Neat! Now we just need to wait for Windows XP and its editions to stop being popular, because people have been enjoying it even years after its end of life, and it seems like it'll never end.
Extended support for Windows Embedded POSReady 2009—the last supported version of Windows based on Windows XP—ended on April 9, 2019, marking the final end of the Windows NT 5.1 product line after 17 years, 7 months, and 16 days. Counting this edition, Windows XP is the longest-lived version of Windows ever—a record that is unlikely to be beaten.
Good lord. XP is almost old enough to vote. There are kids obsessed with this release of Windows that weren't even born when it was released.... excuse me while I disappear into a cloud of dust.
I can't believe, that so much time has passed since XP came out.
Windows XP was the last Windows I heavily used, while using it I switched to linux.
I clearly remember torturing my Pentium 2/266/32MB RAM with Windows XP.
Either it was XP or Server 2003 that needed 64MB for installation. I got a second 32MB module from a friend for installation.
I still use XP regularly on an old Celeron/1.6GHz for Keil µVision for programming 8051 microcontrollers (which are dinosaurs too).
I also use Keil for ARM on this machine and old Eagle PCB-CAD software.
They days where XP was hot+fresh, was the time when I was fiddling around with computers a lot with friends. We were together for weeks, went to school/job in the morning, came back, did something with our computers, ....
I really miss these days, also I miss XP...
I wasnt even born when this came out, which is the best part.
I used this on a vm when I was 9, and I still think it's better than Windows 10.
I was born in 2008.
EDIT: Fixed a typo.
Considering that there are over a billion PCs out there, 1% still represents over 10 million XP machines (online at least), so that number could still fall considerably and yet maintain good unofficial support.
Windows 2000 was at 0.5% at EOS and is now at ~0.01%, so there are definitely a few thousand users out there. Of course the small user base never really hurt blackwingcat's cause and now we have a very-capable-but-still-abandonware OS.
This is what happens when you try to download a POSReady 2009 hotfix:
The good news is that unofficial XP SP3+ rollups are on the way to incorporate all the updates.
Windows 2000 was at 0.5% at EOS and is now at ~0.01%, so there are definitely a few thousand users out there.
The college I work for still operates two or three Dell Optiplex GX1s that are running Windows 2000. They are used in our biolabs in conjunction with highly specialized, expensive (and clearly outdated) software that operates some of the bio equipment.
@Windows99SE said:
And the kids that spammed "GIVE ME WINDOWS XP" will be coming back to ask for it again.
Indeed. It certainly qualifies as oldware (for lack of a better term), but it isn't exactly abandoned yet. Which is just insane to me. XP still has about 3% marketshare, which puts it above OS X 10.14 and just below OS X 10.13. Like, srsly, it's time to upgrade.
Also, don't remind us of that moron. To be honest, what use does InstallShield have anyway, compared to XP?
Yeah, sorry. Got a bit off-topic there.
Gotta say that it amazes me that people loved XP that much. People still use it long after it was discontinued.
@Bry89 said:
To be honest, what use does InstallShield have anyway, compared to XP?
It makes installer scripts and installers with the infamous blue-gradient backgrounds. I looked into it and it doesn't look like it can modify existing installer scripts, unfortunately.
We actually do have Wise Installation System (which was InstallShield's biggest competitor), and I have Wise for Windows Installer Enterprise if anyone wants
@Windows99SE said:
Gotta say that it amazes me that people loved XP that much. People still use it long after it was discontinued.
Which is hilarious because people used to hate it back in the day when it was new. So many people thought it was bloated and slow (I was one of them, but I didn't know any better back then).
Many people were coming from 9x and the software and games that worked just fine on 9x had stability issues on XP, and that's if it worked at all. And there were also driver issues. A lot of older hardware lacked XP drivers at the time. So people bashed XP.
Vista had a similar problem and by the time the drivers and software were updated, 7 was out. So 7 became the golden child and Vista died off.
They also hated the new activation system and felt that one day Microsoft would flip a switch and they wouldn't be able to use the software they paid for (Well, maybe there's some validity to that one).
Actually, XP improved compatibility in a few cases: the updated NTVDM/WOW dealt with race conditions much better than in Windows 2000 or natively on DOS/9x.
WillMaker 4.0 will crash when completing a will by doing a floating point calculation equaling a negative square root on Windows 3.x, 9x and 2000 (on a 1.5 GHz Pentium M) but it doesn't crash on XP with the same hardware.
