End Of Support For XP

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I heard that in three days Windows XP will no longer be supported by Microsoft. Does this mean that other programs will stop supporting XP, too? The reason I'm asking is I have an old partially disabled Toshiba Satellite A105 laptop with Windows XP. I don't want to change, but I do want to get rid of the malware that I aquired before replacing her with my current machine.

What do I do?

There are lots of XP computers out there still in use. Most software developers aren't going to abandon XP under those circumstances.

<sob! wiping away tear> Yes, I know. Parting with XP has been hard. But I'm a cybertwit and need the protection of the cybergods. They have abandoned XP and I must follow. And where did I end up? Windows 8!

You have my sympathy. I bought a little touchscreen laptop with Windows 8.1 for my wife and absolutely loath it. That bloody charm bar thing keeps popping up all the time when its not wanted just because I'm going to click something on the right side of the screen. I had to download a third party start button to make the computer useable. Now it has started hanging when it is shutting down. All in all a huge step backwards. Microsoft's worst operating system ever. It even came with a home/student version of Microsoft Office but even that doesn't work, after entering the licence key (which verifies correctly) I get a bloody obscure error message saying it can't complete the installation of Office because it is already partly installed. Ended up de-installing Office; f*ck it; I'll download libre office or another alternative. Microsoft are going of of their way to drive people away; not just end users but developers of third party applications (like me) too. Microsoft is a company with a suicide wish.

I've read that the philosopher Buckminster Fuller once said that a new idea will come along and grow until it gets too big and unwieldy then it will "become invisible" or get smaller. I think Microsoft is a huge bureaucracy that can not innovate any longer. Microsoft will eventually go away, I think. Apple will also eventually implode, Steve Jobs literally WAS that company, the source of its innovation. Larry Ellison said that we've already seen Apple without Steve Jobs, and it wasn't pretty. He's talking about the time in the 80s when the professional managers/bean counters forced Jobs out sending the company into a graveyard spiral that was only righted when Jobs came back. Now, Jobs is dead. He can't come back. Apple is doomed. I think that eventually open source software like Linux and Android will be the standard. As Microsoft spirals downward Bill Gates will lose his fear grip on PC makers and they'll be more willing to sell Linux boxes. People will prefer Linux, and then the writing will be on the wall for MS.

IMO, you should seek the assistance of a competent computer technician if you really want to keep it XP. Else, replace the hard drive and install Linux.

At least Window must launch a update of Window 8 next week that will turn back the traditional desktop for computers with keyboard and mice.

You're forgetting that Microsoft is more than just desktop versions of Windows--and that these still have 90% of the market share. C# is rapidly winning over followers from the Java crowd--and Windows Server is the main reason why almost nobody uses Novell anymore. The Xbox consoles are another great example. As a whole, Microsoft's income, revenue and total assets are all on the rise. Microsoft will go away the day Google, Facebook, and Intel does.

Steve Jobs is dead, but he left a legacy and a cult of persona that belongs to Apple. While iOS is no longer the most popular smartphone brand, Mac OS X (which itself is a derivative of FreeBSD) has ten times as many users as the most popular Linux distro. While Apple may never be king of the hill again, they'll nevertheless be among the most popular brands in our lifetime.

People already "prefer" Linux on cell phones in the form of smart phones, smart TVs and GPS systems that use a modified version of the Linux kernel. Smartphones used Android long before there were any good versions of Windows available for cell phones. The Linux revolution never happened on desktop computers, simply because there are no advantages whatsoever to switching to Linux there. RPM versions of Linux (Fedora/Red Hat, etc.) fell in popularity when Ubuntu was released; at the present date, both Ubuntu and Debian are declining in favour of Mint as well.

One huge change I've noted over the years. When I used to go into electronic stores, 95% of the hardware was Windows based and 5% Apple based. Nowadays barely half the hardware on sale is Windows based, the other half is largely Android based with a smattering of Apple (iPad, iPhone). Microsoft seems to have really dropped the ball regarding tablet computers.

And what the hell is this Windows RT... the operating system that isn't compatible with any existing software... it is more unpopular than Windows 8.

Last edited by TallyMan on 06 Apr 2014, 10:12 am, edited 1 time in total.

Yes but still, Mint is a still basically a spin on Ubuntu. If Ubuntu implodes, Mint will either go down with it, or adapt to the new reality.

Also, when you consider that Ubuntu itseld is a Debian derivative, and if you look at all of the Debian derivatives collectively, Debian is doing quite well.

I'm well aware of that. If Ubuntu implodes, I think we'll see a merge of Ubuntu and Mint instead. In any case, I think Mint will eventually become the only popular Linux distro for home use--just like Android is the only popular Linux distro for smartphones.

Last edited by Kurgan on 06 Apr 2014, 1:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Both iOS and OS X are FreeBSD based (indirectly, by being based on Darwin), but you can't interchange any software between them either--because the kernels are for two different sets of hardware. This goes for Windows 8 and Windows RT as well; the former is written for x64/x64-86 architecture, the latter is written for ARM architecture. PS4 can't play PS3 games either, despite the fact that both run FreeBSD derived operating systems.

I'd not put anything past Apple.

iJobs....coming in 2015....

Have you seen an early release of that new Johnny Depp movie, by any chance?

Just waiting to read some articles tomorrow of what people are doing to their windows xp computers. If anything major happens other then the end of support for windows xp.

Also, I forgot to mention that the hard drive works fine. The computer gets slow, but it's fine. The battery's completely dead, and the fan needs repairing (or maybe I just need a cooling pad. What is it with Toshiba laptops and heat issues?), and perhaps the RAM needs an upgrade, but it's fine.