Windows XP Still No. 2 Operating System

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It will be interesting to see how well Windows 10 does once it hits the market. Especially considering it will be free for Windows 7 - 8.1 users for the first year.

Net Applications gave XP a 16.9 percent share for the month of March, a hefty drop from the 19.1 percent recorded in February. Though XP's grip on the market continues to loosen, it remains the No. 2 most-used operating system based on Net Application's Web stats, beating Windows 8 and 8.1 and their collective share of 14 percent. Windows 8.1 took the third spot with a 10.5 percent share, leaving Windows 8 in fifth place with just 3.5 percent.
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If everyone on 7/8/8.1 goes to 10 during the free period.. I wonder if their app store will blow up since 10 is suppose to be across all platforms..
 
Carouselambra said:
If everyone on 7/8/8.1 goes to 10 during the free period.. I wonder if their app store will blow up since 10 is suppose to be across all platforms..
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"everyone"? Funny. Windows 7 will be the new XP, have no fear. A whole lot of people just got Windows with a new PC and don't have a clue how to install a new version or just don't care because they're technically unsavvy.

As for the "appstore blowing up", it's still ugly Metro UI and feature stripped, sluggish smartphone apps that desktop users are going to continue to ignore. Microsoft themselves can't even be bothered to make any killer Metro apps to motivate desktop users. They didn't bother in win8, they haven't announced anything for win10.

The "apps across all platforms", again, is just Metro apps. Desktop users will not care. For all intents and purposes Win10 = Windows 8.2 since not a whole lot has changed beyond shrinking the start screen and calling it a "start menu".
 
Being on XP is like a total necessity for some corporations that are too cheapo to upgrade software and hardware. For home use though, if you're not completely offline, it's kinda taking a chance to put it on the Internets.
 
This will be interesting any way you slice it. I am predicting doom and gloom for when the first major XP killing malware is released.
 
I just spent the last 14 hours fixing old dells and frankenstein computers still running windows xp. I can't say i feel nostalgic for being forced to work with shit i used when i was in 6th grade.
 
DPI said:
"everyone"? Funny. Windows 7 will be the new XP, have no fear. A whole lot of people just got Windows with a new PC and don't have a clue how to install a new version or just don't care because they're technically unsavvy.

As for the "appstore blowing up", it's still ugly Metro UI and feature stripped, sluggish smartphone apps that desktop users are going to continue to ignore. Microsoft themselves can't even be bothered to make any killer Metro apps to motivate desktop users. They didn't bother in win8, they haven't announced anything for win10.

The "apps across all platforms", again, is just Metro apps. Desktop users will not care. For all intents and purposes Win10 = Windows 8.2 since not a whole lot has changed beyond shrinking the start screen and calling it a "start menu".
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you should know about which you are talking.
Office 2016 is a universal Windows App.
The Project Spartan browser is a universal Windows App.
Are those killer enough for you?
 
Wont be mass support if the operating system can't support old processors. Tons of older systems that don't support virtualization, CMPXCHG16b, nx bit, and all that. XP could run on anything while windows 8-10 can't. 10 requires as much as 8.1 which eliminates a lot of machines. 8.0 x64 could run on a lot of early 64 cpus while 8.1/10 can't. They limited a lot of cpus to just 32bit version which most programs that are good are 64bit already. Gotta remove the limitations. Allow drivers from xp64 to now to be allowed to be installed on 10 and windows 2000 to now 32bit drivers to be installable on 10 then there will be a huge population shift. They need to take older systems into account. Systems which are still good but need the software support which is why some people are holding onto them still. XDDM support should be in windows 10. There should be a windows 10 classic mode. A lot of things they are screwing up. Won't be successful without all this stuff fixed. Reason windows 7 is popular also is because you could install it on a pentium 3 practically. You could install windows 2000/xp drivers on windows 7 while you can't with windows 8/10. 7 supports almost everything while windows 8-10 don't.
 
