Windows XP x64 support?

[Astara]

I know WinXP has been discontinued, but how insecure is X64 running on an internal net with proxy access?

Are old builds of PM available for download?

I'm trying to run XP64 to be able to run Windows Search 4.0 which is the last version of search that allows (supposedly)
searching of mounted "netdrives" as though they were local. With searches above that, they required a server version of windows to be running on the remove storage to allow searching or -- running XP in, say, a virtual machine on a linux server to index the linux machine's content.

It's definitely an edge case, but I was surprised to see PM fail to install when I brought WinXP(x64). I guess I can go back to FF3.6.28, it's not like I intend to browse much from it, but even accessing this website from the virtual machine to download PM, I got
an error from IE -- didn't want to download -- had to use another version of windows .. kept getting no load on this website, then finally cloudflare asking me to solve a CAPTCHA?? Talk about rotten luck. I ended up loading FF43 or so, but would rather stick w/something a bit more stable even if it doesn't have latest security patches installed. Since this will, for the most part, only be used from an internal net, I'm not too worried about security. But having a decent browser makes it easier to populate the server's SW base.

Not a high priority, I realize... but...just thought I'd ask.

At the least, where can we download old x64 versions?

(Oldest I have locally is 25.5 ;-().

[Moonchild]

Old versions: http://www.palemoon.org/archived.shtml

[BaronHK]

Not sure if anyone has gone over this. This is my opinion on XP, and many Windows support forums and IRC channels will tell you something similar:

(Technically XP x64 is based on Windows 2003, but the following still mostly applies.)

Windows XP is 15 years old. Most people don't drive a car that old. It was made with computers from the late 1990s as a priority one platform. It makes assumptions about how your hardware works based on that viewpoint. It's not even appropriate to run Windows XP on some of the later systems that it came with. It doesn't support modern Windows APIs such as DirectWrite and so Firefox "supports" it with GDI+. There are other crusty Windows XP technologies that Firefox still "supports" that are simply degrading the user experience on more recent versions of Windows.

It is DANGEROUS. It hasn't been supported by Microsoft in over two years. There are already hundreds of known vulnerabilities that will never be fixed.

"Hacking" the registry to fool Microsoft into thinking you are using Windows Embedded POS Ready 2009 is not a solution. Those patches might install, but they are not tested for Windows XP and WEPOS is a stripped down Windows XP, so even if they don't cause Windows XP to break, you're getting patches for maybe 60-70% of the components in Windows XP. And several WEPOS patches do break Windows XP, sometimes in ways that are not immediately obvious.

Windows XP is sorely lacking in security aside from not being patched for over two years. Its firewall doesn't even protect you from attacks over IPV6. It's missing other modern security features.

No antivirus program that I am aware of still supports Windows XP. Microsoft Security Essentials had new signature files for a year even though XP was unsupported to give users another year to transition away from XP. (XP x64 is worse. Microsoft didn't give this OS Security Essentials, period.)

Developers shouldn't make it comfortable to use XP. They should prod their users to get rid of it.

If you have a system that is still running Windows XP, for god's sake, get rid of it, or at least run Linux. There are plenty of Linux distributions that can still run on XP era hardware and are fully supported, and you can run Pale Moon on that.

XP is a giant malware target and the fact that so many people keep it around anyway, hooked up to fast internet connections, is...not good.

[New Tobin Paradigm]

The above post is the most awesome thing I have read on this forum from a user in quite a while. It concisely rolls up everything WE have been saying and is 100% unbiased and factual.

Fantastic!

[Fedor2]

Astara
I myself use winxp, i adapting for it current palemoon, building it myself and so on, x64 built also works fine. You can do it youself if you are familiar with that stuff.

I would happy to go on linux myself, yet i not found linux with good enough desktop ui, all some creepy, hard to do simple things, still too buggy. I think windows desktop beginning form win95 is the best, though are not nowadays win8-10 desktops.

XP is a giant malware target

All windowses are, and now win10 much more. In addition XP has much less network related services, remaining is easily removed, ip6 crap and so on.

