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Service Pack 3 release details revealed.

With Windows Vista taking quite a bit of heat from customers and pundits around the web, many people have looked to its elder brother -- Windows XP -- for solace. The nearly seven-year-old operating system still soldiers on for many and is seen as a relatively "lightweight" and better-performing alternative to Windows Vista.

However, with Windows XP showing more than a few gray whiskers in its beard, it's important to at least keep the operating system somewhat relevant in today's world. Service Pack 3 (SP3) promises to give Windows XP a nice caffeine boost to allow it to stay fresh for at least a few more years.

As DailyTech previously reported, SP3 contains nearly 1,100 hotfixes and patches. In addition, SP3 provides new features to the operating system including a new activation process, Network Access Protection Module, Black Hole Router Detection, and Microsoft's Kernel Mode Cryptographics Module.

Microsoft began pushing out betas of SP3 in August 2007 and released a Release Candidate (RC) version to the public in early December. The last public release came earlier this year with a SP3 RC2.

Today, however, Neowin was able to get the release schedule for the Release to Manufacturer (RTM) version of Windows XP SP3. According to Neowin, OEMs, Volume License customers, Windows Connect users and MSDN/TechNet subscribers will have access to SP3 on April 21. The public will have to wait until April 29 to access SP3 via Windows Update and Microsoft's Download Center.

Microsoft will not push SP3 via Automatic Updates until June 10 which should give IT managers enough time to work with the service pack should things go awry.

The news of the SP3 release schedule comes just weeks after Microsoft gave Windows XP a 2+ year extension on life. Microsoft initially set the end-of-sale date for Windows XP for January 31, 2008 but later revised the date to June 30, 2008.

Mounting pressure due to the increasing sales of low-cost computers forced Microsoft to further push the end-of-sale date to June 30, 2010 or one year after the release of the next version of Windows; whichever is later.

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I love how...
By pauldovi on 4/15/2008 10:09:21 AM , Rating: 4
Every Dailytech Article about any OS starts off with a commentary on how much people hate Vista.




RE: I love how...
By yacoub on 4/15/08, Rating: 0
RE: I love how...
By HaZaRd2K6 on 4/15/2008 10:53:18 AM , Rating: 5
quote:
Should they just not report on that fact?


Not fact. Opinion.

You don't like Vista? That's cool, but don't assume everyone "hates" Vista. I love it and I've been using it for the better part of 9 months now, pretty much exclusively. The only problems I've had were my own fault (usually resulting from aggressive overclocking).


RE: I love how...
By V3ctorPT on 4/15/2008 3:14:04 PM , Rating: 1
i use it too... and i love it... no compability issues at all... but it still freakin' LAGS behind XP... and where the hell is my SP1 for vista... it came out ages ago and I still don't have it...


RE: I love how...
By darkpaw on 4/15/2008 5:25:55 PM , Rating: 5
It's not an automatic update yet, they usually give a few months before doing that.

Go to Microsoft's website, search for Vista SP1, download, install, enjoy!

You should be able to install it through manually running Windows Update as well, but personally I like having the download version available.


RE: I love how...
By HaZaRd2K6 on 4/15/2008 8:41:06 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah I could do that, too. I can't install SP1 because of my lousy Creative drivers. Last time I ever use a Creative sound card. I just with my onboard wasn't Realtek.


RE: I love how...
By darkpaw on 4/16/2008 11:15:15 AM , Rating: 2
I feel your pain there, I took out my Audigy 2 Platinum when I rebuilt my system a few weeks ago and tossed it in a box. I really don't miss it at all, the Realtek HD on my board works better then the Audigy was under Vista anyways.

(Oh yah, and Creative can just go away, they're done time to bury em)


RE: I love how...
By Locutus465 on 4/16/2008 11:41:18 AM , Rating: 2
So far my x-fi fatal1ty seems to be working very well in vista. Though I am at the point where if I have issues with the sound card at this point I will switch to onboard and give up on some of the "cool" game audio processing provided by the Fatal1ty's OpenAL support.


RE: I love how...
By eye smite on 4/15/2008 10:23:00 AM , Rating: 1
You know, when I ask Joe Blow on the street, most everytime I hear the same thing, that they don't care for vista. Some people actually like it. I'm indifferent for the most part, although I don't like how much hardware it takes to run the OS as effectively as XP. So, it's more a perception issue at this point than actual problems with the OS and MS can only blame themselves for not putting the fires out as they came up. Also, their unethical use of UAC is something they should have thought over a bit better, with better explanations and an option to disable UAC right on the popup so that Joe Average user didn't have to deal with that nonsense. I understand from a techy position it's a good thing, but the average user does not want to have to deal with a popup everytime they click on a program they've installed just to use it. In the end, MS can only blame themselves for the bad image Vista has on several issues, and they've done very little to correct any of it. Have they actually got any RC's available yet to fix WHS? I haven't seen any. I'll wait a while after sp3 for XP is released and see what they rehashed in it before I download it. If they put vista like bloatware and DRM in sp3, forget it, won't go near it.