CreepyUncleGoogle said:
Being on XP is like a total necessity for some corporations that are too cheapo to upgrade software and hardware. For home use though, if you're not completely offline, it's kinda taking a chance to put it on the Internets.
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It's not necessarily that they're cheap; it's that they won't use anything newer, so why start a nightmare of a changeover until necessary? The hospital I work at has software that has been running fine on xp for over 12 years. They don't want or need anything else for patient care software, and don't want employees installing anything anyway (the program, 'sunrise' something or other, actually looks like a dos program adapted to windows). So xp does just fine. As machines are replaced (because they burn out; users aren't allowed to open them, and MIS never maintains them so they gradually accumulate enough dust to kill themselves off with heat), they are installing win7 dell refurbs. Yes, your healthcare is in the hands of archaic machinery in most hospitals. Your only hope is having a nurse that knows when something looks wrong, because your doctor only sees you for 10 minutes a day. They tell us things will be updated, but it never happens.
 
Windows XP is now legacy people. Not that it's worthless, its just not being updated or maintained. In a corporate environment with lots of controls it may not be a huge risk for low risk devices. But I would hope that those companies have a migration plan in place or on the roadmap for this year. But for a home user, Windows XP is a bad ideal too risky unless you're running as a guest account or user account and IE/Flash and JAVA are banned.
 
B-b-b-but Windows 8.1 fixed "all" the problems with Windows 8. How could so many not see that a poorly implemented tablet interface is the best way to run 99%+ of traditional desktop systems?
 
Don't care what new OS these XP people upgrade too, they just to need to move on if the machine is Internet facing. I have no idea what they're doing about all the ATM's?
 
The business reason for getting rid of Windows XP is Internet Explorer 8.
Services leveraged using an Internet Browser are typically restricted to the development of 1 browser.
That is currently Internet Explorer.

WindowsXP no longer gets security updates for its OS, otherwise it gets along just fine.
Again, the real problem from a business perspective is Internet Explorer 8.

Until touch screens are ubiquitous the mouse and keyboard will be required for production.
 
nightfly said:
It's not necessarily that they're cheap; it's that they won't use anything newer, so why start a nightmare of a changeover until necessary? The hospital I work at has software that has been running fine on xp for over 12 years. They don't want or need anything else for patient care software, and don't want employees installing anything anyway (the program, 'sunrise' something or other, actually looks like a dos program adapted to windows). So xp does just fine. As machines are replaced (because they burn out; users aren't allowed to open them, and MIS never maintains them so they gradually accumulate enough dust to kill themselves off with heat), they are installing win7 dell refurbs. Yes, your healthcare is in the hands of archaic machinery in most hospitals. Your only hope is having a nurse that knows when something looks wrong, because your doctor only sees you for 10 minutes a day. They tell us things will be updated, but it never happens.
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My friend just got a contract job updating hospital computers, and the specific way they want it done takes hours per computer. So they had to pay 30+ contract IT guys to upgrade them and annoy the shit out of staff, so they'd rather not do that until its 100% necessary. I wish they would upgrade to more reliable OS and hardware because i had to go in for heart problems and i was plugged into an EKG machine staring at a monitor running windows XP that had a windows update warnings on the screen.
 
Anyone who is still using XP is a complete idiot.

It was never a particularly secure operating system, but with all the vulnerabilities which will never be patched, you are really just asking to become part of a BITNET or have your back accounts and passwords stolen by Russians.

At this point people would be better off without a computer at all.

I really wish Microsoft would be proactive and automatically disable all networking on any operating system not up to date on security patches.
 
Ultima99 said:
Let's just all go back to DOS.
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just use linux, even though there is a gui most the instructions have you running command line to install or uninstall things.
this is funny though, the #2 operating system is windows xp. wait for the windows 8/8.1 lovers, when they show up they will correct this story.
 
Zarathustra[H];1041523853 said:
Anyone who is still using XP is a complete idiot.
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Is it possible to hear this comment with anything else but a valley-girl accent?
 
