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122 Comments
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -23/+109"Extend the life of older PCs with "Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs" or you can switch to Linux."
Please don't put taglines like that. The article doesn't mention Linux at all, and if we want your worthless two-bit opinion, we'll ***** ask for it. - PotatoSalad, on 10/12/2007, -6/+67@MyNightwish: Because my attention span only lasts up to "Microsoft releases new OS for old PCs" and I need someone else to read it for me.
- ardnut, on 10/12/2007, -7/+62Although..
The average Windows user wouldn't have a ***** clue what to do with Windows when it does something they don't expect. - hiney, on 10/12/2007, -13/+64Switch to Linux for a whole different set of headaches!
- tooslickvan, on 10/12/2007, -9/+54Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs is essentially a thin client os and is only available for maintenance customers.
- quokkapox, on 10/12/2007, -7/+32Sorry, Microsoft. I installed Ubuntu onto an old Win98SE PC with 96MB and a 20GB hard drive, for a relative, and it runs beautifully. It's not a thin client, it's a full-featured PC with a modern web browser and modern office software. Bummer, it doesn't do that Aero stuff. Whatever. It doesn't catch spyware and viruses either.
- flashpointbob, on 10/12/2007, -7/+29I'm not going to use Legacy, I am going to use Linux instead so I can run that Japanese robot-jiggy
- Grimdotdotdot, on 10/12/2007, -1/+22Because the PC is too old?
- bwmiller72, on 10/12/2007, -2/+22Even as an often Linux user, I will agree with you. Running/switching to Linux still remains nontrivial. Still, Linux is free.
- doolittle, on 10/12/2007, -1/+20I am not sure what this product can be useful for, except for helpdesk / admins who are afraid of non-microsoft products...
I recall one time where we were having an on-site training class and the day before the project mgr decided "all the students should have pc's" so I scrambled to the warehouse to get a dozen old discarded "non-working" 333mhz PCs and borrowed monitors from the data center rack cabinets to get them working.
I had to give the domain admin a list of student names for access to the citrix server, booted all the PCs up with knoppix and wrote a single command on the whiteboard:
"rdesktop -a16 -f -u {username} {citrix-server-host-name}"
and we had an instant dozen clients, none of which had a hard drive - only a 266 or 333 mhz cpu, 128m or better ram, and a working cdrom to boot knoppix.
Not sure if this product could have helped in the timeframe this situation needed. - JakeMcMahon, on 10/12/2007, -5/+22Hear that? That's the sound of Bill Gates crying.
- quokkapox, on 10/12/2007, -4/+21Yes, and guess what--the printer works, the scanner works, the sound works, and the mp3 collection is playable with easily downloadable free software.
There's an armada of aging Windows XP machines out there which will also transition well to free software when microsoft windows support is discontinued. - Grimdotdotdot, on 10/12/2007, -13/+29Totally.
The average windows user wouldn't have a ***** clue what to do with Linux when it does something they don't expect. - Grimdotdotdot, on 10/12/2007, -4/+19"That is how Digg works."
No it ***** isn't! No matter what some people seem to think, a story is meant to be submitted on ONCE.
That's why we can bury duplicate stories. That's why Digg wants you to search before you submit. That's why Digg warns you when you submit a story that's already been submitted.
How is that not obvious? - smellinator, on 10/12/2007, -5/+20In soviet Russia, slashdot wanders into you.
There. Now I have completed the illusion that you have wandered into slashdot. - hiney, on 10/12/2007, -14/+27I'll digg to that!
- IClavdivs, on 10/12/2007, -4/+17Almost everything is available for download.
- JakeMcMahon, on 10/12/2007, -1/+12Link: http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/programs/sa/benefits/fundamentals.mspx
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+12"Called Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs, the software is offered only to customers on Microsoft's Software Assurance licensing and maintenance program."
It's not free to the common user. - paulmdx, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10"why not install win98? or NT?"
Because both are unsupported from a security standpoint. The point of Windows Fundamentals is it offers similar security to XP without the XP bloat. - yaosio, on 10/12/2007, -5/+15Did I accidently wander into slashdot?
- aractor, on 10/12/2007, -3/+13Did you even read the article?
- JakeMcMahon, on 10/12/2007, -9/+18Hell hath no fury than a nerd scorned.
