PANIC! WINDOWS XP 3 DAYS LEFT!

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HELP! I'm panic-stricken! I have a fixed income, and in no way can afford an upgrade at this time! I need to know if I'm safe continuing to use XP to use the Internet...especially YouTube and Facebook! It's April 5th and support ends on the 8th! I'M TERRIFIED! I use Firefox as my browser...somebody HELP...I need reassurance that I will be ok for a while! HELP HELP!

Can you switch to using one of the free Linux operating systems? They are kept up to date and generally have less problems with viruses / malware. If in doubt you could try one of versions that you can boot off CD such as Puppy Linux to see how you like it and that wouldn't even touch your XP system in any way. It has Firefox included with it.

If you're going with Linux, then you should go for Mint. It runs better than Ubuntu on legacy hardware, it has a nice interface, and it's more stable than Ubuntu. Be sure to install and activate AppArmor and not SELinux; SELinux doesn't like the Cinnamon environment. It's easy to install if you make a boot USB stick. It also comes with a compatibility layer that allows you to run basic Windows software, .NET, and most indie games.

I need to stick with XP because of my software...I'm NOT ready for change! WILL I BE OK WITH XP FOR A WHILE?

Depends. You won't get viruses, trojans, or worms unless you open suspicious attachments in mails or visit warez/torrent sites, but you won't get any updates either now that XP is unsupported.

1. You should be ok with XP. End of support just means that Microsoft will no longer provide telephone or email support. However, they will still supply support via their knowledge base, as well as continue to provide stability and security updates.

2. As for Linux, there are some software packages, some of them commercial products, that will allow you to run windows applications under Linux. They do this, with the exception of 1 package, by creating a virtual machine, or VM. You create a container file that acts like a hard drive, then you start the VM and install the operating system and your application. Take a look at Oracle's (yech) Virtual Box, as well as QEMU under Linux, as they are free applications. If you want a commercial product ( and they're not cheap, either), look at VMWare and Parallels.

3. The one exception to a VM I mentioned earlier is WinE. WinE will allow you to run Windows Applications without installing Windows. The only problem with WinE is you still need to keep your windows install disk handy, since whatever applications you use under windows have dome dll dependenceis that are installed when you install windows. That, and if I recall correctly, WinE hasn't been updated in quite a while.

Are you sure? I was under the impression that such updates would no longer be provided, but I've not really paid detailed attention to the news.

^This! Was my understanding as well. However I do have an XP machine and another still on Win 2000. No worries as long as you have something like avast on the machine. I think the hype is all overblown. The only thing that you will suffer from is no updates if there are bugs. But after this long, probably 99.99% of the bugs have been solved at any rate. XP is pretty stable and aside from malware you should be fine. My 2 cents....

You can always keep Window XP and put Linux on a partition, (AKA,a part of your hard drive would be on Linux while the other part still remain on XP.)
so you would have Linux as a way to keep things safe and still got to work on Window XP.

You'll be fine for the time being. Just make sure you have decent and up-to-date antivirus software, because the lack of security updates will make your computer more vulnerable to malware over time.

While I don't use it that often, I have older versions of Windows running under Parallels 9 on my Mac Mini. I have had no problems with getting windows Update to keep any security flaws and fixes to supplementary Microsoft products, like .net, up to date.

All this means there will be no active support for XP from Microsoft, no more updates and the like.

XP should be still good to go for a long time yet, there's still a large number of XP users, even in business. As long as your software still supports the OS, especially any Anti-Virus then it should be fine for a while.

Saying that, the longer an OS goes without an update it does get vulnerable if there's still an active community to exploit flaws. It could even be fine for years but eventually an upgrade I think would be inevitable.

Same goes for me... I have an 9 year and 13 year XP OS systems and ancient hardware, ah well XP you've been great. Time to save up for a beast of a machine... Cheaper as time goes by so there's that too...

This.

End of support just means you'll get no more support from MS.

Most of the security updates aren't really needed unless you are worried about someone exploiting a security flaw in the OS to hack your system.

In reality, that's a threat newer OS platforms must cope with. Hackers aren't that interested in any system running old code. The good stuff is on systems kept up to date.

Your bigger problem is when the software you want to use requires more processing ability than your PC has. Every time I've had to build/buy a new PC it was always a hardware issue, not anything to do with the OS.

I'm in a similar siuation to the OP, and MS says MS Security Essentials will continue to be updated even on XP machines for another year.

Anyone care to comment on keeping such a machine running without a new OS, at least for the next few months?

Also, one reason I kept XP was due to a very old version of Photoshop that I just plain LOVE (Adobe Photo Deluxe). After XP it only works on 7 Pro's XP mode (maybe), and not on 8 at all, as far as I know.

Is there an easy way I could convert to a Linux version that would allow the program to still work? My knowledge of computers is...strange. Some things I do well with, others it's "babe in the woods" time.

ShirtPuppet, I would suggest that you run Windows XP inside a virtual machine on a Linux Mint system, but do any web browsing (or other "unsafe" activities) in the host (Linux) machine, not the virtual (XP) one. That way you should be reasonably safe from any new exploits against XP.

VirtualBox is a free program that will allow you to do this. There may even be a way to "virtualise" your existing XP installation, so you don't have to re-install, but I haven't looked into it too closely.

Having said that, end of support is no reason to panic. Yes, you are at higher risk of getting hacked, but it's still not that high, especially if you're fairly careful about which sites you visit and don't open email attachments that promise nude photos of celebrities. I can assure you that you won't be the only person still running XP, even 3 years from now!

I no longer use Windows on any of my computers. It's all Linux for me. My gaming is done on consoles, so I can buy the cheap hardware and be just fine.