It is DANGEROUS. It hasn't been supported by Microsoft in over two years.
Microsoft didn't give this OS Security Essentials

Beacuse It hasn't been supported by Microsoft? this is ridiculous, as you can say a machinery in savage hands. And that Security Essentials has nothing essential, I came across the banking company with thousands xp machinery without that crap, actually all. And Astara actually using one of the really security essentials: no direct connection on the internet.

[New Tobin Paradigm]

building it myself and so on, x64 built also works fine. You can do it youself if you are familiar with that stuff.

Not for much longer least targeting XP that is.

As for the sec stuff.. You are just plain misguided. It's ok, we all have been at times in our lives.

[theelf]

Not sure if anyone has gone over this.....

wow, long time i did not read so much nonsense in a post in any forum

[New Tobin Paradigm]

Not sure if anyone has gone over this.....

wow, long time i did not read so much nonsense in a post in any forum

So it was nonsense when we said it too? It was nonsense when it was 2000 not XP? Was it nonsense for Windows 98? 95? 3.1? Well, was it?

[LoneCrusader]

Not sure if anyone has gone over this.....

wow, long time i did not read so much nonsense in a post in any forum

So it was nonsense when we said it too? It was nonsense when it was 2000 not XP? Was it nonsense for Windows 98? 95? 3.1? Well, was it?

Yes, it was. And still is.

[New Tobin Paradigm]

While this remains amusing as all hell.. I am gonna bow out of this thread.

Have fun kids!

[LoneCrusader]

While this remains amusing as all hell.. I am gonna bow out of this thread.

Have fun kids!

Ah yes. When confronted with an undesirable opinion one bows out and "appeals to authority" by acting as if they are the adult in the room. Classy.

[Moonchild]

Of course, this has mostly already been said on http://www.palemoon.org/PM_end_of_WinXP_support.shtml when we were transitioning to v25.0.
It's even more true for v27 that simply will no longer have XP compatibility at the code level and we will continue to clean up dead code for a no longer supported OS.
Like many things Pale Moon, this is a gradual process - but a process nonetheless.

You're fully entitled to your opinion, but no matter how strong your opinion is or how many people share this opinion with you, what BaronHK wrote is most definitely an accurate representation of the facts surrounding XP.

[Trippynet]

I have mixed opinions on it myself. On one hand, Windows XP is indeed an ancient OS now. It's basically a tweaked version of Windows 2000 (hence the NT 5.1 internal version number) and is very outdated now as a result. Running it by choice on a main machine is therefore not a good idea from a security point of view, and application support for it is inevitably drying up.

The only situations where I can understand it being used is where it's being run by necessity rather than choice.

As I've mentioned before I have an old Mac Mini which does run XP when it's not running OSX. I did actually spend several days working on it a few weeks ago trying to persuade it to run Linux Mint instead of XP, but the early UEFI firmware and other propriety bits of Apple hardware meant that I eventually had to throw in the towel and give up on that plan. It also won't run Windows 7 properly (I have tried), so I've got the option of either running it with XP, or throwing it away and spending several hundred pounds on a replacement. It works for what it's needed for, so I'm keeping it for now.

Or another example, my wife runs a movement tracking laboratory, and also has an important PC there running Windows XP. It has a motion tracking system (that originally cost £35,000) attached to it which does not support anything newer than XP. Technically it doesn't even officially support XP, but the Windows 2000 drivers work fine on it. Anyway, it's understandable why this is also being kept in service with XP on it as a replacement would be prohibitively expensive due to having to replace dependent hardware.

However, running XP on a major home machine that is capable of running Windows 7 or a Linux distribution just because you "prefer XP" is not a sensible idea. You're entitled to continue running it, but people will rightly tell you that it's not a good idea, and you will increasingly run into situations where software releases drop support for XP. Sorry, that's just how it is.

[half-moon]

I can understand running XP on a secondary machine because you have to, but running it on your main machine because you want to is just plain stupidity. Most software still in development have dropped XP support and many more programs will continue dropping support.

