Save Windows XP petition
 

Pls sign the "Save Windows XP petition" to force MS to keep supporting XP.

Right now they are planning on stopping all support this summer, trying to shove Vista down everyone's throats. Over 150,000 signatures in a week, so lets keep it going.

http://weblog.infoworld.com/save-xp/

Do petitions work? Can Bill Gates monopoly be halted? Mac anyone? I will sign it..I tried Vista last year and it was awful...so i went back to XP.

Who knows but it takes a minute of our time and is worth a try.

Joe, FWIW, MS is not going to stop "supporting" XP, they are going to stop "selling" XP. As a matter of fact, Service Pack 3 is about to be released and among its roll-up of patches and hotfixes is a reported 10% performance boost. Normal support will last at least through 2009, and extended support will be around through 2014.

The recent Info World articles were particularly damning and from bits and pieces I read and hear, MS is quietly working behind the scenes to move to the the next desktop version without killing sales. One of the features of Server 2008 that should be ported to this next version is the ability to load only the components that you want, not everything offered. In other words something that should have been done a long time ago: Smaller tighter code with a reduced footprint.

Actually, XP is going to be available to be purchased for a few more years. I use a computer guy who owns his own shop and is an authorized Microsoft vendor. He just sold me a new Lenovo Thinkpad (I love it) with XP Professional. According to him, Microsoft doesn't publicise it, but authorized vendors can sell XP for a couple more years. If you go to Best Buy or Dell or someone with an exclusive contract with Microsoft you probably don't have that choice.

The day XP stops being supported is the day I take my Windows PC at home and either:

(1) reformat it with Linux or
(2) chuck it in the dumpster and go buy a Mac

At that point, I'll take my chances and deal with the short-term frustration of trying to get my applications (including AutoCAD, FormZ, etc.) to all work under those different platforms rather than be "put over a barrel" by Micro$oft. F*ck 'em. If that's how they're going to play, I'm going elsewhere. Their loss, not mine.

The only thing that's been stopping me from doing it to date is that it's VERY difficult to get AutoCAD to work under Linux. . . I'm pretty sure some folks have been able to do it by configuring WINE (Wine Is Not an Emulator - haha) properly, which is very involved, techno-geeky, and takes a long time to get right. I just haven't had the time to do it. But if M$ is going to pull this crap, I'll make the time and research it and figure it out, and I won't spend a dime into their products in building my business - I'll either do it all on Macs or Linux boxes. Or both.

Most people will just roll over and go to Vista because all they're ultimately capable of doing is "talking tough" and not acting in a meaningful way to effect change - something that Gates & Company have exploited since about 1983 - with great success.

Not this guy.

anybody got a copy of windows 98 or 2000 they want to unload? i want to run it on the mac so i can talk to the power commander in my bike.

Thanks, Joe.

If Vista is all that's available next time I buy a computer, it will be a Mac.

I know I have some original 2000 Pro, Server and Advanced Server CDs sitting around somewhere. I'll see if I can find an English version for you (unless you happen to speak/read Spanish or German).

I've been using it since just after release on my office machine, home machine, and laptop, and don't really see the big deal.

There are a few things that it does that are handy, I don't have any stability issues unless they are related to a bad app, and even get along fine with UAC still enabled.

People said the same thing about XP constantly for the first two years it was out.

Problems with Dells/HPs and such I have just as often on their XP builds because of all the crap software that is on there, so I typcially just flatten and reinstall them anyway.

Right on Mystic. There are some things I don't like about Vista. But all in all, it works fine. The learning curve is a pain in the ass but when is that not the case?:cool:

MS just announced last week they extended support on XP till 2011 or something

and so what if they stop supporting it, the product is very mature
and it's driver support that determines if you can keep using an OS with new hardware...you'll find that more problematic in 1-2 years from now then whether or not MS supports it


Try buying an A brand consumer PC with all bells and whistles, and try to find it delivered in XP today... not going to happen...
luckely , must drivers can be found generic... 2 years from now... doubt it

After being a die-hard windows user for years my work bought me a Mac. I have been converted. No need to sign the petition. Wish you luck.

enough with all the gossip and rumours
cold hard facts

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/?LN=en-us&x=23&y=7&p1=3223
General Availability Date 12/31/2001
Mainstream Support Retired 4/14/2009
Extended Support Retired 4/8/2014
Service Pack Retired 8/30/2005

I've been using Vista at work for two years now running Office, Visual Studio Suite, Macromedia Suite and various other intensive apps. No issues really, cept all the RAM is sucks but you can ge 4gb of ram for $100 nowdays.

If you have trouble, check out all your drivers and update them. Something one should do with all your major components anyways, including your BIOS.

It's not Vista that makes me angry, it's IE7 and Flash that grinds my gears.

Funny you should mention that. We have been testing Windows XP Service Pack 3 Release Candidate 2 Refresh and have been having numerous problems with it. We use all Dell at the desktop and none of our machines are more that 18 months old. We are experiencing BSOD on about 20% of the test machines.

