Should I get SP2??

[Arch4ngel]

Well... I hope they aren't incorporating Avalon and Indigo by SP2 ! :p

 

But I'm curious to know what the hell they had modified so that so much application stop working properly. Did they drop a hammer on the head of Windows ? Violence and comptuer doesn't make good things.

[Volte]

Nothing really stops working, it's just if you leave the firewall configured to block all incoming traffic.

[neodammer]

I have experienced conflicting firewall issues in sp2. Solution is of course simple..use one or the other :p

[Derek Stone]

What the heck are you people doing? Throwing the machine down a flight of stairs while SP2 is installing? I've deployed it to over 75 machines now, manually, via Ghost 8.0 and through SMS. Absolutely no problems.

[Denaes]

One thing I remember reading about SP2 was that it turned on a lot of features in XP/SP1 that were off previously.

 

Things like auto update and the XP firewall. Rollback... things that the average user could make use out of because that's what hackers exploit - what they expect to be there. Unfortunately game makers exploit the same things because they expect certain services to be there or not.

 

I think some people on SP2 could really use a trip to www.blackviper.com - pretty much a site devoted to windows processes and what you should kill and why. usefull things like killing printer services if you don't have a printer, windows messenger - what hackers and spamers use to cause an IE window to pop up with an ad in it when you don't even have IE open.

 

It explains what the services do and why you should use them or disable them and for most, what the ramifications are.

 

Personally I gained back about 60mb of RAM and my startup time went from 2 minutes to 25 seconds.

 

SP2 goes through this list and turns a LOT of things that MS feels you should have on... well, on. constantly. even if you don't use it.

 

I might use SP2 when they finish the beta testing on it :)

[ThePentiumGuy]

Woah!!!

Lemme try this and get my start time down below 5-7 seconds :-D!!!!!!!!!

[pelikan]

noticed that too - real slow down on start up. didn't turn on the fire wall (probably noticed ZoneAlarm) - the only real groans of agony seem to come from the malicious

hacker corner.

[Denaes]

I'm really honestly surprised by the number of people having firewall problems and NEEDING XP Firewall.

 

I don't know a single person by name who doesn't have a Router of some sort. Everyone is doing it for sharing internet connections.

 

Then again I only know one person on dial-up and theres something like 40% of all users still using it.

 

I personally use two routers. My Linksys is wired only, but has a much faster connection. I have a wireless Netgear plugged into that which gives our home wireless. I've learned how to manage my routers to still use Apps which firewalls screw up through portforwarding.

 

I honestly don't know if using a router as a firewall is as secure as a software or other hardware though. I don't get viruses and rarely hacked. Mostly screwed over by IE and spyware installing all sorts of crud on my machine.

 

The commotion with XP Firewall is understandable, but catches me off guard.

[Denaes]

XP SP2 seems to have fixed my Alarm Clock into NOT working!

 

I know it's ghetto, but I use Task Manager to play an MP3 file to wake up. At the given time it runs the mp3 through it's associated program (WMP normally).

 

Well now it gives me the error - even if I browse for the file "Cannot find file" after I select it and it's in the path. It's there, but it won't play it.

 

It looks like - as a "security" precaution they will only let you run applications. It's a shame because I only used it for mp3's and .swf (flash files).

 

I guess I could write a .net app to startup and execute an mp3... probobly easier than what I'm doing right now - trying to get Outlook to play an mp3 at a scheduled time...

 

>>edit<<

 

Seems Outlook will only play .wav files...