Maybe I should try to integrate 2003 SP2's (XP SP3 did break some stuff apparently) NTVDM into Windows 2000...
I just remembered that my older warez CDs' menus didn't work properly on NT-based Windows and only worked properly on 9x. That and classic modules not working in After Dark 4.0 are the extent of my compatibility issues with Windows XP.
Yeah, I mean it all depended on what software you used.
For the most part, things were all stable on the old family computer that ran XP. But we did have a few actual problems and a steep learning curve. I recall some stability issues with Dungeon Keeper 2. Light House didn't work at all I believe (I wound up using a VM for it). There was a compatibility issue with the Johnny Castaway screen saver, but there was a patch for it to get it working on XP. And the Dell rep told us our printer wouldn't work. They turned out to be wrong and I was able to find XP drivers for it later on.
DOS games didn't really work well and that made up a lot of the games we played back then.
But by the time my personal desktop was upgraded to XP, everything I still used had XP versions or was replaced with something else that did work. So my experience (no pun intended) was much more smooth at that point.
Of course, XP was about 6 years old then and the age of Vista loomed in the distance. But everyone decided they hated Vista, so I got a few more years out of XP. Then I started the whole adventure again to find updated software when I built my new desktop with 7.
And just recently I did it all again with Windows 10. Although most, if not all, of the software I had on 7 would still work on 10, I still took the opportunity to get updated versions of things.
@Windows99SE said:
Gotta say that it amazes me that people loved XP that much. People still use it long after it was discontinued.
Which is hilarious because people used to hate it back in the day when it was new. So many people thought it was bloated and slow (I was one of them, but I didn't know any better back then).
Many people were coming from 9x and the software and games that worked just fine on 9x had stability issues on XP, and that's if it worked at all. And there were also driver issues. A lot of older hardware lacked XP drivers at the time. So people bashed XP.
Vista had a similar problem and by the time the drivers and software were updated, 7 was out. So 7 became the golden child and Vista died off.
They also hated the new activation system and felt that one day Microsoft would flip a switch and they wouldn't be able to use the software they paid for (Well, maybe there's some validity to that one).
Lol.
After it has been long discontinued, I wonder how many security tricks the XP users will pull and how long will it do for them until they can't pull any?
@Windows99SE said:
Gotta say that it amazes me that people loved XP that much. People still use it long after it was discontinued.
Which is hilarious because people used to hate it back in the day when it was new. So many people thought it was bloated and slow (I was one of them, but I didn't know any better back then).
Many people were coming from 9x and the software and games that worked just fine on 9x had stability issues on XP, and that's if it worked at all. And there were also driver issues. A lot of older hardware lacked XP drivers at the time. So people bashed XP.
Vista had a similar problem and by the time the drivers and software were updated, 7 was out. So 7 became the golden child and Vista died off.
They also hated the new activation system and felt that one day Microsoft would flip a switch and they wouldn't be able to use the software they paid for (Well, maybe there's some validity to that one).
A lot of people considered XP to be bloated because it was, at least in relation to the prior versions. Each version of Windows has been more bloated than the last. The hardware that was in common usage in 2001 was not quite powerful enough yet to run the fancy visual effects of XP smoothly. Turning those off made a difference but it was still slower than 2000 or ME on the same hardware.
Now, using XP on my 6-core AMD CPU with 8GB of RAM (I use x64 Edition), it's pretty snappy even with all the visual enhancements turned on.
XP was also pretty buggy before SP2 came out. They fixed a lot of issues over time. The same thing happened with Vista. Running Vista SP2 with a modern PC is actually a pretty smooth experience. They fixed a lot of bugs and the hardware got much better.
It appears that due to the incoming requirement to sign all Windows Updates with SHA-2, Windows 2000, XP and Vista (but not Server 2008) update servers will be decommissioned in July.
Windows 2000 has the HFSLIP FullPack on windowsarchives.com as a replacement; I discussed the situation with XP x86 above and XP x64/2003 have good update packs on ryanVM. I'm not sure about Vista though.
Someone will have to preserve Vista's Ultimate Extras, which are bound to be lost forever by this change.
And I don't see anything mentioning Windows 2000, XP or Vista. Are we sure that they are actually decommissioning servers and not just requiring SHA-2 support for new updates, leaving older versions of Windows unaffected?
Also, is it just the main Windows Update website that's going away, or will the Windows Update Catalog be discontinued also?