BSOD, mostly due from video driver issues?

It seems to be just like the problems we had with earlier versions of SP3 causing GDI errors. They were fixed in the last RC but now seem to have resurfaced.

Petition away, I was working for Qwest Communications when NT 4 went end of life. Our company and a few other large companies like Boeing and BASF entered into joint talks with Microsoft to not cutoff support. But, guess what? They did anyway. Charged us a million or so for a hot fix and we quickly migrated.

Done. I have to agree with the sentiment that ms doesn't give a dip. Their plan appears to be "the only game in town" so you have no choice.

Using W2KPro on all the workstations here. Practically bulletproof, though having flash and active scripting disabled helps reliability immensely.

Vista is definitely not in our future, preparing to migrate to linux. Watch for vista going to a subscription model where you have the privilege of paying ms an annual tribute to keep your (they say it's their) computer running.

So far I've got no issues with Vista on my MIL's laptop. I'm starting to think the Vista bashing is perhaps a bit over done...? It's a resource hog for sure but after uninstalling all the usual crap software and dropping in Firefox, OpenOffice, and AVG I seriously can't complain.

I'm typing this on a very old G4 Powermac running OS-X 10.3. So far it's a nice OS but in reality is no more impressive than my nicely setup XP machine or the previously mentioned Vista laptop. Sure it's a slug but the hardware is ancient so I cut slack for that.

Only way MS will change is for a major efflux of paying customers. In this case, a large chunk of folks will have to switch to Linux or Mac. May just happen.

Got copies of both. In the Middle East now and not back home for another 4-5 weeks so PM or email me then. These are from a company I used to work for who went out of business so no problem sharing them.

Why would I need to sign the petition? Vista has been running fine on my computer for over a year now.

MS stopped supporting my version of XP pro over a year ago when they started their authenticity certification checks.
Seems the version I bought (on e-bay) was either a copy or previously licensed. Now MS won't support it at all, no upgrades, no service packs, nothing. It still works just fine.
I un-installed the authenticity check but can't install any upgrades unless that authenticity check thing is installed and running.

They offered to sell me a new copy for some unreasonably high price, I said no thank you I already bought and paid for a copy.
Besides, all they were going to do was to sell me a license, not a copy.
Now if someone wanted to sell something that would bypass that authenticity check .... ;) j/k

There are ways to beat it. Google is your friend. That's all I'm sayin' about it.

Tanks ;)

Vista just crashed from all the details you posted

Thats why I have XP on my machines!

MS sends out an OS that has not been de-bugged and lets the public and businesses de-bug it for them.

So does just about everyone else, SLES 10 was a mess, VIO for AIX was torture.

I see threads with Mac guys trying to get pc apps to run on the Mac but I wonder why I don't see threads with pc guys trying to get mac apps to run on pc's?

can't think of any mac only application that i would so desperately need...

I won't ever need to worry about the next, greatest OS (shyte) from MS. When I'm no longer happy with our WinXP PC's here at home, they will be donated and I'll replace them with the latest offerings from Apple.

Here is a quote that I agree with 100% in regards to Vista:

It's about time Microsoft made it hard for software companies to create buggy software on its OS. It shouldn't reintroduce the security holes that have made it easy for my industry to get away with selling defective products. (Yes, I'm a software developer.)
It's not Microsoft's problem that software companies don't work harder to make their products better. Instead of bashing Microsoft for trying to fix the problems with its product, get on the phone to your application suppliers and demand that they fix their own software.
It's amusing that Apple was applauded for switching from the incredibly insecure and buggy Mac OS 6/7 to the much more reliable and secure Unix-based Mac OS X. Yet when Microsoft tries to make it's product more reliable and secure, it's bashed.
-- Jay Rodgers

From Information Week Dec. 17/24, 2007

Even a lot of MS stuff didn't run without triggering UAC when Vista was first released (such as admin tools, etc.) but they've been updating them over time to where they are all signed properly, etc. and work flawlessly. The other vendors just need to do the same.

Same goes for hardware vendors. Apples don't have driver issues because they have closed hardware which makes it much more expensive. A video card for a Mac is 1.5-2x the price as compared to the PC version of the exact same card typically.

It's not MS's problem that hardware vendors are writing bad drivers, and that's 90+% of all crashes on Vista as well as XP (the first 12-18 months of XP were *horrid* for drivers, but most people don't recall that.)

I would have been perfectly fine with it if they had even broken twice as many apps as they did in the name of progress and run a Virtual PC with XP to run the old stuff. Just like OS X did with running OS 9 apps virtualized.

You get the gold star Stijn. I doesn't matter how good Macs are, pc's have the apps! That is why Macs have a 6% market share!

Am I the only one who read this wrong and thought that someone else was trying to save a Win XP partition?

I have a 2000 machine still running. Will it stop if it finds out it's no longer supported?