People still use Windows 8? When windows 8.1 was a free upgrade, must be people with the dodgy copy of Windows lol.
 
Ordeith said:
you should know about which you are talking.
Office 2016 is a universal Windows App.
The Project Spartan browser is a universal Windows App.
Are those killer enough for you?
Click to expand...

I'm not sure you understand what a killer app is. Iterations of existing products aren't necessarily going to vault people over the fascination threshold. Touch based Office intended for Microsoft's nonexistent mobile products will mean fuckall to hundreds of millions of Windows desktop users that do not have touch hardware. A newgen Internet Explorer will mean nothing to businesses since it breaks IE backward compatibility, and will mean nothing to consumers before it has demonstrated it does anything better than Chrome or Firefox.

So they'll need to keep trying I'm afraid - and no amount of changing the name of metro apps - modern apps - windows store apps - universal apps - and whatever it'll be next week, is going to change desktop users minds and get them using sluggish smartphone apps on their desktops that are inferior to Win32 counterparts.
 
Zarathustra[H];1041523853 said:
Anyone who is still using XP is a complete idiot.

It was never a particularly secure operating system, but with all the vulnerabilities which will never be patched, you are really just asking to become part of a BITNET or have your back accounts and passwords stolen by Russians.

At this point people would be better off without a computer at all.

I really wish Microsoft would be proactive and automatically disable all networking on any operating system not up to date on security patches.
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Yep, all though people with XP systems that are connected to $100,000 milling machines and not connected to the internet, should just dump their systems and spend another $100,000+ to buy something newer. otherwise they are idiots.

As for me I guess I should dump my last XP VM even though I'll have to spend over $80,000 replacing old equipment and software because the management software will not run on anything newer than XP, even though I only use the VM a few times a year to make changes.

It's idiots who make generalizations and paint every everyone/thing with the same broad brush.

As for automatically disable all networking on any system not up to date, that would be asking for a class action lawsuit.
 
DPI said:
"everyone"? Funny. Windows 7 will be the new XP, have no fear. A whole lot of people just got Windows with a new PC and don't have a clue how to install a new version or just don't care because they're technically unsavvy.
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That's why it's being offered through windows update. I'm sure there will be plenty of warnings about what the update will do, but it will be hands off for most users.
 
Autopia said:
just use linux, even though there is a gui most the instructions have you running command line to install or uninstall things. this is funny though, the #2 operating system is windows xp. wait for the windows 8/8.1 lovers, when they show up they will correct this story.
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Most people running XP probably don't even know what Linux is, let alone how to install an OS.

As for the rest (mainly business), the reason they are running XP is due to legacy software that won't run under Windows 7 or 8, so Linux or anything else wouldn't work either.

One thing that has kept most systems in my office on Windows 7, is that we have some legacy software that won't run on Windows 8. It's not even supported on Windows 7, but I found a work around to make it run under Windows 7 32 bit, just so I could get rid of the last XP boxes.
 
Ordeith said:
you should know about which you are talking.
Office 2016 is a universal Windows App.
The Project Spartan browser is a universal Windows App.
Are those killer enough for you?
Click to expand...

4-1-15 (not an April Fools joke) a customer called because Outlook 2010 was "just too different and frustrating", he wanted 2003 back. People want what makes them happy. Windows 8.x didn't make a lot of people happy. New versions that are different just for the sake of change aren't universally accepted with open arms. When I worked at a hospital in the IT department Windows 98se was the machine of the day. The majority of those machines were used for purposes other than browsing the internet. Not everyone can be painted with the same brush. 7 is going to be around and popular for a very long time.
 
nightfly said:
It's not necessarily that they're cheap; it's that they won't use anything newer, so why start a nightmare of a changeover until necessary? The hospital I work at has software that has been running fine on xp for over 12 years. They don't want or need anything else for patient care software, and don't want employees installing anything anyway (the program, 'sunrise' something or other, actually looks like a dos program adapted to windows). So xp does just fine. As machines are replaced (because they burn out; users aren't allowed to open them, and MIS never maintains them so they gradually accumulate enough dust to kill themselves off with heat), they are installing win7 dell refurbs. Yes, your healthcare is in the hands of archaic machinery in most hospitals. Your only hope is having a nurse that knows when something looks wrong, because your doctor only sees you for 10 minutes a day. They tell us things will be updated, but it never happens.
Click to expand...