Pale Moon must be allowed to evolve and improve, and that it's progress should not be held back by supporting an ancient OS like XP (or 98SE).

While this remains amusing as all hell.. I am gonna bow out of this thread.

Have fun kids!

Ah yes. When confronted with an undesirable opinion one bows out and "appeals to authority" by acting as if they are the adult in the room. Classy.

Off-topic:
You're not acting much like an adult either really.

[Astara]

Not sure if anyone has gone over this. This is my opinion on XP, and many Windows support forums and IRC channels will tell you something similar:

I'm pretty sure that you didn't read what I posted. The search SW only runs on XP and earlier. As I said in the BP, it's on a non-routable subnet and running in a virtual machine that is running on a linux server.

Your assumptions about what matters to me are also misguided-- I don't use firewalls and generally haven't run any anti-virus until recently when I installed the free MSSecEssentials because it was provided by the OS-maker. I don't use its realtime scanning -- I do a once/week full scan that takes 12-16 hours.

So next time you want to go off on a rant, please read the base post.

*shaking head*


@moonchild -- thanks, I was in a hurry, and went ahead and installed latest FF on that machine, though I might shift to an older version of PM. It's not like its going to be used much, but as mentioned in BP, IE couldn't access this site (kept getting a blank page, and finally got a Cloudflare error asking me to solve a captcha (which wasn't displayed on the error page)...strange...maybe PM was being DOSed?

[LoneCrusader]

Of course, this has mostly already been said on http://www.palemoon.org/PM_end_of_WinXP_support.shtml when we were transitioning to v25.0.
It's even more true for v27 that simply will no longer have XP compatibility at the code level and we will continue to clean up dead code for a no longer supported OS.
Like many things Pale Moon, this is a gradual process - but a process nonetheless.

You're fully entitled to your opinion, but no matter how strong your opinion is or how many people share this opinion with you, what BaronHK wrote is most definitely an accurate representation of the facts surrounding XP.

"Facts" are apparently a very subjective thing around here. The fact that a majority of people are gullible enough to believe the Microsoft propaganda of fear, uncertainty, and doubt (aka FUD) about an older operating system that they desperately wish to kill does not make any of said propaganda or opinions of said people true or factual. I will quote another of our good members from MSFN on this point (good show jaclaz!)

It seems to me like the usual FUD.

Before Windows XP went out of support, etc. there have been years of the same things, namely right after Vista release, and then again after Windows 7 release (surprisingly not so much in occasion of 8 release), but at the time most were pessimistic previsions or mere fanboyism for the new, improved Windows OS, now that the years have passed, statements like:

It is DANGEROUS. It hasn't been supported by Microsoft in over two years. There are already hundreds of known vulnerabilities that will never be fixed.

should be proved, I mean, the bad guys had all the time in the world to prepare and execute terrible attacks against this poor OS, the 10% or so of computers around the world still using it [1] should have been already largely compromised, bringing to its knees a not-so-small part of the economy and of the Internet.

Still, it didn't happen (yet), maybe the bad guys have a code of honour that prevents them from taking advantage of those hundreds of vulnerabilities because of respect for the old, aging OS, cannot say, but still it didn't happen in these two years since April 2014.

The good Palemoon guys may have all the reasons (like very reduced user base, more complex code testing, less bug reports and what not) and certainly have all the rights to stop maintaining compatibility with XP, of course, but there is no real reason to denigrate the poor ol'thing.

jaclaz

[1] approximate and meant to represent those actually connected to the Internet and browsing, so that NetMarketShare could count them

