All Things Microsoft > Microsoft Software
An XP review
Centurian:
I am sure I will get alot of flames for this.
The other day my wife bought herself a copy of XP. As luck would have it her computer crashed and burned before she got home with XP. So I told her to get online and find herself a computer she liked and order it. She ordered a Dell which comes with XP included.
Now here we are with an extra copy of XP. I know I could have just taken it back and gotten my money back (it was only a hundred bucks) but I decided to check it out and see just exactly what I felt was wrong with XP. That way I would have a more objective view when I bitch about it. Up to this point I had only worked on other peoples comps who have it. So I installed XP side by side with Redhat on my Athlon 1600XP.
It installed without any problems at all. I am still using Grub as my boot manager. Xp made no attempts to change the boot manager or overwrite the mbr.
The install took about 15 minutes to complete but remember I do have a very fast computer which was built specifically to be fully compatible with linux. BTW I upgraded it from W98 rather than going with a fresh install.
Now I expected to have problems by the ton because of everything I have heard about XP and what I have seen.
To the contrary once installed it did a very nice job of setting up everything. Everything works great but that was not good enough for me I wanted to immediately see what was going on. So I headed into My Computer to find out what the real errors/issues were.
I found them.
In the system properties area.
System Restore was on by default.
Automatic Updates was on by default.
Remote Assistance was on by default.
I turned all of them off and instantly XP ran even faster.
Now MSN messenger may be a bit confusing because it auto loads on startup and when you open MSN messenger it tries to set you up with a passport account. Just hit cancel and the MSN messenger screen will pop up. Go into options and turn off load on startup. Now it will not load on startup and you dont have to worry about it. Once you turned MSN Messenger off it no longer bugs you to get a .NET account.
I have been running it now for a couple days and it has not once tried to access the internet without my permission.
Overall I find XP very fast and efficient. I really don't like the idea of it requiring registry within 30 days but other than that I can't find any issues with XP once I turned off the above mentioned problems.
There are some programs that must be upgraded in order for them to work with XP which is a pain in the ass but it isn't a real issue.
No don't get me wrong I still love my Redhat but I like using XP and I see no security issues with it.
RudeCat7:
Phoning home is meant to be "discreet".
I've spent $100...on linux books....cuz once I figure out all this Linux shit, I'm set for life...
If I were you, I would've at least tried to get some of my money back, because if M$ says, "fuck the EULA pay us!" then you can say "Fuck the EULA, I'm downloading the 'Devil's Own'!"
So if M$ can breach the EULA by not upholding it's rebate agreement, then the public can do whatever they want!
So if you HAVE to use winderz, screw m$ at the same time!!!!!!!
And don't give it an internet connection. :D
Zombie9920:
quote:Originally posted by Centurian:
I am sure I will get alot of flames for this.
The other day my wife bought herself a copy of XP. As luck would have it her computer crashed and burned before she got home with XP. So I told her to get online and find herself a computer she liked and order it. She ordered a Dell which comes with XP included.
Now here we are with an extra copy of XP. I know I could have just taken it back and gotten my money back (it was only a hundred bucks) but I decided to check it out and see just exactly what I felt was wrong with XP. That way I would have a more objective view when I bitch about it. Up to this point I had only worked on other peoples comps who have it. So I installed XP side by side with Redhat on my Athlon 1600XP.
It installed without any problems at all. I am still using Grub as my boot manager. Xp made no attempts to change the boot manager or overwrite the mbr.
The install took about 15 minutes to complete but remember I do have a very fast computer which was built specifically to be fully compatible with linux. BTW I upgraded it from W98 rather than going with a fresh install.
Now I expected to have problems by the ton because of everything I have heard about XP and what I have seen.
To the contrary once installed it did a very nice job of setting up everything. Everything works great but that was not good enough for me I wanted to immediately see what was going on. So I headed into My Computer to find out what the real errors/issues were.
I found them.
In the system properties area.
System Restore was on by default.
Automatic Updates was on by default.
Remote Assistance was on by default.
I turned all of them off and instantly XP ran even faster.
Now MSN messenger may be a bit confusing because it auto loads on startup and when you open MSN messenger it tries to set you up with a passport account. Just hit cancel and the MSN messenger screen will pop up. Go into options and turn off load on startup. Now it will not load on startup and you dont have to worry about it. Once you turned MSN Messenger off it no longer bugs you to get a .NET account.
I have been running it now for a couple days and it has not once tried to access the internet without my permission.
Overall I find XP very fast and efficient. I really don't like the idea of it requiring registry within 30 days but other than that I can't find any issues with XP once I turned off the above mentioned problems.
There are some programs that must be upgraded in order for them to work with XP which is a pain in the ass but it isn't a real issue.
No don't get me wrong I still love my Redhat but I like using XP and I see no security issues with it.
--- End quote ---
XP isn't really a bad OS at all. The reason people here flame it is because they have never used it, don't know how to disable the troublesome stuff((Messenger, Sys Restore, Auto Update and Remote Assistance isn't really troublesome for some people, I prefer to leave the stuff disabled though ;P) or they feel that it is bad and threatening because it is more widely used and more widely supported by software developers than any alternative OS.
It is really a big step up from previous home incarnations of Windows(the Win9x series) and it is a step up from the old workhorse OS(Windowes 2000).
I'm sure that you can agree that Windows XP is alot easier to use than Linux(for the consumer side) and it has *ALOT* more available apps and games for it. Chances are you won't see many crashes at all with XP either. If an app crashes it will not cause your OS to BSOD(therefore it won't take out your OS and cause a reboot), XP will just close out the offending app and you will still be up and running. In the worst case scenerio where an app freezes just press CTRL+ALT+DEL and use the management console to close out a frozen app. The Linux is more stable argument is pretty much BS if you know how to properly run your XP box.
PS. XP doesn't spy on you the way the uninformed idiots of this forum try to say it does. I've kept close tabs on my firewall logs, etc. and I've never causght XP trying to phone home without my permission.
[ October 17, 2002: Message edited by: Zombie9920 ]
Zombie9920:
BTW, if you want to gain some more hard drive space go to your Power Mangement properties and disable Hibernation...you will regain as much hard drive space as you have Ram. I like Hibernation myself so I leave it enabled. If you actually use Hibernation hold down the Left Shift key in the shutdown menu and Standby will be replaced with Hibernate(until you let go of Shift).
RudeCat7:
quote: PS. XP doesn't spy on you the way the uninformed idiots of this forum try to say it does. I've kept close tabs on my firewall logs, etc. and I've never causght XP trying to phone home without my permission.
--- End quote ---
When you update your SpyPack 1 you have no choice! :D
I have Xpee (at work, for yuks) stuck in a little itty bitty 1.5gig partition, and no wan/lan connection. No phone home detected either! :D
But look out! I have discovered Qcad, which uses the industry standard *.dxf format, this could prove to be interesting.....Maybe I can live my life without Autocad. Hmmmmmmm....... :cool:
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