I have obsolete ABIT board, Athlon 64 single core, Ran XP Media center several years on SATA. No Problem
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I have obsolete ABIT board, Athlon 64 single core, Ran XP Media center several years on SATA. No Problem
Once you get SP 1 it works fine with SATA. You must really hate trying to install all those service packs LOL
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The programs you've mentioned are a very good choice. You already have multiple levels of defenses, more than most people have.
Your eventual problems come with the inability to upgrade future security issues, many of which you're already covered by your defenses. Future editions of Microsoft products such as Office will be impossible, however if you already have an older version, it's all you need.
Bottom line: you'll have to switch AV protection to Kaspersky's or another program of choice. If security is a BIG future concern, consider connecting through a "VPN" service or software.
Basically, if you are comfortable with what you have, etc. don't change it. A better alternative would be to upgrade to the Windows 7 edition. Easy to do, the disk costs less since it's an "upgrade" version. And Win 7 will continue to be supported for a long time to come.
Hope the above helps!
I agree with everything you said except the last - upgrading to Windows 7 isn't always possible if you've got a hardware configuration that was built for XP. It's not just memory - it's the processor, the graphics card and possibly the printer/scanner drivers.
I would suggest Robb T. get a version of Linux to dual boot and start getting used to it, and/or get an imaged drive of current XP configuration. When either the system or the drive goes (and eventually one or the other will) he'll need an imaged drive if he wants or needs to reinstall and keep running XP, both for Windows and peripherals drivers.
Win 7 is NOT XP. It is not 100% compatible. I know, I have two programs that will not run on Vista either. I even have an old Win 98 program I use that cannot migrate to XP. So, I have OEM disks of Win 98 and XP. I suggest you get hold of an OEM disk. XP Home or Pro, whatever you use now. The image your drive is an excellent idea. Most of these suggestions are excellent. I will turn off Windows Update after April, 2014. If I choose to continue to use my XP machines on the 'net, I will have the latest, working antivirus and then leave it alone.
The other odd ball thing I did was get hold of some older 160 gb Hard drives. Plenty big for most storage and XP seems to really like my 80 and 160gb drives. I also run a 250gb. I do not know how large you can go with XP, but that would be easy to find out and small drives are cheap. I also picked up an older XP laptop for $75 that runs great. Just needs a little more RAM.
Thanks everyone! I'll be making a list.
I have 3 x 500gig SATA drives on XP box I built several years ago.(1.5 terabytes)
The 160 gig EIDE drive holding OS failed so I recently replaced it with WD 'Black' as that has the longest warranty (5yrs)
The drives and videocard can fit into a newer machine, I just don't want to.
Linux UBUNTU works real well with the setup as is and addresses 4gb of memory
I have two completely independent boot drives. One is an SSD running Win 7 Home.
The other is 1TB partitioned as 67GB bootable with XP and 865GB for data. Regardless of whether I boot from the Win 7 drive or the XP partition, they both store their data on the data partition.
Normally I have the system set with the SSD as the boot drive. If I want to run XP (rare nowadays), I reboot the machine and go into setup and change the boot drive, Save & Exit, and it boots in XP until I reverse the process.
If you're going to set up a system like this, just be sure to physically disconnect one drive when you are doing a major update such as installing a Service Pack. Normal updates aren't a problem, but if you do something like upgrade from Win 7 to Win 8 or Win 8 to Win 8.1 with both drives hooked up, Windows will probably realize there are two boot drives and automatically install a boot selector. It's a lot less hassle to not have that.
IMO, comodo free firewall is fit for the job. I recommend you always allow alerts for each application to connect to the internet for the first time. It is annoying at first, but you'll guarantee that, via internet, that no program gets unnecessary access to potentially do something harmful.
I also agree with suggestion to upgrade to windows 7. You could dual-boot for a while until you are confortable enough to make switch.
Answering within your parameters...(You should upgrade to Win 7, but..)
First, continue to use 3rd party Internet security programs that will support XP. Also, move to a browser that will continue to upgrade it's security and faults. (Firefox, Opera are but 2 examples.) At one time or another though they will also be unable to support XP. At that time you may want to move over to Linux, (Mint is one I can recommend and it has a familiar interface to Windows XP-7.)
It has features that might be able use some legacy Windows software with the use of Wine, and even DOS programs with Dosbox. It is free. You can download it, and install it in your existing machine in parallel with Windows XP in dual boot mode. That way you can look and play with it and still go back to XP with a reboot.
I also recommend Ubuntu linux, you can install it along side Windows for free. It will still be developed which may help with new disability hardware & software, and will run efficiently and fast on your older pc. It's what I will do with my laptop when MS ends XP support.
Not sure if that's the exact title but it's going to be supported until at least 2017
I downloaded it a couple of weeks ago and installed next to VISTA on laptop and XP on desktop
It can be used as 'point and press' but there is still something of a learning curve. If your using Android it should be easy enough to switch over (I've never used a MAC/Iphone so can't comment)
The various free office programs are also mainly compatible with Windows although I've heard Office 2010 has features that are not supported? (I don't use the features in Office 97 so it isn't a big deal for me)
%TRUST ME%....... i have the 'WINDOWS & 64 BIT OS' AND ITS PURE JUNK!
