The end is nigh for Windows XP

[scarper]

In April 2014, Microsoft will be ending their support for Windows XP so there will not be anymore official updates for that OS after that date. Bad news is that it looks like 20-25% of people will still be using Windows XP when support ends. Thoughts? Does anybody know anyone that is still using the OS? Do you think Microsoft will decide to still offer support past April once the date draws closer?

It's a bit exciting to watch this whole drama unfold but this definitely sucks a lot from a security point of view, at least initially.

[Lebarhon]

Hello,
Supported or not, what is the difference ?

[jiml8]

*shrug*

I still use Windows 2000 on a daily basis. I presently have two copies up and running as VMs on this machine. I also use XP.

I don't care if support is gone. When I need Windows, 2000 and XP are both much faster than their successors. I only use Win7 when I need to run programs that don't run on XP or 2000, or when I am doing dev work that requires it. It is slower than molasses in antarctica.

[yankee495]

I couldn't vote "Maybe". I think most of the people I know are running Windows 7, the ones that don't listen to me about Mageia.

I have Win7 installed as a virtual Machine and on a separate SSD but I think I'll free up that drive. I have the horse power to run Win7 just fine, but I only boot to it when I have a problem. I was having disconnects and booted to it to see if it was OS or router related. It was the router.

[scarper]

I couldn't vote "Maybe".

Just added one!

[yankee495]

I couldn't vote "Maybe".

Just added one!

Now, if only the government worked that fast! Hahah! I guess "maybe" is a category. I know some people that refuse to buy a decent computer and I mean they buy the cheapest one made and then do it again in two years or less....over and over. My neighbor finally let me build her one and not a peep out of her since.

[scarper]

I realised that "maybe" is an option since you might know someone had/has XP but it's been too long to make a call. Also I can't blame a person buying the cheapest computer since technical terms are hard to understand so to an average person it looks all the same. In any case there are good cheap laptops that run for quite a while. I'm actually visiting a friend today who has Windows XP on a laptop. The laptop is so old that it has a floppy disk drive on the side! Only thing that doesn't work well is the battery.

[yankee495]

Yeah, I actually had an old XP laptop and put Linux on it...don't know where it ended up. I've got one in a closet that I may try out that was given to me non-working but it works. It had flowers and stuff painted on it by a teenager. I also have a Gateway dual core laptop that stinks when you plug in the charger and will not power on. It is the right charger so I don't know. It has a key cap missing but that is cheap to fix and it is a decent looking dual core, 2GB and ??? HD.

None of them are worth much but I just got an idea. Put Mageia on them and loan them to a couple of people. I also have about 3, 4 or 5 1.4 ~ 2.0 GHz desktops that really are not worth much but they'll run Mageia.

When I say they buy cheap computers I mean AFTER I told them about decent refurbished ones and offered to put one together for them at no charge...they still buy the junk. Jerry bought the bottom of the line single core Gateway and I told him to return it and get a dual core refurb for less money. Six months later I ran into him and he said I need to come see his new computer...Second new one, the other had a virus and was "too slow anyway".

I tell people to buy while stuff is on sale too. I bought 16GB 1866 MHz DDR3 for $60, now it is $160. I bought two 120GB SSD's for $60 and they are over $100 now...they just don't listen.

Anyway, back to XP. I really liked XP and I like 7, but 7 is a hog and they are both MS. I had an Amiga back in the day and everyone had Commodore 64/128's or PC's. I just loved that the Amiga was different. If MS had chose something like Apple did for a kernel it at least might be fun. I mean, if it was some kind of something normal in the vein of *nix.

I do have to hand it to them, 30+ years even if that did include some unfair practices. I'm pretty certain they'll never top the popularity of XP with phones, tablets and Chrome Books etc taking a slice of the pie.

As desktops get cheaper, garage sales etc., people will be looking to get them running cheap and Linux is the answer. At present it all depends if they'll use Linux or hacked XP and later Linux will be the better choice by far.

I'm sure everyone here knows that if Linux ever had the chance Windows had there'd have been no Windows. Some will argue it has had the chance all along but that isn't true. People had a fit over W95 being so different, some loved it and some hated it, but it didn't take long before they all loved it. If that would've been Linux things would be different, but MS already had businesses locked into their stuff.

I miss the old days when you had to figure it out for yourself...no Google etc. We had a lot of fun and we were just hacks, never no training or anything.

[scarper]

Heheh Wow that story just reminded me of the eMachines computer that was purchased, it hardly lasted more than a year.

I've actually tried that experiment in my family as we had bought a computer with no OS on it so it was cheaper and I had installed Mandriva on it. The problem I ran into immediately was that the printer was so old and the manufacturer (Lexmark) had such an old Linux driver that it didn't work at all and cloud printing wasn't available then. If the exact scenario happened now with my HP printer I'd probably still have linux on it. I remember wow-ing my bros too when I showed them the whole 3d desktop cube and writing with fire on my desktop.

Technology is definitely advancing with Linux so perhaps the "Year of Linux" will come soon. Especially with gaming companies like Valve looking at it in regards to Steam OS with a serious mentality. It''s always welcomed in the community, well, as long as you contribute a fair bit (Google...).

Windows 7 was a hog but compared to Windows 8 and Vista it definitely looks like a diamond in the rough. Actually I recently had to wipe my laptop's HD around New Year's since a bad install of Windows 8 to 8.1 had damaged my partition tables beyond repair. And reinstalling Windows would've been a pain since you had to order the recovery CDs ($60 CAD why?!) and worry about a UEFI boot if you decided to dual-boot. So I just wiped the damn thing and it's now my first time using linux on my laptop without dual-booting. Working fine so far.

I remember all the machines I had with XP lasted a good 6-7+ years which was amazing. People still running the OS today is definitely a testament to how great that OS is. I also remember when I was in Grade 5 everyone in class was excited when they saw all the computers being installed from 98SE to XP.

XP has run it's course IMO and Microsoft's new endeavours have been hit and miss lately. So Linux may seem like the natural successor.

Even when XP is gone it'll definitely represent the times when I developed a fondness for technology. I also loved the days when I had to figure everything out. It all started when we had our first computer and I wanted it to run Runescape on it. It was a 400mhz rig but the game ran in Java so low quality was 300mhz and high quality was 500mhz. I was always fooling around with every little bit trying to squeeze every bit of juice it had left to run that damn high quality setting. When I got my XP machine I wanted to see more improvements so I just kept on fiddling with everything. I guess that's how I got into IT and now I'm an IT student and gamer!