Support for Win 2K, XP SP2 ends July 2010

ill just keep rockin sp3

Hard to believe but I still encounter companies running web servers on Win2K. I don't know if it is management ignorance or just lack of IT staff to replace it.

I hope XP users do get viruses. They've had ample time to upgrade to Windows Vista. There are no excuses for still using XP. Microsoft should have discontinued support for XP a long time ago.

Push everyone to Windows 7 , it is superior. =3

I hope you're just trolling...

Doesn't win2k still have fewer exploits than XP and Vista?


The motto in a profitable company is, "If it isn't broken, still works, and isn't costing us in overhead, don't change it." I use the word "works" loosely.

I do single-player almost exclusively. Only once in a (long) while I'll do two-player with a friend over my network; never online.

Huh? Srry. I don't know how that got posted; I think my auto-login software did it somehow... Can a mod/admin delete both my comments? Thnx.

Your foolishness lies in viewing 'ample time' to be synonymous with 'ample reasons'.

I am still running XP on an old desktop and Vista Premium on a HP laptop

i still like XP and don't see much of a difference between Vista and XP, in fact my faster HP laptop takes just the smae mount of time to boot up as the 1.2 ghz tualatin Celeron, so it shows how bloated the OS is

i plan on building a new tower and going directly to 7

Why would anyone not want to upgrade to Windows 7 from XP. If you want DirectX 11, Trim for SSDs, better security, cleaner interface, better multi-core support, more stable kernel, XP Virtualization, etc. People swearing dedication remind me of those old timers that won't leave their home when their warned to evacuate for a flood.

Considering the software is now 10 years old, that is not a bad thing. Besides, it's not like XP is going to all of a sudden stop working. It just won't have any support. After 10 years anyways, if someone still needs support for XP, they may want to consider retiring from computers all together.

Glad I got a cheap pre-order Win7, was well worth the money.

Are MS really supposed to continue supporting software they will no longer sell and have superseded (twice) forever...

By all means use XP if you want, but it was never sold as software with a lifetime of free updates.

Really simple, official support is ending, if that support is important to you, you will need to update, if not, don't worry about it and carry on...

This move is squarely aimed at businesses to give them a kick up the butt and get them to update their tired IT infrastructures.

Hopefully it will give an added boost to hardware manufacturers and the IT industry at large, which lets face it we all love...

It probably won't do the global economy too much harm either, (and yes it will directly increase Microsoft's profits too).

How many PEOPLE actually call microsoft for support? End users who buy HPaq/Dells contact Dell. Those who build our own PCs, don't need MS and theres a huge data base of tech info and forum boards with XP info.

But downgrading XP to vista to upgrade to Win7 is stupid. Win7 can be used to install on an XP box, but it'll wipe the drive... which should be done anyway for any major OS change.

Not in every aspect!
For audio and video engineers, XP and Windows 98se where the best tools on the market (with an ASIO driver).

The problems with bigger and heavier OS'es is that you have increased latencies for audio and in video. In order to synchronize audio and video is particular CPU intensive, and the switch from XP to Windows 7 takes several milliseconds tol on latency!

For live synthesizer or musicians, anything beyond 12ms (or about 256 samples at 44,1kHz) is noticeable (much like LCD's with latencies of tens of ms of delay is noticable for experienced gamers).
I'm convinced that unless MS is going to refocus on creating a platform that has a better solution than XP, most audio and video engineers will continue to use XP for perhaps many more years!
And especially audio engineers,since Windows 7 offers no benefit whatsoever over XP on audio field.
Video only if you're using DX11 effects within a clip.

Ow,and also, one word where XP beats windows 7:
netbooks!

It is also a BIG market.
I think MS needs to refocus on getting an ultra light OS, that is fast, compatible, and is Windows; and save the eyecandy,and total compatibility and automatic background activity for it's regular end users.

Bullshit alert.

RIP Windows 2000. It was great knowing you.

There are plenty of reasons like fewer crashes and better security. Things like audio and video should not has direct access to hardware except in cases where Microsoft says it is ok. There will be fewer security issues this way.

Wow... MS is trying to make money by forcing people to get rid of their NINE YEAR OLD OS!!! God forbid!!

Xp64 SP2 is probably included in that factoid (and no sp3 will be released)

Hardware support for 64-bit XP has been discontinued from most major hardware manufacturers.

I will agree with you on that 100% , as for the music and Graphics ... get a solid state drive and more RAM. and get a decent video card like an 8600GT. That'll solve the problems.

I'm sure the majority of users could just run linux instead. Especially if they're still running windows 2000 they probably don't use anything other than internet email and office.

Finally !! i hate fkn XP...
Vista sucked too, but Windows 7 pwns...

I have dumped XP day 1 VISTA was released. And never looked back. There was some frustration with VISTA initially mainly due to lack of Creative drivers. But for Win7 , i haven't encounter any lack of drivers issue so far.

XP beats WIN 7 on netbook? I don't think so. Win 7 just runs fine on my ATOM desktop(which is no faster than most ATOM netbook). Even with Aero on.

ProDigit: And yeah, like there's 100 million musicians out there who cares about 12ms latency?? Most of us don't give a freak. No disrespect, i play guitar and keyboard myself (but i'm not a pro).

You can't satisfy everyone with a single product, but Win7 has a boat load of more pros than cons which only certain people are affected.

The problem with people sulking here i see is some people expecting a Porsche engine to runs smoothly in a mini cooper. If you're running on netbook or old and slow machine. Why do u even bother to upgrade? New OS is not meant for your hardware. You should stick to XP or Win98(if have even older machines).

Go Win7 Go!!!

yeah vista us a bit doggy but it is not as bad as everyone says.

you wait until you try some netgear wireless adaptors on windows 7 and then youll see what i mean.. There is still alot of hardware which require drivers that are not available.

Long live Win 2k.. Loved that OS. XP time has just now come. Windows 7 will soon be on everyones pc.

Saying that i have had issues with 7. Creative really need to remove their finger from their A$$ and produce some drivers which work, its almost like they want to destroy them selves... Any one who wants a XIFI - dont do it- for an extra fps the agro is not worth it. Itunes in windows 7 lost sound - which never happend in Vista.

hmm so there stopping updates for win xp well i think that someone should tell them to stop selling it then or are thay going to sell it untill July 13, 2010 my friend has just got xp because his comp wont run vista (old comp)he will do his nut when he reads this

NO...

Microsoft will no longer support Windows XP SP2. IE: If you friend has a problems with Windows XP with SP1 or SP2, they will not help him when he calls Microsoft directly. If he installs SP3, then they'll be happy to talk to him.

MS will continue to release security patches, which is ALL that they do since around SP3. What else does WinXP need?

Summer 2014, Microsoft will END any additional updates for WinXP.

What does that mean? Well, you can re-install XP, download all the patches. Up until that cut off date. No more "updates". Microsoft may (can) shut down servers for XP, but that would be a bad thing to do... but who knows.

With Windows98 as of now for example. Microsoft says they are not providing anything for Windows98. http://support.microsoft.com/ph/1139

So there is a chance, in 4 years (1~2 years after Windows 8 is released) - that ALL Windows XP support (other than knowledge base) is dead. That should be WRONG - because people will still need to Activate the OS after a re-install on legit systems.

I agree with you there. Running Cubase and Reaper. XP has a small memory footprint allowing me to utilize the remaining memory for my software synths and plugin effects. I tried it on Vista and the latency was way out of control.

You should try DOS, it has a much smaller footprint and uses less CPU resources at the same time. I bet my video card has more RAM then your whole PC. Plz ditch your 486DXII.