RE: I love how...
By HaZaRd2K6 on 4/15/2008 10:56:18 AM , Rating: 4
quote:
Also, their unethical use of UAC is something they should have thought over a bit better


Unethical how? Does it kidnap your children and demand a ransom? Or perhaps it puts a gun to your head before you can open up that clearly virus-infested .exe file from mp3FreeForLife.com?

UAC is designed to annoy users, perhaps. But for the most part, unless you're installing something that's a little out-of-the-mainstream, you'll never see UAC prompts. I turned it off simply because I know what I install, and when I first set up the machine, I was getting tired of having to allow Windows to install so many of my normal applications.


RE: I love how...
By 306maxi on 4/15/2008 7:42:57 PM , Rating: 2
Since when does Joe Blow know **** about the IT world? The vast majority of people merely ask their "tech guru" friend who has probably never even built a PC in his lifetime and he merely spews forth what his ignorant anti-Microsoft friends tell him.

If I hadn't used Vista in various shapes and forms for the last 2 years or so I'd say it was a pretty horrible OS going on what a lot of people say. But I can honestly say hand on heart that at release it was the most polished Windows version I've seen on launch day. XP took two service packs to be decent. Vista was good without SP1 and is even better now.


RE: I love how...
By archcommus on 4/15/2008 6:30:07 PM , Rating: 3
Yes, it is absolutely ridiculous. This article is about XP and SP3, why the HELL would it start off by saying how much everyone hates Vista. I like DT for the news it delivers, but I am starting to see great bias in its writers, and it's starting to get really annoying.

I said basically the same thing as you in the Gartner article, but got rated down hugely for it.


RE: I love how...
By jimbojimbo on 4/16/2008 1:10:10 PM , Rating: 2
The whole point of mentioning that is because that is one of the reasons they extended the support time for XP and thus SP3. If everybody loved XP and went to Vista, Microsoft would've been happy to end XP support way back when and there would never have been a new service pack.

I for one still use XP for the same reason ultra-portables are using XP. My desktop will drag like all hell with Vista so I'm with the leaner XP which worked and still works perfectly.


XP vs. Win2000
By vailr on 4/15/2008 10:17:45 AM , Rating: 2
If Microsoft wanted to be realistic, why don't they continue support for XP, to include a future SP4? Windows2000 had a SP4, so why not WinXP as well? Continue selling XP discs as potential upgrades, for all those still using Win98/ME/2000. An older 500 MHz CPU machine is still adequate for your basic email & web surfing box. Maybe even consider a "planned price reduction schedule", so that a retail WinXP SP3 package would cost only: $39 at Office Depot/Staples/Fry's. Or: bundled with a MS keyboard/mouse, for $59 after $10 MIR.




RE: XP vs. Win2000
By Alphafox78 on 4/15/2008 10:58:02 AM , Rating: 3
WinNT - SP6
Win2K - SP4
WinXP - SP3

Each OS has 1.5 service packs less than the previous version, it is impossible for XP to have SP4!! IMPOSSIBLE IS SAY!! ;)


RE: XP vs. Win2000
By PurpleDiamond on 4/15/2008 11:30:58 AM , Rating: 2
Windows 2000 SP4 was for the pro and server versions, it made more sense to continue making service packs since they were used by multiple products.


RE: XP vs. Win2000
By PICBoy on 4/15/2008 12:03:57 PM , Rating: 1
Usually M$ tends to be more opportunistic than realistics, so I wouldn't keep my hopes up with something as dreamy as this. But hey, we can always dream, right? ;-)


RE: XP vs. Win2000
By ltcommanderdata on 4/15/2008 12:33:20 PM , Rating: 2
I also think that an SP4 would be a good idea, especially now that XP Home's EOL has been extended for an in-determinant amount of time. At the very least, we should get an SP3-Rollup Update in a year or two's time, like Windows 2000 got for SP4.

One question I've had is that with XP Home being extended, has Microsoft extended mainstream support for XP? I believe mainstream support is set to end in 2009, which means after that they won't have no-charge incident and warranty claims, which will be strange if they intend to keep selling XP for a year or 2 after that with no warranty.


RE: XP vs. Win2000
By Master Kenobi (blog) on 4/15/2008 1:17:41 PM , Rating: 2
Yea, no word on the extended mainstream support. Logically one would assume it would also be extended but not necessarily. They may shift the caveat over to the individual vendors that they have to support it because they wanted it. Microsoft is crafty, best check the fine print on the extension.


RE: XP vs. Win2000
By darkpaw on 4/15/2008 5:28:01 PM , Rating: 2
I don't see them extending mainstream support either. The continued sales are specifically OEM for companies selling ultra low cost systems and OEM is always vendor supported.

Since MS will be ending retail sales on schedule as far as I know, I'm pretty sure mainstream support will end on the scheduled date.


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