Remind me not to go to your hospital... My patient information should be secured. All of the offices here and hospitals are running Windows 7 Pro/embedded last time I checked...
 
tec805 said:
4-1-15 (not an April Fools joke) a customer called because Outlook 2010 was "just too different and frustrating", he wanted 2003 back. People want what makes them happy. Windows 8.x didn't make a lot of people happy. New versions that are different just for the sake of change aren't universally accepted with open arms. When I worked at a hospital in the IT department Windows 98se was the machine of the day. The majority of those machines were used for purposes other than browsing the internet. Not everyone can be painted with the same brush. 7 is going to be around and popular for a very long time.
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At least until 2020...
 
It seems a bit silly to count Win 8 and 8.1 separately but count all the various versions of XP together. I'd say there was more change installing SP2 on XP than there is upgrading from 8 to 8.1.
 
tec805 said:
4-1-15 (not an April Fools joke) a customer called because Outlook 2010 was "just too different and frustrating", he wanted 2003 back. People want what makes them happy. Windows 8.x didn't make a lot of people happy. New versions that are different just for the sake of change aren't universally accepted with open arms. When I worked at a hospital in the IT department Windows 98se was the machine of the day. The majority of those machines were used for purposes other than browsing the internet. Not everyone can be painted with the same brush. 7 is going to be around and popular for a very long time.
Click to expand...

People want what makes them happy sure. Were you happy with your old televisions? You want it back with the turn dial for channels because pressing a remote is too different and frustrating? Don't need more than 13 channels? Can't output surround sound but you're OK with that? What's that you say, you like it in black and white? It makes you happy? Great! :rolleyes:

Ok obviously a bit of sarcasm and exaggeration in that paragraph but when you're talking about staying with a 12 year old unsupported product, its not all that different.

I'm not suggesting that people don't know what's good for them, nor that they can't be content with something for a lifetime. But there is a reason for progression of products, improvements, new capabilities, and stability. Think about it nobody embraced the motor vehicle and just stuck to their horses and bicycles. XP is a dinosaur at this point. You might as well just leave your computer in a coffeehouse unlocked with all of your data and information sitting plainly in the open if you're going to use it.

12 years to accept change and an upgrade is far more than reasonable. Especially for technology. I wonder how many of you are also so stubburn about remaining on the original iPhone? Oh but it worked and made you so happy! I don't buy it.
 
DPI said:
"everyone"? Funny. Windows 7 will be the new XP, have no fear. A whole lot of people just got Windows with a new PC and don't have a clue how to install a new version or just don't care because they're technically unsavvy.

As for the "appstore blowing up", it's still ugly Metro UI and feature stripped, sluggish smartphone apps that desktop users are going to continue to ignore. Microsoft themselves can't even be bothered to make any killer Metro apps to motivate desktop users. They didn't bother in win8, they haven't announced anything for win10.

The "apps across all platforms", again, is just Metro apps. Desktop users will not care. For all intents and purposes Win10 = Windows 8.2 since not a whole lot has changed beyond shrinking the start screen and calling it a "start menu".
Click to expand...

Hahaha, tell us how you really feel!

But really, it's sad because he's right.
 
So if everyone with win 7/8 move to win 10, how will that change xp's number 2 status? Seems to me then win 10 will be number 1 and xp 2. or win 7/8/10 will be so diluted that xp will be on top again.

Ive also noticed in the south chicagoland and NW Indiana area alot of health care facilities still use win xp.
 