- sbin, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12@hiney
I totally agree. A few years back I was a fervent Linux evangelist. Even though I still run linux, love it and boast about it to all my geek friends (who understand what I'm talking about), I've realized you are right. So these days I'm more careful about telling people to actually use linux.
Being a developper I understand that Windows has some fundamental design flaws. Or maybe at times it just uses weaker designs. However the end user does not care about the subtle difference between the problems of these OSs.
Average Joe does not understand the difference between for example Windows95 basically emulating multi tasking versus Linux not having some GUI tool to configure something you may use everyday.
(Please note: these problems I use as examples only since they are almost completely extinct now but they make obvious examples.
One thing you learn while developping is:
Users don't care that you have an amazing framework that allows you to make something nice in the future.
They will think your system is inferior if it lacks a feature. Even though the competeing system may have the feature implemented in the crappiest of ways, the end user truth is the competition has it and you don't. - rfunches, on 10/12/2007, -0/+9Imagine a beowulf cluster of Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs.
*head explodes* - Grimdotdotdot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8What, 'Matamoris'?
- jbklego, on 10/12/2007, -9/+17@ardnut: touche
- arnar, on 10/12/2007, -9/+17beware of alex2's link, it uses some nsfw language that might get caught by content filters.
- dipswitch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Back then, the "desktop" was a lot different.
Try running fvwm and rxvt on your 386, not Gnome or KDE. - dipswitch, on 10/12/2007, -0/+7Actually, there's still a _LOT_ of win98 in use at small businesses. You'd be suprised. NT4 too, although I've seen more Samba boxes put in a corner doing it's thing. Usually with a very outdated version on an even more outdated distro. But it works just fine.
- Eldoo77, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8Umm.. Maybe its not free to the common user because the common user doesn't have an Enterprise-Class applications server in their basement to connect their legacy PCs!
- nickiank, on 10/12/2007, -1/+8I don't get it. If they're limiting it to customers under MSA, it seems to imply that they're only concerned about preserving marketshare in larger small businesses and smaller to mid-sized enterprises, but are these places really facing a crisis? Somehow I doubt many of them are still running Win98. Just what is their line of reasoning here? What are they trying to accomplish?
- johlin, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8I find it amusing to see that as soon as you even mention Linux in a Windows-related digg you get dugg down in a few minutes. Pretending it doesn't exist isn't a solution you see.
- Sc00t, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Because they're end of lifed and you can't get security updates for them anymore.
- MasteRR, on 10/12/2007, -0/+6The problem is you are trying to use distros made for modern desktop computers. There is no way in hell you care going to get Fedora Core or the like to run on an old system like that. Now Damn Small or a net install of Debian is much more likely to work well on the same system. You have to pick the right distro for the hardware.
- bwmiller72, on 10/12/2007, -9/+15@jrbrewin
How is Linux not free? You can download it, install it, use it and even modify it and the apps that run on it for free?
If you mean you have to pay people to maintain it and maybe retrain users, well then, yeah it's not completely cost free. But then again, Windows admins don't work for free either. Please explain what you mean exactly. - MrUnderbridge, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6"Windows 2K with 96MB of RAM? .....Good luck, sir."
I've done it, no luck needed. Runs quite well. Remember, when Win2K came out, 96MB RAM would have made a rather nice machine. I've even installed 2K on a PII with 32 MB RAM, and while it took a while to boot and there was hesitation when pushing the start button, it was still usable. - rarkai, on 10/12/2007, -2/+7>>wot a load of rubish. why not install win98? or NT
Becuase they just dropped support for those and this article is about a version of windows for people that have windows 98 or legacy NT installed? Please learn to read. - angryredplanet, on 10/12/2007, -6/+11@ PJBonoVox
GreyDakotan offered a suggestion, not an opinion. He didn't submit "I think/feel/believe windows [favorite opinion here] but linux [favorite opinion here]". "Windows Fundamentals for Legacy PCs" has some serious drawbacks and submitter offered a viable alternative wrapped up neatly in a one-liner.
You sound awfully pissed over a single sentence. May I suggest that you don't read more than is presented and then come out swinging based on your own interpretation based on assumption? - khyberkitsune, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4@stoanhart
6 HOURS? Quess you've never heard of quick-formatting over an already-existing file system? 250 GB NTFS Quick Format took only 5 minutes, install took an hour, driver install after that for maximum usability took another 30 minutes. After that, games and other programs are non-trivial for installing. You must be doing something wrong. - stoanhart, on 10/12/2007, -4/+8"Linux is only free if your time is worthless."
