ROB MCCART wrote:
>> Not so much, the RPC holes, for example, are intentional, and are usefull
>> features, as is the Messenger Service, and SMB(Windows Networking), however,
>> these are all usefull in business, and network environments, and
belong behin
>> a firewall... not as a default in the consumer version... the XP SP2 goes a
>> good ways to helping this, making the firewall on by default.
> 
> Yes, that was a big help. It was amazing that they didn't at least ASK
> during install about the firewall, recommending you use it. That way
> the newbies would allow it, to be safe, and anyone who knows what they
> are doing and knows they Don't want/need that firewall could skip it.
> 
> Better on by default.. Can't shut it off unless you know what
> you are doing well enough to manage it..   B)

true, I wish there were some NAT devices that supported a dialup connection
as well as dsl, etc... honestly, that's the biggest point of entry these
days is all the XP home users who won't/don't download updates because
they are ignorant and/or on dialup.

>> Not so much as you may think... they don't want it to be
"impossible" to
>> pirate, just hard enough to prevent the casual user from doing it...
> 
> MS made their 'bones' by being the most Pirated software in history.
> As you say, given the choice of a user using another OS or using
> a pirated Windows OS, they would prefer to be the one that gets used.

True enough...

>> I'm more concerned about the DRM & High Def. limitations in Windows
>> Vista, it pretty much just pisses me off all around..
> 
> Other than seeing a few demo pages online I haven't looked at Vista
> all that much. Seeing as I prefer Win 98SE to Win XP I likely will
> not be looking at Vista for some time to come..   B)

It's honestly, imho more of the same in the transition from win2k to xp,
mostly some gui updates (given the changes in favor of better 3d/graphics
performance in XP was an arguable necessity), the fluff really isn't, it's
to step up a little compared to Aqua, and even pass it a little.. I tried
it, but had some fatal issues with my wireless card's driver (only was able
to get an XP driver for it, which caused hard lockups/crashes)...

Not really worth it, there's a lot of "features" that in the end only make
it harder to *use* your computer (installing your own apps).. apps that go
in through holes are as likely to make it in.. given though, executable
bit support in newer cpu's should help, but only so far as the security
to begin with, which is honestly getting a little better...

I kind of wish they'd shove IE7 down the throats of everyone running
windows (older versions) if only to correct the exploits available in
pre-xp versions of windows.. let alone the rendering bugs/fixes.

-- 
Michael J. Ryan - tracker1(at)theroughnecks(dot)net - www.theroughnecks.net
icq: 4935386  -  AIM/AOL: azTracker1  -  Y!: azTracker1  -  MSN/Win: (email)

---
 þ Synchronet þ theroughnecks.net - you know you want it
--- SBBSecho 2.12-Win32