiba laptop and of course it had Win7 preloaded and ready for installation. While she uses computers every day and is expert in running highly specialised software, she isn't really computer literate in some senses, so she left it with me to get Win7 running for a very, very few specialised options she needed. I believe it took me 2-3 hours to get that thing into a usable form. First I experienced the usual Windows loading where I swear the thing almost was at the stage of: "Ahaaa.....you moved the mouse so I need to reboot !". I'm uncertain but I also thought that the Win logo began to have almost a vindictive look about it. Then came the really messy bit: trying to get rid of all the garbage wear with which a new Windows machine is infected and which tries to force you into takeups of antiviral packages, games etc. etc. etc. etc. I am used to the control panel, remove software method from my Win98SE and WinXP days, but removing the pile of utter refuse on that machine wasn't fun. I then pulled the hdd out, put in a new 500Gig drive and loaded it up with openSUSE 11.4 running KDE4......And do you know what ? After 4 months, she STILL hasn't bothered to swap back to Win7. She loves Linux and its freedom to do what she wants. Rather nice really. Tracyanne, that's a nice little bit of news. And darn good to see. I wouldn't be surprised to see at least a minority of XP users take the Linux path......and never look back. |
| Ridcully Apr 08, 2012 11:40 PM EDT |
@BernardSwiss.......you have me intrigued. I am sure I loaded VLC onto that Toshiba's Win7 hdd and that it then played videos to my heart's content. Mind you, I didn't try to copy anything. Perish the thought. So is the DRM you mention aimed squarely at copying ? .........if so, (and I have no experience whatsoever purely because I have no Win7 machines in the house), I'm willing to bet that the big makers of copy packages have already overcome any problems. DRM has always seemed so pointless to me with its only results to annoy the actual users; but that's another story. |
| tuxchick Apr 09, 2012 2:00 AM EDT |
That is nice bit of news from TA, I meant to comment before. Really, it's like so many of us have been saying for so long-- preloads are the key. MS has followed the same script all robber barons follow-- become dominant via ruthless crushing of the competition, lockin, and insider connections. (Gates' mom was on the IBM board when they made the infamous deal to pay MS every time they shipped a PC. IBM has never been stupid and that was no accident.) And now they're fat and lardy and adrift, propped up by inertia, funny accounting tricks, and protection rackets, like getting paid for Android. And Bill Gates is busy polishing his image by being a philanthropist. The script never varies. |
| BernardSwiss Apr 09, 2012 2:55 AM EDT |
I'm hardly an expert, either. The last Windows on my own computer was Win '98 SE (but I recently got a free, legit (never opened package) Win XP install disk, so I figure I'll play around with running that as a virtual guest) -- so my info is entirely second-hand. I was remember this in particular A Cost Analysis of Windows Vista Content Protection Peter Gutmann http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html Which I probably first heard about from Bruce Schneier's short version Why Vista's DRM Is Bad For You http://www.forbes.com/2007/02/10/microsoft-vista-drm-tech-se... http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2007/02/drm_in_windows... Also, I seem to remember that someone actually measured how big a performance hit this DRM exacted, but I don't recall who, or where I saw it. Of course Microsoft and friends (esp Ed Bott and George Ou) swore up and down that all the critics had it all wrong {snort}. |
| Fettoosh Apr 09, 2012 10:05 AM EDT |
Quoting:She loves Linux and its freedom to do what she wants. Rather nice really. @Ridcully, I have one like her at home. :-) My daughter bought her first laptop when she was in high school. She bought a Dell and of course it came with WinXP. Couple years later its hardware broke and needed a new one, I gave her an IBM ThinkPad T42 I had which was running Kubuntu. I didn't give her a choice and so, in a way she was forced into using Linux. She didn't mind and said she will give it a try. last year, she broke one of the screen hinges and wanted a Netbook. So, she went and bought two Acer Netbooks that were on very special price of $250 per machine. The other one was for her sister. I was surprised when she asked me to wipe Windows and install Linux on hers. The other one didn't stay long because her sister didn't like the computer. I did install Kubuntu. Every thing worked fine except she didn't like the touch pad and the wireless worked half time. It was very annoying for her but she decided to return it because it didn't fully support Linux. So we went searching looking for a good Netbook reasonably priced and has good Linux support. She liked the HP Pavilion dm1z. She made sure to let the salesman know that she will return it if it doesn't support Linux. It was OK with him in spite of not really knowing what Linux was. She wanted me to remove Windows totally but I insisted to keep it just in case we needed to return it. Any ways, I ended up having to disable the TouchPad (She disliked it very much) and downloaded/built a wireless drive to get things all working good. While I was doing that, she had a chat with HP support people and really really told them how she felt about HP's support for Linux and got to speak to a supervisor. All he could do is apologize. Her computer usage is mainly creating documents and other office applications. She does use Google tools quite a bit and very happy with Linux. The funny think is she even brags about using Linux. |
| Bob_Robertson Apr 09, 2012 10:26 AM EDT |
TC, As much as I disagree about the actual effects of the actual "Robber Barons" of yore (Rockafeller, Vanderbilt, Carnegie, Hill, etc), if there was an example of someone who fit the negative stereotype created by the historybooks, it would be Bill Gates. From his mom on the IBM board, to the Gates law-firm which specializes in "estate planning" to avoid taxes, to that same law-firm buying into an established Washington lobbying firm which was magically followed by the stopping of the "farming" prosecutions of Microsoft for various avaricious business practices, the list goes on. Unlike the Robber Barons of old, whose tenure was marked by massive decreases in the costs of their products to consumers, Windows continues to sell (for those who bother to buy it) at exorbitant prices. Microsoft did do one good thing, in my opinion: It did all the advertising to get computers into the hands of pretty much anyone who wants one, and once enabled the user is free to find something _else_ to use. Like Linux. |
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