Hard Light Productions Forums

Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: est1895 on October 27, 2012, 05:29:29 pm

Title: Windows 7..
Post by: est1895 on October 27, 2012, 05:29:29 pm
Microsoft says that there will be no SP2 for Windows 7.  They also state that people who still have XP will have no support by 2014.  I've been wanting to get Windows 7 with the SP2, but I guess that's only a fantasy.  How safe is Windows 7 with SP1?  I've hear so many times of the holes that hackers find in it, compared to XP.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: General Battuta on October 27, 2012, 05:37:46 pm
Microsoft says that there will be no SP2 for Windows 7.  They also state that people who still have XP will have no support by 2014.  I've been wanting to get Windows 7 with the SP2, but I guess that's only a fantasy.  How safe is Windows 7 with SP1?  I've hear so many times of the holes that hackers find in it, compared to XP.

Wasn't XP support already dropped?

e: oh that was 'mainstream support', 'extended support' continues until 2014

Anyway, uh, I can't speak from a position of technical expertise, but Windows 7 is a fantastic OS and I've had no problems with it. It doesn't seem to need another Service Pack (from, again, my pretty limited perspective)

e: I'm actually a little puzzled by what you've heard, my impression has always been that Windows 7 is much more secure than the comparatively hole-riddled XP.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Klaustrophobia on October 27, 2012, 05:50:26 pm
the difference in security, if there is one, isn't enough to make it a deciding factor.  and if you're not going for 7, your other option is the mobile-for-desktop 8.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Ghostavo on October 27, 2012, 06:58:59 pm
How safe is Windows 7 with SP1?  I've hear so many times of the holes that hackers find in it, compared to XP.

 :lol:

Wait, you are not serious are you?
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Nuke on October 27, 2012, 07:25:30 pm
i dont know why people who use an os on a home computer are concerned with security. unless you make yourself a target, visit hacker boards, or have something others want, i find the whole need for security to be rather pointless aside from basic firewall/anti virus/router/os tweaks (like disable remote administration services or secondary logon) that i do. way i see it im not running the cia here. if i get hacked the worse thing that can happen is i loose data, and backups render that point moot. also a service pack wont make all the holes go away. there will always be holes, ones the os devs make and ones you make with poorly informed security tweaks. my network is probibly full of holes.

that said any windows os (with the exception of windows 9x based oses and earlier) can be locked down tighter than a homophobe's asshole at a gay pride event if you know what youre doing. most of the security holes in windows in the past have been because of default configuration issues. it was too weak or the average user didnt configure things properly or listened to the advice his hacker "friend" who intentionally gave bad advice so as to use your rig's unused resources to host a torrent tracker. and then theres the whole social engineering aspects of hacking too. windows 7 is pretty secure by default.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: jr2 on October 27, 2012, 08:57:26 pm
Windows Vista and 7 also made a move towards being more easy to update, so service packs were less necessary, as regular updates did the trick just fine. (Or at least so I've heard.)  I definitely recommend 7 over XP; or maybe 8 after someone figures out how to make the Win 7 Start Menu on by default again.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Klaustrophobia on October 27, 2012, 09:16:52 pm
and kill the app store. and give me my goddamn desktop back.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: jr2 on October 27, 2012, 09:34:23 pm
Yeah, and put the desktop back.  Don't worry, I'm sure someone will find a way to change it back.  Just a matter of time...
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: General Battuta on October 27, 2012, 10:04:06 pm
and kill the app store. and give me my goddamn desktop back.

From The_E's impressions it sounds like the desktop works like it always has
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Klaustrophobia on October 27, 2012, 10:18:25 pm
yeah, maybe.  i haven't looked at it past some of the review threads here.  one of those made it sound like the touchscreen tiles thing is the default screen, and the desktop was like a program you run. 

but informed critiques are way less fun than blind rage.  and even if the new OS is perfect, i'm not paying for it when mine works just fine, so i have little motivation to research it.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: General Battuta on October 27, 2012, 10:23:07 pm
I'm not getting anywhere near Windows 8 until Gabe tells me I can
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Klaustrophobia on October 27, 2012, 10:48:00 pm
who is gabe?
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: SpardaSon21 on October 27, 2012, 11:19:15 pm
Gabe Newell, most likely.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: General Battuta on October 27, 2012, 11:20:47 pm
who is gabe?

