[geeks] Windows XP, and activation

[Charles Shannon Hendrix]

Mon, 06 Nov 2006 @ 15:39 -0500, Nadine said:

> > ...this doesn't do anything at all.  It never downloads anything.
> 
> Odd.  I have not had a problem with it.

I suppose it could be no updates.

Just FYI:

My own XP CD is very old, and I didn't like the idea of having to find
all the patches and service packs, especially since Microsoft has yet to
release a much needed SP3. 

I installed XP once years ago, hated it, and went back to 2000.

But with games and other things asking for XP a lot, and some idiot
installers even refusing to work on 2000, I thought I'd move.

I found a customized unattended DVD install of Windows XP, SP1, SP2, and
all patches up through September 2006, including about 1500 third party
drivers.

Put the DVD in, pick a partition, and just walk away. In less than an
hour you have a fully updated XP install, no activation, and hands off.
You can use a utility program to update the license number with your
real license if you want, or just use the volume license it comes with.

It saves one hell of a lot of time.

It's possible there have been no updates since September, but somehow I
doubt it.

Aside:

The slipstream I used specifically removes a couple of the bigger
performance killers for WinXP, so this isn't that much of a step down in
speed as it was years ago.  Plus, I think there have been improvements
to XP in some areas.

However, there are enough problems that it feels like a downgrade
overall.

Parts of the UI really are better now (and I mean with the cartoon stuff
turned off), but at the same time some of it is worse. For example, who
is the idiot that decided XP should default to scaling bitmapped icons
in your folder views? That's really ugly.

Multiple logins are not bad, and it does seem it is faster in some
areas, though it is clearly slower in others too.

It does boot faster, including loading my utilities and default
applications, so that's nice.

It seems to me they should have just merged 2000 and XP, and given 2000
users a free upgrade.

They are both the same OS anyway.

-- 
shannon "AT" widomaker.com -- ["The object of war is not to die for your
country but to make the other bastard die for his." -- General George S.
Patton]