if you're a basic PC user thinking about buying XP, don't. It's basically malware. It harangues you with nagging, fake-friendly reminders to obtain a Passport and submit to product activation, and treats you like a child when you try to do anything heretical, like install a device driver of which it disapproves.
You get your first hint of its 'you're an idiot; let Daddy help' posture during the install, where the progress summary informs you that Windows is "analyzing your computer". Yeah, right. Analyze this....
Got a suspicious piece of hardware on that box of yours? You might be out of luck if XP doesn't like the drivers it needs to function. MS has a new scheme of 'preferring' signed drivers which it will distribute, automatically, no less, via its support Web site.
That wouldn't be quite so bad if the digital hand of Daddy wasn't programmed deep within XP to keep us all from harm. In the old days, when you went to install a driver manually, you could search through a list of those you'd installed previously and stuff around until you got one going to your satisfaction. No more.
If you've already installed one that XP 'likes' but then attempt to choose one it 'dislikes', you won't be given the chance to defy the Wisdom of Redmond. You'll get a little message telling you that 'Windows has determined that the driver already loaded better suits your hardware.' And that's it. Gone is the little query allowing you to 'install your choice anyway.' Let Daddy help.
During the installation of any unsigned driver using the 'Wizard' you'll be harangued twice with warnings that it's not signed, and invited to interrupt your work to view Redmond's PR propaganda on why this driver-signing is ever so much in your best interest.
Network support is largely concealed for your safety. Devices, services and protocols which one used to be allowed to install no longer appear anywhere, either in the Control Panel networking system app or in the add/remove system app.
No, you have to install the device first, and let the Wizard decide what support to install. All you can enable on your own is client for MS networks and basic TCP/IP. That's it!
Screw you if your network configuration is a bit eccentric, like mine. Using the Wizard and Control Panel, I can't even find the stuff I need, and what XP thinks I need is wrong, wrong, wrong....
The splash screen looks a lot better, but the desktop is a queer blend of slick graphics and kindergarten safety engineering. "Start Here" a large yellow balloon pointed at the start menu informs you. This goes on until you click the start menu button while the balloon is displayed. Otherwise you get it with each re-boot until you capitulate.
Other balloons emerge from the tray toolbar, urging you to 'take a tour of Windows XP', get yourself a Passport, and enjoy the pleasure of product activation.
Menus and windows default to full-on graphics entertainment mode. They fade in and out, they have shading and shadowing, menus not only fade, they 'slide', and icons have immense palettes, all of which gobbles up immense amounts of system resources for absolutely nothing, and slows your desktop to a crawl. If you're nine years old, you are just going to love it. If you're a few years older, you'll resent the choking paternalistic atmosphere of vapid gee-whiz kiddie entertainment (babysitting), euphemism, and fake-friendly bullying.
Incredibly, MS has failed to include a virus scanner in spite of its recent public humiliations by means of Code Red and Sircam and its sudden interest in security. Outlook is still one of the finest worm and virus propagation mechanisms known to man, though the IE6 package now includes a version of Outlook Express which no longer launches executables. But you still can't force OE or Outlook to display HTML message bodies as plain text, to avoid malicious links, AxtiveX controls, JavaScript and 'Web bugs'. No, the advertising lobby wouldn't like that. The spam industry would object. 'Functionality' (bl***y illiterate word) has got to take precedence over common sense.
Viruses, worms and Trojans make their way onto your machine because of Outlook's default insecurity, or because you are an idiot and you'll download anything off the Web that sounds interesting and launch it, or because your teenage kids take what they think are porn and music files from their 'friends' in IRC and ICQ without question. The solution is a virus scanner and a more secure Outlook -- and we'd have both if MS was actually serious about security, which it obviously isn't.
There's a firewall in XP, which is installed by default whenever you make a new Internet or networking connection. It's also turned full-on by default. This covers the clueless newbies who'll be making their first forays onto the Net from XP.
But if, by some miracle, your device drivers are all up to XP's demanding standards and you successfully carry over an existing connection from a previous version of Windows, the firewall has to be enabled manually. Not the best situation, but clearly better than nothing.
As for the firewall itself, I recently wrote a satirical article 'lauding' its power on the basis of a "Full Stealth" A+ rating I got from Gibson Research's little ShieldsUp toy. I'll be subjecting the firewall to more rigorous testing this week, and I fully expect it to be a disappointment. Just like ShieldsUp.....
Redhat 7.2 (on the other hand) installed perfectly, has unlimited "tweaking" potential, and is free. Granted, you need to actually know something about computers to use it, but we're not dumb. Now i`ve got a BETTER os than XP, with free MS Office standard office software, free Photoshop standard graphics software, free DVD ripper, free games, free... everything.
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