He's a sex machine
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Mongoose on October 28, 2012, 12:45:30 am
Maybe if we compliment Gabe's appearance, that'll counteract the HL3 delay caused every time someone makes a fat joke about him.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Fury on October 28, 2012, 01:15:14 am
1) Windows XP is 11 years old obsolete piece of junk. Get rid of it if you plan to play new games on PC platform.
2) Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8 are significantly more secure than Windows XP. Anyone who claims otherwise is an idiot.
3) In the first place Service Packs were nothing but individual updates put together into one big package. Most of which were already released through Windows Update or Microsoft Update. MS no longer releasing SP's is irrelevant to most people.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Klaustrophobia on October 28, 2012, 02:05:19 am
1) Windows XP is 11 years old obsolete piece of junk. Get rid of it if you plan to play new games on PC platform.

the only game i'm aware of (keeping in mind i stay about a year behind) that doesn't work on XP is halo 2, and that is just because microsoft deliberately made it so in an attempt to push vista.  only having direct x 9 isn't that big of a deal, especially if you're on old hardware.  i don't get why everyone acts like old OS versions magically break when new ones come out.  my XP laptop works as well as it ever did, and that's even with it being used as the expendable risk-taker.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Mongoose on October 28, 2012, 02:39:04 am
Seriously.  My current (and only) machine is more than half as old as XP is at its core, and I'm not about to drop over $100 on it just to replace a still-perfectly-usable OS.  Even after MS finally ends extended support for XP, I expect I'll still have it as a dual-boot somewhere, for legacy purposes.  Hell, I might even try building an old-school 98 machine someday for the fun of it.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: BrotherBryon on October 28, 2012, 03:17:01 am
Windows 7 has been solid, don't know about 8 as Windows tends to release duds every other release. Haven't had the chance to play around with it myself but I'm already hearing bad things about the user interface. My work is still operating on XP machines but that is due solely to legacy software we haven't been able get working on windows 7 yet. Basically we painted ourselves into a hole and our venders are screwing us over big time. The software in question was of course not recommend by the networking staff but other departments in our company had to have it and by passed our recommendation to get it. We got stuck supporting the piece of crap but go figure that happens in every IT department. I've been running 7 at home since it came out and the only issue I've had involved a BSOD because one Microsoft update didn't like the firmware version of my SSD. Simple fix just updated the firmware after a good back up and everything is good again.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: FreeSpaceFreak on October 28, 2012, 01:08:47 pm
If you're really that concerned about security, there's only one solution: (http://www.kiwix.org/images/thumb/a/af/Tux.png/40px-Tux.png)

Otherwise, if you just apply some common sense and don't make yourself an easy (or valuable) target, you should be fine with W7.

one of those made it sound like the touchscreen tiles thing is the default screen, and the desktop was like a program you run. 

That is correct, W8 boots to the touchy-tiley Start thing. The desktop is one extra click away.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: MP-Ryan on October 28, 2012, 01:48:43 pm
Seriously.  My current (and only) machine is more than half as old as XP is at its core, and I'm not about to drop over $100 on it just to replace a still-perfectly-usable OS.  Even after MS finally ends extended support for XP, I expect I'll still have it as a dual-boot somewhere, for legacy purposes.  Hell, I might even try building an old-school 98 machine someday for the fun of it.

I think Fury's point is that if you're buying/build a system or looking to upgrade an OS.  If you have an old machine and it's hardware is fully utilized by XP, then no, there isn't a compelling argument to upgrade just for the sake of doing so.
Title: Re: Windows 7..
Post by: Mongoose on October 28, 2012, 03:20:16 pm
Fair enough.  I certainly wouldn't use XP as a primary OS on a new machine.