Now, that being said, Moonchild, you as the developer and maintainer of this project are perfectly entitled to make any choices you wish about which operating systems to support and which ones not to. However there is much to be said for a developer who makes every reasonable effort to ensure that his program runs on the widest possible amount of systems and configurations (maximum compatibility), and who most importantly does not purposely introduce false incompatibilities simply for the purpose of preventing a user from attempting to run your program on a different platform. I lost most of my respect for this project when the false incompatibility to block Windows XP users who were running the POSReady hack was introduced. This was senseless and despite whatever your intentions may have been could only be viewed as if you were trying to be the "OS police" or the "Microsoft toadie squad." You didn't want to support this configuration? Fine, don't support it. But there's no good, legitimate reason to artificially block running on that configuration unless you are attempting to be one of the two. This also extends by default to purposely using a function that only exists in a newer operating system when the same effect can be perfectly achieved with a different function in a previous version (for example, say AnyRandomFunction in Windows 2000 versus AnyRandomFunctionX in Windows XP).

Now, is one supposed to interpret from Tobin's post above

building it myself and so on, x64 built also works fine. You can do it youself if you are familiar with that stuff.

Not for much longer least targeting XP that is.

that you intend to do some other useless, intentional change in order to break the browser from being compilable for XP? If so, then in all honesty you should be getting paid by Microsoft for doing their dirty work for them. So you don't want to compile it for XP or support it under XP.. fine. But to purposely break it? therein lies the difference. Maybe you should accept a policy more akin to "We won't support it under XP period so don't ask us, but we also won't intentionally make any changes that we know will break it either."

This idea stated above

Developers shouldn't make it comfortable to use XP. They should prod their users to get rid of it.

is one of the most offensive statements I have ever heard in relation to computing. It is no business whatsoever of a developer to encourage or discourage a user from using any operating system of their choice. This is essentially groupthink on steroids - conform or be ostracized.

Now, to draw from these statements and make an observation about this project in general. Whatever the various stated reasons or goals of the PaleMoon project, it is obvious that one consistent goal has been to preserve a common, common-sesne, established (yet fully customizable) UI for browsers that has been abandoned by virtually every other mainstream browser. (This is the only reason why I personally ever even bothered to look at PaleMoon to start with, and I'm sure it's the same for many others.) I think this is an admirable goal. But if one follows the flawed logic used by yourself, Tobin, and others, then, based on what is considered "modern" and "mainstream" by Microsoft, Google, Mozilla, and whoever else, YOUR BROWSER UI IS DEPRECATED, UPGRADE NOW, CONFORM, OR BE OSTRACIZED!

Do you see where this type of groupthink leads?

On the main site you list various features of PaleMoon, for example "Familiar, efficient, fully customizable interface." So you want users to have a familiar and efficient interface? Then why doesn't the same logic apply to a user's operating system of choice? "More freedom in customization" - once again, does this only apply to your browser? Shouldn't a user be able to customize their computer system any way they want and use whatever operating system they wish? Now, I know you have not anywhere implied that a user does not have this right to choose, I'm not trying to make a straw man here. But you all really need to lose the high-horse attitude you have toward older systems and those who choose to use them, because if not, you look like a bunch of raging hypocrites.

I can understand running XP on a secondary machine because you have to, but running it on your main machine because you want to is just plain stupidity. Most software still in development have dropped XP support and many more programs will continue dropping support.

Pale Moon must be allowed to evolve and improve, and that it's progress should not be held back by supporting an ancient OS like XP (or 98SE).

Whether I choose to run Windows 95, 98SE, XP, or whatever is hardly any or your business, and I could really care less what your opinion of my choices is. I should upgrade just because someone else thinks so? Not likely. Stupidity? Fine. Guess I'll be stupid for a good long while then!

Off-topic:
You're not acting much like an adult either really.

And how is that? He asked a question, and didn't like the answer he got, so he took his toys and went elsewhere.
But wait.. you find the opinion "undesirable" as well, and think I'm "stupid" for having it. So now an ad hominem attack to go along with the "appeal to authority."

[Fedor2]

Nevertheless i shall do making it to run on winxp. i never demand support, and do some support myself where i see can do it.

I lost most of my respect for this project when the false incompatibility to block Windows XP users who were running the POSReady hack was introduced

Certainly missed that period, was sort of an uprising, some day i read posts about that, to understand myself why this was done.