"Any devices without SHA-2 support will not be offered Windows updates after July 2019."
That's the thing. Perhaps it only applies to Windows Server 2008 and up, but they have also shut down the 9x update servers without warning. This may be a good opportunity to do so for NT5.
Anyway, some people out there are really trying to kill XP and New Moon :( :
Comments
Good. Now it shall be consigned to history.
No, now it enters the ranks of Windows 2000 with its dedicated die-hard fans who will keep it going too.
Yeah, someone on MSFN just figured out how to get ACPI working on new motherboards (like Z390)!! I think that win2k is not far behind either...
And they're not even supposed to run Windows 8.1
Neat! Now we just need to wait for Windows XP and its editions to stop being popular, because people have been enjoying it even years after its end of life, and it seems like it'll never end.
Good lord. XP is almost old enough to vote. There are kids obsessed with this release of Windows that weren't even born when it was released.... excuse me while I disappear into a cloud of dust.
I can't believe, that so much time has passed since XP came out.
Windows XP was the last Windows I heavily used, while using it I switched to linux.
I clearly remember torturing my Pentium 2/266/32MB RAM with Windows XP.
Either it was XP or Server 2003 that needed 64MB for installation. I got a second 32MB module from a friend for installation.
I still use XP regularly on an old Celeron/1.6GHz for Keil µVision for programming 8051 microcontrollers (which are dinosaurs too).
I also use Keil for ARM on this machine and old Eagle PCB-CAD software.
They days where XP was hot+fresh, was the time when I was fiddling around with computers a lot with friends. We were together for weeks, went to school/job in the morning, came back, did something with our computers, ....
I really miss these days, also I miss XP...
XP users were given a "wonderful" sendoff by M$. KB4494528 has reportedly crippled the Windows Installer service!
https://msfn.org/board/topic/171814-posready-2009-updates-ported-to-windows-xp-sp3-enu/?page=192
I'm kinda surprised they didn't force all updated systems to BSOD with the code "OS_NOT_WIN10".
I wasnt even born when this came out, which is the best part.
I used this on a vm when I was 9, and I still think it's better than Windows 10.
I was born in 2008.
EDIT: Fixed a typo.
Well, you've got a point. I suppose the market share won't sink beneath 1% if that's going to be the case.
Considering that there are over a billion PCs out there, 1% still represents over 10 million XP machines (online at least), so that number could still fall considerably and yet maintain good unofficial support.
Windows 2000 was at 0.5% at EOS and is now at ~0.01%, so there are definitely a few thousand users out there. Of course the small user base never really hurt blackwingcat's cause and now we have a very-capable-but-still-abandonware OS.
This is what happens when you try to download a POSReady 2009 hotfix:
The good news is that unofficial XP SP3+ rollups are on the way to incorporate all the updates.
And here it is: the post USP4 rollup:
https://ryanvm.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=10321&start=2250#p145718
At the start of the thread is USP4 itself
The college I work for still operates two or three Dell Optiplex GX1s that are running Windows 2000. They are used in our biolabs in conjunction with highly specialized, expensive (and clearly outdated) software that operates some of the bio equipment.
And the kids that spammed "GIVE ME WINDOWS XP" will be coming back to ask for it again.
Indeed. It certainly qualifies as oldware (for lack of a better term), but it isn't exactly abandoned yet. Which is just insane to me. XP still has about 3% marketshare, which puts it above OS X 10.14 and just below OS X 10.13. Like, srsly, it's time to upgrade.
Damn. And after 5 years since Extended Support ended. I expected that people would upgrade to Windows 7 and XP would die off but nope.
The user that repeatedly requested for InstallShield is like 5 years old.
Yeah even though Xp is out of support, I left a pet store today happily shining the xp professional default screensaver on their registers.
I think that's already happened
Also, don't remind us of that moron. To be honest, what use does InstallShield have anyway, compared to XP?
Yeah, sorry. Got a bit off-topic there.
Gotta say that it amazes me that people loved XP that much. People still use it long after it was discontinued.
It makes installer scripts and installers with the infamous blue-gradient backgrounds. I looked into it and it doesn't look like it can modify existing installer scripts, unfortunately.
We actually do have Wise Installation System (which was InstallShield's biggest competitor), and I have Wise for Windows Installer Enterprise if anyone wants
Which is hilarious because people used to hate it back in the day when it was new. So many people thought it was bloated and slow (I was one of them, but I didn't know any better back then).