Autopia said:
just use linux, even though there is a gui most the instructions have you running command line to install or uninstall things.
this is funny though, the #2 operating system is windows xp. wait for the windows 8/8.1 lovers, when they show up they will correct this story.
Click to expand...

I love Windows 8.1. I know a shit ton of people that HATE it. I mean they refuse to buy a new computer because of it. They are waiting for 10.

Linux is a great OS. I learned how to use it via command line before I used X (connected to servers via SSH and did everything that way). I prefer Windows, but for nearly everything I do on a PC (save many games), I can do it on Linux. I have a Linux laptop (and several VM's), but everything else is Windows. I just prefer Windows. If you're on XP, you're either not smart or into it to upgrade (many older people use what works, and they know it and they don't want to learn a whole new thing... life is too short for them). For the younger people on XP. When their PC dies, they'll buy a new one with a new OS. For geeks/parents that don't care/others that just want something that works and does what they want and don't mind the learning curve (little, once set up) - Linux is great.
 
GotNoRice said:
It seems a bit silly to count Win 8 and 8.1 separately but count all the various versions of XP together. I'd say there was more change installing SP2 on XP than there is upgrading from 8 to 8.1.
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Hardware requirements increased that pretty much caused systems without certain cpu instructions to be not supported. Dumb move by microsoft. Amd sockets 939/940 and back are not supported for 64 bit in 8.1 but in 8.0 they are supported. Forced to use 32 bit version of 8.1. You can't even upgrade to the 32 bit version from the 64 bit without reinstalling everything. Includes some intel core 2 quads and pentium 4 cpus and back also. Motherboards with older on board video cards are not supported on 8 and higher also. Xddm support was removed so that removed a lot of legacy support for older video card drivers before vista. Legacy support for windows 8, 8.1, and 10 is very poor. A lot of these systems are very capable for what they are used for still. Bad decisions mostly.
 
My workplace is starting to upgrade to 7. I'm still on XP but a few of my coworkers are on 7 now. It's a pretty involved process, the first upgrade took about a week. Now I think most of the quirks are ironed out though. I suspect 7 will become the new XP as companies do finally manage to upgrade.
 
kreno said:
Remind me not to go to your hospital... My patient information should be secured. All of the offices here and hospitals are running Windows 7 Pro/embedded last time I checked...
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Funny, because when I think Windows, I think "Secured". :D

Are you aware of how many vulnerabilities there are at any given time for even the current Windows OS, in the wild or not? The last time I updated 7 from scratch there were hundreds of security updates and it took hours.

Then there's the matter of none of these companies actually giving a rat's ass about securing your information, as that would cost them lost profits.
 
nutzo said:
Yep, all though people with XP systems that are connected to $100,000 milling machines and not connected to the internet, should just dump their systems and spend another $100,000+ to buy something newer. otherwise they are idiots.

As for me I guess I should dump my last XP VM even though I'll have to spend over $80,000 replacing old equipment and software because the management software will not run on anything newer than XP, even though I only use the VM a few times a year to make changes.

It's idiots who make generalizations and paint every everyone/thing with the same broad brush.

As for automatically disable all networking on any system not up to date, that would be asking for a class action lawsuit.
Click to expand...

Exactly correct.
Problems with forum topics its that sometimes all its not seen from every perspective.
-WindowsXP is used heavily in business automation.
--It is often tied to very expensive software and proprietary internal hardware that will not run on anything else.
-If the WindowsXP machine cannot be isolated in some way from the internet then install Firefox or Chrome...
most I have seen have already done this anyway because IE8 no longer runs properly regardless if the machine is infected with viri or malware or not.
-As for personal. Not so sure that recommending Linux to those who cannot move away from WindowsXP is a good idea. Win7 is safe and cheap enough for those without touch screens.
-Operational procedures protect data better than any OS or hardware can.
--Security is about people and what they do... not what their things are.
 
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