And stuff like that are removed form code faster than it was added.

AnyRandomFunction in Windows 2000 versus AnyRandomFunctionX in Windows XP

Here there is no a problem either.

To overcome VS 2012\2013 differences more complex, feasible though.

[lyceus]

@LoneCrusader

Usually we expect to find people that bash developers when they don't support their current OS. Windows 2000 EOS moved the nerves of some people, but I think that some people had gone too much about Windows XP. I had run Windows XP 64 bits and even in the mainstream support several developers just ignored it or never consider this OS.

I think that the rage here is not valid since even in Windows XP 64 bits you can run the Atom Windows XP version fine. Also most of the plugins works better in the 32 bit version anyway. If you only use the Windows XP version as the flag to bash us then you are more than welcome to use another browser that fits your needs. Nobody ask you for use Pale Moon if you are too mad or find it too troublesome to use it.

[Moonchild]

Just one clarification for the people reading this thread:

However there is much to be said for a developer who makes every reasonable effort to ensure that his program runs on the widest possible amount of systems and configurations (maximum compatibility), and who most importantly does not purposely introduce false incompatibilities simply for the purpose of preventing a user from attempting to run your program on a different platform.

We do make every reasonable effort to ensure the program runs on the widest feasible amount of systems and configurations.
Aiming for maximum compatibility will inherently tip the very much needed balance for development of software sharply to one extreme. Maximum compatibility and efficient program design are mutually exclusive. We are aiming for the entire NT6 range (next to Mac and Linux) which spans 13 years and 5 major versions going from Vista to 10, which already is an extremely broad range to aim for.

Also, the compatibility check introduced for PoSReady had already been discussed at length and as a developer I immediately responded to feedback on it. It's not an argument.
If you think Tycho has "false" compatibility checks, then I invite you to inspect the code, remove the safety check added for Vista+ in the app launcher code, and watch it fail to run.

If you don't like the necessary development choices here, you still have the same options you always had: Use another browser, run a version of Pale Moon that is no longer supported to match your OS and its support, or fork the browser and develop your own spin-off.

[Thehandyman1957]

I have thus far stayed out of this diatribe as I know full well that the XP horse has been simply beat to death.
But I feel it is important to say these few things in defense of Moonchild and Team.

If I remember correctly, the reason Moonchild made the choices about POS ready machines was because there was simply no way to give them support
for Pale Moon and all the things that could go wrong with updating XP in this manner when it is obviously not the way it should be done and is in fact a
hack.

I think you need to put yourselves in Moonchild and team's shoes for a bit and understand how much havoc that would have caused here on the
forum and the time they would spend trying to fix something thinking it was their fault only to find out that the poster had hacked their OP with
unsupported updates that were never made for XP directly.

And before you go and think I'm some butt kissing fan boy, you can go read all my posts about XP. And what will you find?
You won't find any post bashing Moonchild and Team anywhere. You will find that I am passionate about using XP.
You will also see that I understand the issues at hand and I simply cannot complain about the decisions made by those who
go through all the work to make us a browser we can use, FOR FREE.

And what the heck! Did we not just get an update for Pale Moon 26.4.1 just a few days ago that is XP compatable?
While they are working on a completely new browser?
They could have just dropped this version and focused solely on 27, could they not? I find that they have gone beyond the call
of duty here and that it's really not right to dump on them about this.

In the end it is our choice to stay with an older OP, not theirs. As I have seen in other places,

Your bad planning does not make it our emergency.

So lets get this straight, Moonchild goes out of his way to make us a browser for many years and after careful consideration finds that the
burden to keep his up to date browser working on OP systems that have code that does not always mix with the newer OP's is simply too
much work and decides to focus on a narrower band of OP's that makes it manageable for him and the team and we freak out?

Oh, and all this and it didn't cost us a dime? Hmmm, me thinkith you protest too much.

On the other hand, we could still be stuck with FF, Oh the horror!

Thanks Moonchild and Team. I'm still enjoying this ride.