Rest in peace, ftp.microsoft.com

SoftPCMuseum · September 2015

Before I go on any further, guys, this may be one of the very saddest announcements for us historians:
Microsoft's FTP server (ftp.microsoft.com) has finally been taken offline.

It's easy to see why - practically all of the products that were available on it are now out of support, and it was likely not worth the financial capacity to keep it going anyway. Still, it is hard to see it go after all these years, especially given its historical significance.

Rest in peace, ftp.microsoft.com (July 1993 to August 2015)

NOTE: I even left a message on Raymond Chen's blog (The Old New Thing) asking about this, but he hasn't responded (not surprising given how many of the comments that he gets are spam anyway, so I really wouldn't blame him for ignoring me).

EDIT: Changed topic title to be more clear.

Icon · September 2015

Are you sure it's not just down for maintenance or revamping? I can't find any information about it going permanently offline.

SoftPCMuseum · September 2015

Icon wrote:

Are you sure it's not just down for maintenance or revamping? I can't find any information about it going permanently offline.

Just because Microsoft didn't specifically post any information about it doesn't mean that they didn't take it offline for good. If you can't access it either, and it doesn't come back within a week, then let's face it, it's dead.

On that note, though, I did find what appears to be a 66 GB file download of it on another website. If it is indeed legit, then I might offer it to some websites dedicated to preserving computer software (and probably here too for that matter, if you have the space for it all).

Still waiting for a response from Raymond Chen, but I doubt that he could possibly even care less about my message, let alone actually respond to it - it was rather off-topic within that discussion anyway, and most of the actual "chatting" had already ended (it was the last message in that thread by the way).

Bry89 · September 2015

If it's really true, then that would be a real shame, considering that I just learned that Microsoft Plus for XP lurked somewhere there recently (and I wanted to try and get it just for nostalgia's sake). Although, I saw no information to do with its downtime according to a Google lookup I just did but I guess we should just wait and see if it's really gone for good.

dosbox · September 2015

There are some things there that might be lost forever.

SoftPCMuseum · September 2015

I still can't access it. It's dead. Let it rest in peace.

Also, Bry89, just because nothing has been posted yet about it doesn't mean it isn't true. The FTP server was a whole load of unsupported products anyway - it was bound to be taken offline sooner or later.

Still, it looks like Raymond Chen decided to ignore my post on The Old New Thing as spam - either that or he simply had no interest in it to begin with.

EDIT: Here is a link to a publically archived version that I found online: http://www.mmnt.net/db/0/0/ftp.microsoft.com.

I'm also thinking very seriously about downloading the 66 GB archive and offering it to a few software preservation societies, if they are interested that is.

Bry89 · September 2015

If you plan to do that, you better have a very good connection in use. I can imagine that would take hours, even days, for you to download the whole thing. Well, could you maybe mention what things are on the archive, just out of interest? I hope there's some goodies here and there, even the one I mentioned earlier in this thread.

Daniël Oosterhuis · September 2015

Ah, is it really dead? I loved going there and looking at photos of old games, and just staring into the past. I heard it sometimes does have downtimes, not weird considering that this server probably has the lowest priority anyways. Fun fact: It was actually launched alongside NT 3.1, to demonstrate the FTP capability of the OS. This was 1993, so the FTP has a lengthy life of 22 years. Last updates were done in 2010, IIRC, so that they might have gotten rid of it isn't much of a surprise, but still sad.

BOD · September 2015

C:\Windows\System32&gt;ftp ftp.microsoft.com
Connected to ftp.microsoft.akadns.net.
220 Microsoft FTP Service
200 OPTS UTF8 command successful - UTF8 encoding now ON.
User (ftp.microsoft.akadns.net:(none)): anonymous
331 Anonymous access allowed, send identity (e-mail name) as password.
Password:
230-Welcome to FTP.MICROSOFT.COM. Also visit http://www.microsoft.com/downloads.
230 User logged in.
ftp&gt; ls
200 PORT command successful.
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection.
bussys
deskapps
developr
KBHelp
MISC
MISC1
peropsys
Products
PSS
ResKit
Services
Softlib
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 104 bytes received in 0.01Seconds 20.80Kbytes/sec.

Daniël Oosterhuis · September 2015

Oh, so it's not dead! I can access it fine via the CMD, but no web browser access, nor linking the FTP to a network location in Explorer, both just give me a time out error.

