6 ms·
What I like about this project, besides the dedication and professionalism of the team behind it, is that it offers PC gamers a possible way to play Windows-era
by rocky1138 9y ago
What I like about this project, besides the dedication and professionalism of the team behind it, is that it offers PC gamers a possible way to play Windows-era games moving forward. In a decade or two, we likely won't be able to activate a Windows XP machine (and wouldn't want to with all of the security hazards either) so it's great to have a free and open source project to run our Windows stuff.
- jug 9y agoYeah, DOSBox is nice for retro gaming or even the oddball application, but it pales in comparison to the potential of this project.
- megaman22 9y agoThe place where DOSBox isn't sufficient is for games in that Win 95/98/2000 era. Most of those don't run very well, if at all on modern Windows, unless somebody still has the source and bothers to rerelease a modern "HD edition" or somesuch. I still have to keep a Win 98 VM so I can play Sierra's Civil War Generals 2 from time to time.
- orionblastar 9y agoI heard that DOSBox can run Windows 3.1 to run 16 but Windows games. I also heard someone hacked Win95 and Win98 to run under DOSbox. You could just use QEMU emulate a Pentium box and install 95 or 98 under that as an alternative.
- efreak 9y agoDosbox runs windows 3.1 perfectly, with resolutions up to at least 1280x1024 (what I use for tetris) _or_ true color mode (unfortunately not both). You can supposedly install 95/98 in it, but I've had trouble actually using them in it.
- geff82 9y agoGood thought, never saw it from an archiving point of view!
- wrinkl3 9y agoDon't all new Windows releases ship with backwards compatibility modes?
- code_duck 9y agoI wouldn’t count on Microsoft supporting XP era software 10 or 20 years from now, and I wouldn’t ask them to.
- userbinator 9y agoI recall seeing videos on YouTube of Windows 1.0 applications running on Windows 10, so I suppose it really depends on what type of software exactly; more system-level things like disk defragmenters are unlikely to work, but basic productivity software likely will continue working. I personally have a few from Win95 era which I still use regularly, and of course I'd expect the basic Hello World messagebox binary to remain usable 10 years from now.
- code_duck 9y agoBasic applications such as that, sure. But the top parent comment referred to games, which are the opposite in terms of complexity and operating system features, and generally harder to support adequately in emulation.
- shdon 9y agoI doubt it will be too long before 32-bit versions of Windows are no longer produced or supported. The 64-bit versions do not run 16-bit software. When that time inevitably comes, the Windows 1.0 software will also stop working in native Windows (rather than a 32-bit or even 16-bit Windows version running through emulation).
- gravypod 9y agoThey do until Microsoft decides they don't. Unfortunately I don't know of any guarantees that MS has made about forever supporting XP comparability.
- 9y ago
- bitL 9y agoRecently I had an issue activating XP on Eee PC after a RAM/SSD upgrade (setting it up as a retro-gaming console, better performance than RetroPie). I had to resort to registry hacks and msoobe to suppress activation forever, despite having product key at the back of the netbook - XP CD wasn't accepting it at all. One more situation where legal owners have to waste more time than pirates... If ReactOS makes it far enough to run on Eee PC, I'll get rid of XP.
- heywire 9y agoI use a lot of virtual machines across all versions of Windows. What I've found is that almost every time online activation fails, if I do the telephone activation, it goes though. Just wanted to pass that along in case you or someone else runs into this again.
- bitL 9y agoI tried phone activation as well, it was rejected. I typed all installation numbers correctly.
- heywire 9y agoDang, I was hoping to help :(
- da_chicken 9y agoIf the automated telephone doesn't work, you used to be able to stay on the line (or just don't enter anything) and talk to a person. They can usually help.
- Lammy 9y agoIt sounds like you were trying to activate the OEM key on your netbook using retail media.
- bitL 9y agoYes, that's the case. Unfortunately, ASUS didn't provide installation media, just recovery media, which only works for their 4GB/12GB SSD combo and was failing operation when I tried it on a new SSD. So I tried regular XP Home ISO, but was out of luck.
- userbinator 9y agoCracks will always be around... and XP is one of the "simpler" ones compared to the newer Windows. "security" isn't a big deal either, just keep all your ports closed and don't run untrusted code or unnecessary services. AFAIK all the exploits have been on services and such, which shouldn't be exposed to the Internet anyway.
- jkollross 9y agoNewer Windows is still only two shell commands away from activation.
- apatheticonion 9y agoDo tell
- gruez 9y agoKMS servers. there are a bunch on the internet you can use, and you can even run one locally on your LAN. only catch is you can't run the server locally (although you can patch out system files to bypass this), and you need to connect to the server every 180 days to refresh your ticket.
- math0ne 9y agoEven better buy a $10 key on ebay.
- dragontamer 9y agoLife gets a lot better when you start running Win10 security. IE: Win10 can run the password manager service on a separate VM now automatically. Hell, you can start new version of Microsoft Edge in a clean and isolated VM, requiring the attacker to use a hypervisor zero-day to pwn your box. And since the Microsoft Hyper-V hypervisor is often running through UEFI secure boot with assistance of the TPM modules on the motherboard, and because the Hypervisor has very few services running (really: any service is in its own VM), its a much, much harder attack surface to go through. https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2016/09/27/application-guard-microsoft-edge/ https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2016/09/27/application-g... Security features that add convenience (ie: group policy allows admins to automatically open websites in "Application Guard" mode) helps a lot. When the user literally only has to wait ~5 to ~10 seconds to boot up a clean version of IE isolated inside of a VM (separated in a RDP session), its much easier to have widespread security throughout a network. I mean really: think about the security model needed to pwn AppGuard + IE. You either need to pwn the RDP session (unlikely, but hey its possible). Or, you figure out how to escape an isolated VM, when said VM has virtually all applications locked out. I saw a security demo of AppGuard recently. You can't run cmd.exe, you can't run powershell, you have zero permissions inside of your VM. If you somehow escape the sandbox, you STILL have to break through a hypervisor to get to the user. Its way, way WAY easier to do "proper security" with Win10 + all of the virtualization tricks (AppGuard, Credential Guard, Device Guard). The modern Win10 security model is beginning to be immune to even kernel-mode exploits. ----------------------- With that being said: WinXP has security problems with modern Win Vista+ because that's the edition where Microsoft decided that direct-hardware access is a BAD IDEA for standard usermode applications. WinXP allows any user-mode application to directly talk with the hardware. Win Vista+ does NOT allow it. And that broke a ton of programs (old controller hardware, printer drivers, etc. etc.) Fixing security issues causes compatibility problems.
- robertAngst 9y agoIve considered this in a few things. What if we could go back and access that infrastructure, what lessons could we learn? I really dont know, but I personally see this as useful from an entertainment POV, let alone function.