Future of Microsoft Windows

[ThinkPad560X]

I was just thinking about this and was woundering about it. The current Windows 7 requires atleast 1GB of RAM and a 1GHz processor. As with Windows 95 I think can't remember the reqiurments, 8MB of RAM and a 50MHz processor. But in the future Atleast I think wouldn't Microsoft try to make Windows use less HDD, processor and memory usage on future computers? If so our older ThinkPads could run the newer operating systems. The bad thing is the graphics card, some old ones like my 755CD I think only handles 640X480 resolution, that witch I don't thing Windows 7 handles. The hightest operating systems im running on my old ThinkPads is Windows XP or for my 701C and 755CD Windows ME. And I don't even think most PCs use the full processing power like in the Intel Core 2 duos and such. My SL500 has a Intel Core 2 Duo and it seems to run the speed as my 600, both running fast. Windows XP Pro on my 600 and SL500 by the way.

I think it would be nice to be running Windows 7 or even XP on my 701C.

[Temetka]

Yeah, that is quite simply not going to happen.

Computers are getting exponentially faster with each major hardware refresh cycle.

In a year or 2 the Core2Duo will be referred to as "slow" while everyone is talking about that 8 core CPU.

Same with graphics.

Heck you can do scientific calculations using the GPGPU features built into a lot of cards shipping today.

If you want a good idea of where graphics processing is going check this out:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/tesla_comp ... tions.html

If anything I want the hardware requirements for Windows to increase.

If you want all the eye candy and the speed and the features, then you better show up at the party with a man's computer and not a toy.

My machine due a recent hardware upgrade is rocking 4 cores and 8BG of DDR2 1066 RAM with an Nvidia GT240 video card.

Is it fast? God yes. But it will be even faster when I am done. I will be adding a hardware RAID controller, a better video card some SSD's and doubling the amount of RAM.

I want my OS to take full advantage of my hardware. No. I demand that it takes full advantage of my hardware.

Asking for a lighter Windows, is well, backwards IMO.

[ThinkPad560X]

I did a boot up and shut down between my ThinkPad 770 and SL500
770:Windows 95
SL500: Windows XP Professional

Within less than a minite the 770 loads up faster than the SL500
during shut down. within "1sec" the Windows 95 ThinkPad 770 shuts down.\

And my 770 only has a Intel Pentium MMX I 233MHz, 160MB RAM.
SL500 has a Intel Core 2 Duo 3GHz, 3GB RAM.

Now is all the requirments due to the Windows using alot of flash now? even during Windows 7 startup you see the Windows logo come together in a small flash video.

And most programs now require alot more power aswell. I may buy a new ThinkPad someday but my new SL500 should still due fine for me still, I bought it in 2008 and the warranty expired this march.

[dr_st]

The startup/shutdown speed differences are due to modern hardware being increasingly more sophisticated, requiring more complicated bootstrap / configuration / shutdown / power state change flows.

And of course newer programs require more power / space / whatnot than older ones. They do more complex things.

[mediasponge]

For one thing, the earlier versions of Windows (95, 98, ME) used a file system that could become corrupted at any time for any reason causing many files to be simply lost (FILE00000, FILE00001). One reason for slower bootup/shutdown times may well be the housekeeping that makes the NTFS more robust. I have also noticed that for folders with large numbers of small files, NTFS is actually a lot slower than FAT32 the first time you open that folder after bootup. This has been discussed at length in other forums. I have a 1Ghz Celeron with Win 98SE that boots up in a snap, but it has no antivirus software. The AV software itself becomes part of the problem. The more complicated the OS, the more complicated the protection. Then throw in all the automatic updates (even just checking for them) that happens, and of course it gets slower.

Although it was widely noted that Win7 is a major improvement in memory footprint over Vista, these things are going to seem like a speedbump in the relentless march of CPU/MEM/HDD improvements over the years. 25 years ago, when a 10MB disk was standard, a 100MB disk would literally cost you thousands of dollars. With old hardware, at some point, you have to lock it in to a particular rev, and resign to not updating it anymore, because in the realm of more modern software, that hardware has been left in the dust.

"Any given program will expand to fill all of available memory." -- Murphy's Laws of Computing

And don't forget, "640K should be enough for anybody."