Time spent setting reformatting a windows PC/reinstalling everything for a friend recently: 6+ hours
Time spent replacing Windows with Linux on my lapttop: 45 minutes (including EVERYTHING - all codecs, all apps I need, all drivers, EVERYTHING) - pred8tr, on 10/12/2007, -9/+13Wow... I'm prolly gonna get flamed for this one. The common belief that Linux is the way to go for old, tired, antiquated hardware is just plain wrong for the average user, and even for the technically adept user! I spent quite some time looking into this very thing and I tested a series of platforms from 386sx30's (with very limited RAM, SIMM's are big $$ now a days) up to around P60's from my stash.... Bottom line is I found NO full featured linux distro that one could install and run with a reasonable amount of effort and have it function reasonably on significantly antiquated HW. These same machines I installed W98 on and it performed well. Now, I am not bashing linux at all. Some of my best computers run linux. ;) I'm simply saying that the common belief that "Linux rocks on really old HW" is WRONG! You want to build an appliance with some really old HW? You don't need to run a GUI on it? You need it to be secure? Sure, you can install the latest Fedora or whatever and have on it and run fine. You need a GUI? You got some legacy software you can't get to run right under W2K, WXP, WME(uggh) etc? You don't need it to be exposed to the internet and / or are able to keep it in a bubble? I'm going W9x for that.
Just my .02$ - Langford, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5From the title, I expected something else. You know, like Windows 3.99 or something like that for old computers? They have had thin-client software available for quite a while, so this one isn't really a big deal. I suppose it's convenient if it comes with a little OS of it's own, but it's not nearly as nifty as the title seemed to indicate.
- EdLesMann, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4"Try running fvwm and rxvt on your 386, not Gnome or KDE."
I cant agree more. One summer a bunch of friends crashed my place for about a week. I didnt want them mucking up my primary system when they checked their email and what not, so I setup the only spare box I had, a Pentium 166 with 64mb ram, a 3 gig harddrive, and a 4mb vid card. At the time I was in love with SuSE and KDE. OMG that sucked! it was completly unusable!
I then installed Debian with fvwm and it made it a very fast and nice machine, espicially since it was mainly for internet browsing!
Its all about the right tool for the job. You dont use a hammer on a screw, you dont install (insert OS here...SuSE with KDE / Vista/ whatever) on a (insert really old hardware here...p 166 ). - MrUnderbridge, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4Seriously, if you're expecting all the bells and whistles, yeah, you'll be disappointed. For one, you won't find one with a disk big enough. Try throwing Damn Small Linux on one, that's 50MB. Or try Small Linux, oddly enough even smaller than that. It's been installed on a 386 with 2MB RAM according to the site. But no, Gnome 2.6 won't work.
- cadrass, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3That sounded so promising until I read the article.
If MS released a paired down version of Windows for 10 bucks or so they would make a lot of people happy. - jellygraph, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4It's funny... when I think about it, I honestly don't know why it took me so long to switch from Windows to Linux. I guess it took Windows slowing to the pace of a snail on my _new_ laptop and sometimes sitting and grinding on the harddrive for 5-10 minutes just because I Alt-Tabbed to another application... and I had upgraded to 512 mb ram.
I guess I knew so little about Linux that I was worried to make a big switch.
And when I did, it took me about 1-2 weeks to get used to it and have since wondered what took me so long. I mean, there's so much about Linux that works _better_ for me than on Windows. *****, using Windows now for me is a nightmare, because I keep wanting to hold down the ALT key and drag windows around, only to realize... oh yeah, I'm in Windows. I have to drag the title bar... so inconvenient...
Windows is just another operating system. There's nothing uber-elite and difficult about using Linux. Even my mother-in-law got used to it right away. - MrUnderbridge, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7Not available for download. RTFA.
- cody50, on 10/12/2007, -3/+6Personally, I welcome our new windows legacy overlords.
- shizakapayou, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3You're right, there's plenty of Windows 98 boxes still in the world. Our Human Resources and Food Services departments both operate on old programs that won't run on anything past 98SE. Thankfully, they're finally upgrading HR next year, but that still leaves FS, which isn't upgrading anytime soon.
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