Many people were coming from 9x and the software and games that worked just fine on 9x had stability issues on XP, and that's if it worked at all. And there were also driver issues. A lot of older hardware lacked XP drivers at the time. So people bashed XP.
Vista had a similar problem and by the time the drivers and software were updated, 7 was out. So 7 became the golden child and Vista died off.
They also hated the new activation system and felt that one day Microsoft would flip a switch and they wouldn't be able to use the software they paid for (Well, maybe there's some validity to that one).
Actually, XP improved compatibility in a few cases: the updated NTVDM/WOW dealt with race conditions much better than in Windows 2000 or natively on DOS/9x.
WillMaker 4.0 will crash when completing a will by doing a floating point calculation equaling a negative square root on Windows 3.x, 9x and 2000 (on a 1.5 GHz Pentium M) but it doesn't crash on XP with the same hardware.
Maybe I should try to integrate 2003 SP2's (XP SP3 did break some stuff apparently) NTVDM into Windows 2000...
I just remembered that my older warez CDs' menus didn't work properly on NT-based Windows and only worked properly on 9x. That and classic modules not working in After Dark 4.0 are the extent of my compatibility issues with Windows XP.
Yeah, I mean it all depended on what software you used.
For the most part, things were all stable on the old family computer that ran XP. But we did have a few actual problems and a steep learning curve. I recall some stability issues with Dungeon Keeper 2. Light House didn't work at all I believe (I wound up using a VM for it). There was a compatibility issue with the Johnny Castaway screen saver, but there was a patch for it to get it working on XP. And the Dell rep told us our printer wouldn't work. They turned out to be wrong and I was able to find XP drivers for it later on.
DOS games didn't really work well and that made up a lot of the games we played back then.
But by the time my personal desktop was upgraded to XP, everything I still used had XP versions or was replaced with something else that did work. So my experience (no pun intended) was much more smooth at that point.
Of course, XP was about 6 years old then and the age of Vista loomed in the distance. But everyone decided they hated Vista, so I got a few more years out of XP. Then I started the whole adventure again to find updated software when I built my new desktop with 7.
And just recently I did it all again with Windows 10. Although most, if not all, of the software I had on 7 would still work on 10, I still took the opportunity to get updated versions of things.
Lol.
After it has been long discontinued, I wonder how many security tricks the XP users will pull and how long will it do for them until they can't pull any?
A lot of people considered XP to be bloated because it was, at least in relation to the prior versions. Each version of Windows has been more bloated than the last. The hardware that was in common usage in 2001 was not quite powerful enough yet to run the fancy visual effects of XP smoothly. Turning those off made a difference but it was still slower than 2000 or ME on the same hardware.
Now, using XP on my 6-core AMD CPU with 8GB of RAM (I use x64 Edition), it's pretty snappy even with all the visual enhancements turned on.
XP was also pretty buggy before SP2 came out. They fixed a lot of issues over time. The same thing happened with Vista. Running Vista SP2 with a modern PC is actually a pretty smooth experience. They fixed a lot of bugs and the hardware got much better.
It appears that due to the incoming requirement to sign all Windows Updates with SHA-2, Windows 2000, XP and Vista (but not Server 2008) update servers will be decommissioned in July.
Windows 2000 has the HFSLIP FullPack on windowsarchives.com as a replacement; I discussed the situation with XP x86 above and XP x64/2003 have good update packs on ryanVM. I'm not sure about Vista though.
Someone will have to preserve Vista's Ultimate Extras, which are bound to be lost forever by this change.
I've read this article: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4472027/2019-sha-2-code-signing-support-requirement-for-windows-and-wsus
And I don't see anything mentioning Windows 2000, XP or Vista. Are we sure that they are actually decommissioning servers and not just requiring SHA-2 support for new updates, leaving older versions of Windows unaffected?
Also, is it just the main Windows Update website that's going away, or will the Windows Update Catalog be discontinued also?
"Any devices without SHA-2 support will not be offered Windows updates after July 2019."
That's the thing. Perhaps it only applies to Windows Server 2008 and up, but they have also shut down the 9x update servers without warning. This may be a good opportunity to do so for NT5.
Anyway, some people out there are really trying to kill XP and New Moon :( :
https://msfn.org/board/topic/177125-my-build-of-new-moon-temp-name-aka-pale-moon-fork-targetting-xp/?page=141