[Norway Pad]

To put it into perspective: The Pentium I machines were once seen as a huge leap forward, and they could run applications that I remember my old 486 stationary computer struggled with. Some of them even came with several Gigabytes of storage space and over 100MB of memory(wow).

So the development that once gave us the Pentium i and II machines to replace our old 386 and 486 machines, will in the future continue to give us equipment that exceed what we have today. And for a software manufacturer, it makes sense to create software that takes advantage of the hardware. We really can't blame Microsoft for developing Win95 to replace DOS, and not for developing further beyond W7 when the time comes.

The difference between today and back then is that equipment from the Pentium I/II/III era can to some extent still be used today. Back then, the old equipment was only capable of running very limited software and OSs, so limited that it soon had no practical use anymore. While today we see that even 10-15 year old computers can be used for practical purposes. I can still use the AutoCad application on my Win95 360CS, and with an Ethernet PCMCIA card I could probably have been online and surfed the web, within the capabilities of IE4 or 5. But I don't see the point of doing that, and definitely not the need for even trying to install a newer OS on it. The 360 has become more of a collectible, only to be used a couple of times a year for typing documents in WordPad for Win95, and transferring them on floppy discs. Just because I can.

[ajkula66]

mediasponge wrote:

With old hardware, at some point, you have to lock it in to a particular rev, and resign to not updating it anymore, because in the realm of more modern software, that hardware has been left in the dust.

Very true. One of major advantages of W7 over Vista in my experience is a significant difference between age of hardware turned obsolete, or close to it. I tested Vista on both T42p and T43p and wasn't one bit pleased, they felt sluggish, yet they fly under W7 and are above and beyond usable for most purposes, at pretty much the same level as in XP which they were designed for.

The AV software itself becomes part of the problem. The more complicated the OS, the more complicated the protection.

You're not kidding. I went through he!! and back trying to find an appropriate AV for my (since sold) S30 with its W2K and measly 256MB of RAM...that's where some older forms of Linux come in handy, but that's a big issue for quite a few people who just don't want to be bothered with anything *nix and would rather deal with Windows in any shape and form...

Norway Pad wrote:

The difference between today and back then is that equipment from the Pentium I/II/III era can to some extent still be used today.

Absolutely. I was showing my butterfly to someone a few days back and actually got online with it. Of course, 85% of the websites can't really be browsed properly if at all in W95, but if I ever got really stubborn I'm certain I'd find my way around it...

All jokes aside, if I had to, I could still go back to my semi-retired A31p and use it as the only machine on a daily basis for several more years, assuming I don't run out of spare motherboards. If pushed really hard, I could do the same with the TransNote, although that would be a bit more of a struggle...

I've recently given away an older ThinkPad (570 with 366Mhz PII CPU) to a friend's daughter who wanted to explore Linux on an older machine. With 320 MB RAM, 40/5400 HDD and Ralink PCMCIA wireless card that antique flies in an older version of PCLOS. I wouldn't attempt any serious computing, but for web and office applications it runs surprisingly well...and one wouldn't get more than $30-40 for it unless parted out...

[Unknown_K]

Someday someone will figure out a way around the Mghz speed ceiling and we will be back to making single or dual core speed demons. Currently few apps make use of more then a couple cores anyway.

I was thinking the 64bit OS rewites would force MS to start over with the OS and allow others to get back into the OS race, but I guess not. There are good and bad things about standards/monopoly, you know exactly what to expect (users and developers) but it is very hard to get anything revolutionary to be made since it upsets the old standards.

There is too much bloat these days eating up CPU cycles and RAM for no real gain in use.

[Norway Pad]

...W2K and measly 256MB of RAM...that's where some older forms of Linux come in handy, but that's a big issue for quite a few people who just don't want to be bothered with anything *nix and would rather deal with Windows in any shape and form...

Yes, I guess a discussion about the usability of old hardware can't be had without bringing up Linux and the new and extended life that the proper Linux distribution can blow into an otherwise unusable piece of hardware. I am still amazed by the nice and up to date applications I got (for free) by running Linux Mint on the T30, as opposed to running W2K, which it is COA'ed for. A new world for an old Windows user, but I'm glad I dared to try.

Talking about W2K: I went to a local US Bank branch yesterday, and while waiting, I looked over at the people working at the Drive Through window. I could see right onto their computer screens, and as they logged on and off, I could see the Win2000 Professional logon screen.. I had no idea that any businesses still ran W2K today.