ILL BE MORE THAN HAPPY TO TRADE YOU "WIN 7 64 BIT for your XP 64 BIT"...........HOWZAT???
FYI, MICRO-crap-SOFT HAS NOT MADE A DECENT "OS" SINCE THEY STUFFED VISTA DOWN OUR NECKS
& YES, IM LOOKING VERY HARD @ THE "LINUX OBUNTU OS"!!
Showing through.
I'm sure you have a CAPS, CAPSLOCK or a SHIFT key.
Your computer is probably at least 10 years old, and may not even run a newer Windows operating system, except at a crawl.
Since there will no longer be security updates you will have to be careful out on the internet. Consider doing the following:
1) Make sure your firewall is on.
2) Make sure you are running a good antivirus. AVG Free is a good choice and better than MSE. Running more than one anti-virus at the same time is not recommended. MBAM (Free) is OK to keep as a second opinion since it only runs to scan.
3) This next suggestion is a bit of a pain but if you are running your computer on an Administrator Account, consider setting up a Limited or User Account which makes it harder for malware to run on your system. Some programs or operations won't work or update in a limited account but if you right click on the program icon or shortcut and select Run As Administrator and sign in under your Administrator password you can run, update, or install a program. You may have to move or copy your documents because the limited account won't let you access My Documents under the Administrator Account.
4) Switch your browser to Firefox, Opera, or Chrome if you are still using IE8 which run much faster.
A more drastic option is to install Linux, but you will need Linux programs to replace your Windows programs. You can try out Linux by installing it on a flash drive and booting your computer from the flash drive to see how you like it. It won't affect your Windows installation. There are articles on CNET, PC World or PC Mag that tell you how to do this if you are interested.
You can install Linux alongside Windows and boot into either operating system at startup via a menu.
When Microsoft discontinues updates I am going to reinstall XP and set up another partition(s) to install Linux, probably Xubuntu on my old PC. If your RAM is very low you can substitute Puppy Linux - Precise Puppy version.
These suggestions may work, but realize you are taking a chance running a system that is no longer being patched. Especially if you do online banking or shopping (where you input your credit card info). But a hacker may even get enough information for identity theft if an Email account password is compromised.
I would seriously recommend the Linux option. It's your safest solution for your present hardware, and will probably run better than Windows XP.
I was one of large number of people who got hit by rogue malware on the NYTimes.com website via a third-party ad. Several thousand people lost their system from this.This was sometime around 2007. I don't have time to find the particular one, which the Times admitted in a small blurb a few days later that caused some systems to crash, but if you do a search for it you'll find a similar thing happened in 2009 and here's the CNET article: http://news.cnet.com/8301-1009_3-10351460-83.htmlI had a fully up-to-date version of Kaspersky AV. It did not prevent this.
My point is this - you can get hit by malware on a totally reputable site. NYTimes.com no longer runs third-party advertising but a lot of respectable sites still do. And even those that don't can get hijacked.
If you think you're safe by "being careful on the internet" you are dead wrong. You are not safe, even if you are careful, and even if you run an expensive security software. You need multiple layers of protection and some of them have to be in your browser.
The only thing that saved me that day from a complete system loss was using Ad-Block Plus and Flashblock on Firefox. I was not able to close the browser even by Task Manager so I hit the power button. I do not know the mechanism of this particular piece of malware but I'm guessing it was Flash-based.
Trust no one.
You've gotten a lot out of your computer. Soon your hardware will fail. What's the point in making your software secure when the underlying hardware finally gives out? It's time to make another investment, my friend. It's time to ask yourself the same question you asked yourself years ago: what should I buy now that will last me ten years?
I, too, am disabled and retired. I am running W8 on a machine that I built for myself, piece by piece, over several years.
You will be repeating this question in a few years; inevitably, there will be a point when you no longer will find XP a viable OS.
Save your pennies and upgrade your hardware, incrementally if you have to. In the mean time, while XP is still useable, there are some really valuable articles here whose advice is well-worth following.
Time waits for no man...
Well, 'everyone' is 'trying' to be green and re-cycle but throwing away perfectly usable components isn't even close to 'green'
It isn't just the replacement direct cost but also the indirect cost and pollution created from production to transport
If you don't care about any of this stuf, go ahead and buy new every year or so while driving around in a Prius pretending to 'save the planet'
The problem for you my friend is not so much as when MS stops supporting it but when hardware vendors along with software vendors do as well. You could quite happilly upgrade to a newer setup of hardware like The Intel Z77 chipset system and be supported by graphics drivers and so forth with the i3 processor, I have the problem of having a similar issue which is that Vista is not supported by the Z77 and Intel as to regards of Integrated graphics. Soon Vista will be no longer supported completely. I keep Vista because it has Windows mail which is much the same as Outlook Express. It is easier to securely setup and mantain as well as backup important E-Mails. The bugbears of Windows 7 and 8 is the fact that they rely on you being online and not just popping into get your Email when you want it. This leaves more security loopholes and you E-Mail is now more online than in your inbox on your PC. What you will find is that your free programs slowly disappearing off the market for XP and being replaced by paid ones as long as there is a demand. As far as the third world goes these days there isn't one as far as the press believe it because all the poor countries are getting modernised and the poor few have to live in the unknown fourth world.