PortugueseGuy · September 2015

I was also able to browse it via terminal (FileZilla didn't work):

####@####:~$ ftp ftp.microsoft.com
Connected to ftp.microsoft.akadns.net.
220 Microsoft FTP Service
Name (ftp.microsoft.com:####): anonymous
331 Anonymous access allowed, send identity (e-mail name) as password.
Password:
230-Welcome to FTP.MICROSOFT.COM. Also visit http://www.microsoft.com/downloads.
230 User logged in.
Remote system type is Windows_NT.
ftp&gt; ls
200 PORT command successful.
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection.
04-28-10  07:21PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          bussys
04-28-10  10:17PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          deskapps
04-28-10  11:14PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          developr
04-28-10  11:15PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          KBHelp
04-28-10  11:15PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          MISC
04-29-10  06:54AM       &lt;DIR&gt;          MISC1
04-29-10  08:47AM       &lt;DIR&gt;          peropsys
04-29-10  05:10PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          Products
04-29-10  05:13PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          PSS
04-29-10  05:22PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          ResKit
04-29-10  07:51PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          Services
04-30-10  08:37AM       &lt;DIR&gt;          Softlib
226 Transfer complete.
ftp&gt; exit
221 Thank you for using Microsoft products.

SomeGuy · September 2015

Well, I guess it was just pining for the fjords. But this should be a reminder that interested individuals should take opportunities to mirror publicly available information, because it can, and ultimately will disappear.

InsanityIsMyEnemy · September 2015

I've always wondered why the Goldeneye 007 Logo was at /Products/Windows/Windowsce/007LOGO.JPG

Microsoft Windows &#91;Version 10.0.10240&#93;
(c) 2015 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\Administrator&gt;ftp ftp.microsoft.com
Connected to ftp.microsoft.akadns.net.
220 Microsoft FTP Service
200 OPTS UTF8 command successful - UTF8 encoding now ON.
User (ftp.microsoft.akadns.net:(none)): anonymous
331 Anonymous access allowed, send identity (e-mail name) as password.
Password:
230-Welcome to FTP.MICROSOFT.COM. Also visit http://www.microsoft.com/downloads.
230 User logged in.
ftp&gt; ls
200 PORT command successful.
125 Data connection already open; Transfer starting.
bussys
deskapps
developr
KBHelp
MISC
MISC1
peropsys
Products
PSS
ResKit
Services
Softlib
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 104 bytes received in 0.03Seconds 3.35Kbytes/sec.
ftp&gt; help
Commands may be abbreviated.  Commands are:

!               delete          literal         prompt          send
?               debug           ls              put             status
append          dir             mdelete         pwd             trace
ascii           disconnect      mdir            quit            type
bell            get             mget            quote           user
binary          glob            mkdir           recv            verbose
bye             hash            mls             remotehelp
cd              help            mput            rename
close           lcd             open            rmdir
ftp&gt; cd Products
250 CWD command successful.
ftp&gt; dir
200 PORT command successful.
125 Data connection already open; Transfer starting.
04-29-10  03:45PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          AMSigs
04-29-10  03:46PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          expedia
04-29-10  03:58PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          frontpage
04-29-10  03:59PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          mediaplayer
04-29-10  03:59PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          msmq
04-29-10  04:05PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          mspress
04-29-10  04:11PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          MsReader
04-29-10  04:11PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          MSRT
04-29-10  04:12PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          Oemtest
04-29-10  04:57PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          outlook98
04-29-10  04:57PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          peropsys
04-29-10  05:10PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          vxtreme
04-29-10  05:11PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          Windows
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 630 bytes received in 0.11Seconds 5.73Kbytes/sec.
ftp&gt; cd Windows
250 CWD command successful.
ftp&gt; dir
200 PORT command successful.
125 Data connection already open; Transfer starting.
04-29-10  05:10PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          Windows95
04-29-10  05:13PM       &lt;DIR&gt;          Windowsce
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 103 bytes received in 0.02Seconds 6.44Kbytes/sec.
ftp&gt; cd Windowsce
250 CWD command successful.
ftp&gt; dir
200 PORT command successful.
125 Data connection already open; Transfer starting.
08-25-99  06:32AM              1504504 007LOGO.JPG
08-25-99  06:41AM             92266198 007_LOGO.EPS
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 108 bytes received in 0.02Seconds 6.75Kbytes/sec.
ftp&gt; get 007LOGO.JPG
200 PORT command successful.
125 Data connection already open; Transfer starting.
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 1504504 bytes received in 16.17Seconds 93.07Kbytes/sec.

dosbox · September 2015

I know some files there can be used to get networking in older OSes in a virtual machine. I don't know what those files are though.