[ThinkPad560X]

Is there a free download of Linux? I always was a Windows user. I was going to try out Mac software but my PowerBook needs memory. I have MAC OS 8 CDs.

So any Linux can run on new and old hardware. I remember lenovo selling a few ThinkPads that came with Linux on them.

[craigmontHunter]

Talking about W2K: I went to a local US Bank branch yesterday, and while waiting, I looked over at the people working at the Drive Through window. I could see right onto their computer screens, and as they logged on and off, I could see the Win2000 Professional logon screen.. I had no idea that any businesses still ran W2K today.

I know someone who used to work at a major bank, and as of a couple of years ago, they were still running windows 95. As long as the network is local, with no internet access, if it ain't broke, don't fix it I guess. Win2k is not that bad, especially if it is on a closed network/cannot access the internet. Banking would have the specialized software that only works on certain OS's I would imagine.

[Norway Pad]

Is there a free download of Linux? I always was a Windows user.

So any Linux can run on new and old hardware. I remember lenovo selling a few ThinkPads that came with Linux on them.

Linux is open source software, and is free to download, yes. No fees, no license, no key.

I am not too familiar with all the different Linux distros around, others here know more about them than me. So I am not sure which distro would run good on your hardware. I run Linux Mint (8), which is probably on the more resource demanding side of Linux, since it's got a fancy and extensive GUI. But the T30 has good enough capabilities (1.8GHz/1GB RAM) to handle it, and the advantage of the good GUI is that it's not too unfamiliar when you come from the Windows environment. But even Mint is moving on, and apparently no longer properly supports the graphics card in the T30. Luckily the right drivers were out there, so it was an easy fix as soon as someone told me how to do it.

And if your old Thinkpad has an optical drive, you can even run some of the distros as live cds, where they load and run from the cd. By doing this, you can try them out before you install them. Be prepared that the performance is poor by doing it this way, but you can see if it works at all, and test some basic functions.

[ThinkRob]

A Pentium M with 1 GB of RAM should be able to run any modern distro. It might not run some of the more intense stuff at top speed, but it can certainly run any of the "big name" choices with no problem.

Personally, I'd recommend Ubuntu as your first distro. Head on over to ubuntu.com and get your free copy today!

[j-dawg]

Xubuntu is supposedly optimized for slower computers with fewer resources, but I've never noticed a difference, and the packages are not as nicely optimized as Ubuntu's. I gave up on it as useful a long time ago. Give Ubuntu a shot - run it off the live CD or a thumb drive to get a feel for it, but bear in mind that it will be slower than if it ran off a drive.

[ThinkRob]

Xubuntu is supposedly optimized for slower computers with fewer resources, but I've never noticed a difference

Eh.... Xfce is, but in my experience Xubuntu is no "lighter" than a normal Ubuntu install.

IIRC, Canonical's Xfce packages are pretty heavily modified too, but don't quote me on that.

That said, with a gig of RAM and a reasonably-new processor, there's really no reason I can think of not to use Ubuntu. By the time you start using resource-intensive apps that require every last ounce of power your machine has, you're likely experienced enough that you can upgrade to Debian or another distro.

[mediasponge]

On a whim, I loaded up Debian on a really old server that had dual Pentium Pro cpus. It loaded, it ran, but was quite a dog. A 1Ghz Celeron should run Debian, Suse, Fedora, or any other free distro just fine. There is another forum on this site devoted to the topic of Linux on TPs. I used to have RHEL 4 on my A31p for demos, but I had to nuke that at one point. I have OpenSuse on a not too old Fujitsu laptop, and it runs quite well.

[ajkula66]

Norway Pad wrote:

I had no idea that any businesses still ran W2K today.

Many businesses - quite a few banks included - have the "if it's not broken don't fix it (or upgrade it) " mentality. You'd be stunned to see some of the stuff that data is still transmitted over. I've recently held a circuit card that had a stamp date of June, 1963. Still working. In a bank in midtown Manhattan, no less. Go figure.

BTW, I still use my employer-issued T20 with W2K to teach classes...with 512MB RAM and 5400rpm HDD, it runs like a deer, 650Mhz Pentium III or not...and it's much lighter than my other two "work" laptops...which are, you've guessed it, fully-rugged ToughBooks...

