php/mysql - webhosts use old versions?

[toString]

Sorry for the seemingly noob thread....
I was reading into php5 and it's OO uses. Which I like the look of, coming from java taught schooling..
This is all very good for me as I have XAMP installed:
MySQL 5.0.24a
PHP 5.1.6

However, I notice that hosts (well mine and a couple of other well known ones) are using things like:

PHP version 4.4.2
MySQL version 4.1.21-standard

Why are they 'behind', so to speak?

 

[toString]

Of course if your hosting provider is who I think it is (from memory) then they can arrange to migrate you to a PHP5 server free of charge.

PHP4 is simply safer/simpler for the masses at present due to possible incompatabilities.

Looks like you're right, I checked their forum

However I'm a bit weary of doing such a thing, as my main site is basically just a (slightly old) vB installation with mods, and if there are incompatibilities, I'm bound to find them

Just seems like a shame though, all this work into php, and it's not really moving forward where it counts.

 

[toString]

One other thing I forgot to bring up, it seems MySQL 5 supports stored procedures?
I was under the impression this was one of the reasons why many people preferred SQL Server?