What will happen when MS stops supporting Windows XP?

Belly · 22 May 2007 at 14:40

What will happen when MS stops supporting Windows XP?

Supposedly all the windows updates will cease and the system will be open to attack?

Is this what has happened to older operating systems like Windows 98, 2000 etc? Or did all those nasty virus spreaders emigrate to Windows XP?

On some threads members have suggested sticking to XP and not updating to Vista. What do you think are the sensible alternatives to someone considering buying a new (pre-built) computer now or in the near future?

To get a new (pre built) computer now and have XP or Vista installed?

If one opted for XP and wished to upgrade to Vista in the near future, ie after Bill Gates stops supporting XP would one have to buy the full Vista (not OEM), is that so?

To get a new computer with Vista preinstalled and suffer many of the niggles other members seem to have had?

Spend the money down the pub?

BloodWolf · 22 May 2007 at 14:41

I doubt itll be for a few year, i mean it wasnt long ago when they stopped supporting 2000 right?

iCraig · 22 May 2007 at 14:44

XP mainstream support will retire in 2009. However it's extended support will continue all the way to 2014.

Everyone will be on Vista and Vista's successor by then.

How many people do you know who are still in 95/98?

TheVoice · 22 May 2007 at 15:29

Buying a PC with Vista already installed is probably going to be fairly smooth - I'd imagine that the PC manufacturers have done their research and ensured that the drivers and apps they're shipping their systems with are completely stable.

AJUK · 22 May 2007 at 15:35

Your hard drive will self destruct.

I am still using 2k as my sole Windows PC (Mac for everything) and when I use it (rarely) it updates itself and behave very well. XP will need to be supported for a good few years yet.

bledd · 22 May 2007 at 19:59

they won't stop support for a good 4 years at least

service pack 3 is still in the works, and due to public demand, they won't stop supporting it anytime soon

dunker · 22 May 2007 at 23:15

iCraig said:
XP mainstream support will retire in 2009. However it's extended support will continue all the way to 2014.

Everyone will be on Vista and Vista's successor by then.

How many people do you know who are still in 95/98?

i still have an older working pc "amd k2-500" i think it is with a massive 256meg of sdram ooooo and running win98, great little beige email - very light surfing machine

vincent1989 · 22 May 2007 at 23:48

TheVoice said:
Buying a PC with Vista already installed is probably going to be fairly smooth - I'd imagine that the PC manufacturers have done their research and ensured that the drivers and apps they're shipping their systems with are completely stable.

and you'd be wrong, it was reported after vista was released that many of the pc retailers had been told (by microsoft) what they were selling would support vista when infact, a heck of a lot of retail PC's/laptops that are shipped with it are far to feeble to run vista in its promised glory, cant remember where i read it, but it was quite recent

afraser2k · 23 May 2007 at 00:01

I'm only upgrading our student desktops at work with Windows XP during the summer now that we're getting all our machines up to a decent specification to run it. We'll probably be running XP for another five years or so and I'm sure there are a few NT boxes still in the research groups due to expensive experiment equipment (e.g. £3k+ ISA cards still being used

).

The last time we upgraded to Windows 2000 was due to the end of NT support and certain viruses "in the wild" that the department caught due to laptop users. It'll probably be security that is the reason for any move to Vista for us.