Think Rob wrote:

A Pentium M with 1 GB of RAM should be able to run any modern distro. It might not run some of the more intense stuff at top speed, but it can certainly run any of the "big name" choices with no problem.

You can easily go one generation back and say P4M, at least on a ThinkPad. Graphics might not be as smooth as we'd want them to, but the machines will run with no noticeable lag, at least in my limited experience...

[ThinkRob]

On a whim, I loaded up Debian on a really old server that had dual Pentium Pro cpus. It loaded, it ran, but was quite a dog.

The default GNOME environment? Oh yeah, that won't be speedy.

For a server, that should be quite usable though. I run Lenny on my slug (NSLU2), and that's got a slow 266 MHz XScale CPU with only 32MB of RAM. It works great as a DNS server, print server, and HTTP proxy.

[automobus]

I had no idea that any businesses still ran W2K today.

When I donated blood a few months ago, Red Cross had several Toughbooks running Windows 2000. They were using good old grayscale Palms, too. I assume they have the same computer configurations today, though they might have switched, since Windows 2000 support ended in July. And until a few months ago, I, too, was using Windows 2000 on my primary computer.

[Norway Pad]

That makes sense, as long as it works, why change it. And least but not least - these companies and businesses have IT staff that know what they are doing.

A different story: When I went back to work at my old milk processing plant in Norway last summer, I noticed that the PC running the application for the access control system (Door/gate control for the entire plant and related key-cards and access levels) still ran Win2K. I put that computer there myself 5-6 years ago. It's still connected to the network, so some of the staff surfed the web with it. And no one there knew what Win2K was, except that the icons and menus on that PC looked a bit different than they were used to from XP.

[bill bolton]

I think it would be nice to be running Windows 7 or even XP on my 701C.

You can think all you want, but where is the business case that would cause a commercial software vendor to even consider your desire?

Cheers,

Bill B.

[mediasponge]

IMO, businesses lingering on outdated software because "it works" is one of the reasons it's so easy for Cybercriminals to assemble armies of zombies into a bot-net. And, if you think these companies all have IT departments that know what they are doing, you're probably being a bit too generous. Any truly competent IT manager would be making the case that while the costs of upgrading are relatively known, the costs of getting completely shut down by lack of network security are completely unknown. Once an OS gets dropped from active security support by the vendor, it's time to move on. Cybercrime is no longer the whimsical activity of High School students. It's now the domain of Organized Crime, and State-run International Espionage. You'd think a bank would be more conscientious on this subject.

The only difference between the fool and the criminal who attacks a system is that the fool attacks more unpredictably and on a broader front. -- Murphy's Laws of Computing

[Unknown_K]

I was under the impression botnets consisted of home PCs and not corperate ones, are you sure its corperate machines?

[ajkula66]

mediasponge wrote:

You'd think a bank would be more conscientious on this subject.

Hmmm...no, not really. Had banks been anything close to conscientious in other respects, we wouldn't have seen the housing flop let alone the bailout that followed it so...no, that perspective has been surgically removed sometime in the past. If domestic or foreign cyber pirates end up with a couple of zillions of our $$$, the affected banks will just cry that they're too big to fail once again and here comes another handout...

[automobus]

Nice reasoning, George.

lingering on outdated software because "it works"
[and later on]
You'd think a bank would be more conscientious on this subject.

I once read a really good opinion about outdated software, where expired code was compared to expired food. I would like to add that if the food has a sterile seal, then it should be safe until the seal is broken. The preserved food can only experience chemical decomposition, which I guess compares to hardware failure. I am sure some members can pitch-in about aging cheese and alcohol .

I see absolutely no problem with banks using old software, so long as there is never external network access. That's like preserved food. A few isolated machines cannot become a botnet. A breech would require social engineering or physical access, and if an attacker can make that happen, then it makes little difference what software is involved.

I have no real training or education about computer security; my opinions might be poppycock.

[ajkula66]

That's really a question of Intranet vs. Internet...and imperfect humans having access to both at the same time...

Having said that, main routes of internal data communication are usually well-protected, be it analog or digital transfer ("private lines" vs. point-to-point T-1 circuits)...

The problem arises when the information originally available only on Intranet is leaked through Internet or compromised in another manner...now that's when all the little propeller heads with cheshire cat smiles come into play, sucking on their lollipops...