Daniël Oosterhuis · October 2015

InsanityIsMyEnemy wrote:

I've always wondered why the Goldeneye 007 Logo was at /Products/Windows/Windowsce/007LOGO.JPG

I'm going to speculate there were plans for a Sega Dreamcast Goldeneye 007 game that would run on the Windows CE system. Seems like the most logical story.

ssybesma · December 2016

The link given earlier to http://www.mmnt.net/db/0/0/ftp.microsoft.com is actually a dead end and not a true mirror.

Take a look here...this is the real deal:

https://archive.org/download/2002-07-02 ... rosoft.com <-- mini-me download (260.4MB ftp archive from 2002)

https://archive.org/download/ftp.microsoft.com.warc <- semi huge-mongous download (18.2GB web archive from 2014)

https://archive.org/download/ftp.microsoft.com <- massively huge-mongous download (66.1GB ftp archive from 2015)

Basically everything you should potentially ever need, however the newer download is very gargantuan. I'm getting all 3 just because. Probably every Microsoft update known to man is in there between the 3 of them. The value of the older and much smaller 2002 one may be in case some were taken offline later. No doubt it has a lot of old DOS and Windows and Office version updates.

The best use of this:

Next time you run into a link that leads to a file you wanted to download from ftp.microsoft.com, check one of these files you downloaded and see if it's in there. Microsoft gives a lot of its files non-descript names, so you're likely to find the filename first by doing a search on the web for what you need (as you did), then check your download to see and you should have the file already on hand.

The technique of finding FTP sites at archive.org is different than how you look for an ordinary website, and it has to be downloaded as a large file instead of browsing a webpage. There are probably a lot of other FTP sites archived there as well.

02k-guy · December 2016

^^^---I am gradually learning to appreciate the long-sighted vision archive.org has.

I've been there dozens of times, downloading archived pages from the old Microsoft Office 2000 area. Very much a treat to see how the older pages were presented.

About 10 years ago, I turned loose my ftp client on Microsofts site and thought I would be doing a great public service - only to have the HD crash and burn shortly after.

Ah, no good deed goes unpunished!

ibmpc5150 · December 2016

I used to accept ftp of Microsoft to get information of each MS-DOS retail upgrade disk / Windows retail disk or supplemental disks.

Das Ohrwerk · September 2019

Rest in peace,
But he is risen!

Here you can find a mirror of ft.microsoft.com.
Have fun Frank
http://ftpmirror.your.org/pub/misc/ftp.microsoft.com/

This mirror is also saved in WayBackMachine
https://web.archive.org/web/20190922141255/http://ftpmirror.your.org/pub/misc/ftp.microsoft.com/

02k-guy · March 11

Some current links as of March 11, 2024

These are scrollable indexes:

http://ftp.gaby.de/pub/win3x/archive/softlib/

https://ftpmirror.your.org/pub/misc/ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/

http://204.9.55.82/pub/misc/ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/

https://ftp.zx.net.nz/pub/archive/ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/

http://cwcyrix.nsupdate.info/ftp-archives/ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/

https://ftp.xtal.net/pub/archives/ftp-sites/ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/

These last 3 contain 7z, RAR, or ZIPs of some or all of the library:

https://archive.org/details/softlib.7z

https://archive.org/download/ftp.microsoft.com.warc

https://archive.org/download/ftp.microsoft.com

Garcia · March 11

Microsoft isn't what it used to be, hasn't be for a decade or two

02k-guy · March 16

"Microsoft isn't what it used to be, hasn't be for a decade or two"

Well of course it isn't. Neither are you nor me.

I can fully understand an outfit scrubbing 20-30 year old archives. I for one wouldn't want to field questions and complaints on archaic crap.

That's where all the collector forums come in and can do a much better job, because contributors can add context, box and packaging artwork - and quite frankly - be allowed a more critical observation of what the software was compared to others "back in the day."

Garcia · March 17

I meant they used to be lean and mean software, optimized and feature full.
It's been bloatware since XP and now spyware... for a few extra features.

IMO, That's not a normal trajectory of time, that's a huge shift in principles...
MS is like the crap food industry, to sell health services (new hardware)

Western degrowth is a thing... and something Chinese will come to replace MS, I dont doubt it.

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Rest in peace, ftp.microsoft.com

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