For now your only chance would not be to think about keeping the XP secure but looking for some way to afford to upgrade your system to a new one before all support disappears. Windows 7 or 8 is perhaps the only alternative. Security in older systems is always going to be an issue and can only be addressed by larger institutions. It is commercialism at its worst.
Dear Forum Members
I, like most of you, will continue to run my WinXP Pro SP3 after April 2014 because it is not that simple to just upgrade to W7 as others of you think.
I have lots of old applications, utilities and hardware that work perfectly now that will probably not work under W7 plus, I refuse to loose my existing facilities and go running around replacing my working IT kit, for me that is just a waste of time and scares resources.
My PC is just not for my benefit but for the good my family as well and, as such, I do not play games, mess about with frivolous and potentially dangerous stuff. I have to consider what would be the best options that will not impact on my family, not what is best for MS, the IT shops and the legion of IT consultants.
After April 2014, when I am on the Internet, I intend to run my browsers (Opera, Firefox and IE
in a sandbox, one such as Sandboxie. Simply put, any malware or any other rubbish caught in Sandboxie's sandbox when browsing is automatically deleted when the browser is closed.
That, forum members, is how I intend to keep my PC free of any nonsense that may attach itself by coming through my browsers or via a download.
Please note, I also intend to keep all my protective software updated as long as they still support WinXP.
UK Bob
Robb,
You can't do too much more. The Windows XP house is so old, it is basically being labled as condemed. Use at your own riak, because other software will be dropping support, just like they all did to Windows 98. Windows 98 came out 3 years before XP. XP is the longest supported Microsoft OS of all time. If yoi do any financial work, I highly recommend upgrading.
You already have a firewall, so that cuts out a significant number of threats against your computer.
You need to use a web browser that will continue to receive security updates. I imagine Firefox will continue to be available for Windows XP at least for the next year or so, with security updates for a while. DO NOT use an outdated browser.
Also, be careful what you download on the internet. Before downloading any programs, try and find out as many opinions from "regular people"; if a program is legit it should have a community of users willing to recommend it. Don't do what my father does, which is "Hmm, I need a program to play FLVs; I'll just do a Google search and download whatever the first result is". That's about the quickest way to get malware.
You have another option, actually: Instead of using Windows XP which is very nearly abandonware; and instead of buying a new computer or buying a new operating system; you could switch over to a Linux-based desktop system like Lubuntu.
Lubuntu 12.04 is free, easy-to-use (of course) and should run fine on a modest Windows XP-era computer. It'll be updated for another 18 months, but the next major long-term version of Lubuntu is being released in April next year and will be supported for three years. Because it's Linux, there's no need for anti-virus software or even a firewall in most situations. Because it's still under active development and is supported by a reputable company, you will continue to get security updates. When the security updates run out, you can just update to a newer version - or update earlier than that, your choice.
I strongly recommend moving away from Windows XP and toward Lubuntu.
Make sure all current service packs are installed. It would be nice if MS came out with a final wrapup Service Pack 4 of the last of the hot fixes after SP3 but don't hold your breath.
Jr Foley Jr,
Yes, I agree.
I'm gonna create a new Windows XP install cd with all the servicepacks.
So when I need to make a fresh install I'm covered.
If I find trouble still I'll switch to Linux,
The basic system is smaller than XP with all software included.
You've got your Office software, Firefox, Email, torrent software.
If you need more software, you can install it for free.
It is safer, faster, free of cost and doesn't stop support.
As for Robb, being disabled... I hope he finds a solution, maybe someone can help him.
Fred
As an FYI, I have a hand-me-down Dell Optiplex GX620 running XP that I use as a "second system" that I dedicate to chat and some light surfing. It's a year newer than yours and has 1 GB of memory. And I find it fairly frustrating how often it gets horribly bogged down. I alsohave an inexpensive laptop that I bought new last year as a third system, that, while not lightning fast, is far, far better behaved than my Dell.
So, I'm going to echo the others, here. I just searched on your computer, and CNet did a review of it in 2004. Assuming you paid the $600 it cost at the time, that hardware has only cost you about $70/year. You got your money's worth out of it.
The good news is that you can buy a brand new system that has far more memory and runs much faster for under $400, these days. That one would only have to last about 6 years to hit the $70/year level of your current machine. That seems like a reasonable target.
You could even get a laptop for that kind of price That's one of those things that you don't think you need. But, for those occasions, once every couple of years, it sure is nice to be able to take your system with you. And, while you have it at home you can hook it up to your current monitor, keyboard and mouse. You may even find that having a second screen is far more useful than you expected. My mom has found that she really likes it.
You do still have a system that works. So, you don't have to get it right this minute. But it really will be one of those things that will make a night-and-day difference in using your computer. I would strongly recommend starting to save up for it. And, plan on having to do the same thing for the one after that. It really is the nature of using these machines.
Drake Christensen