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I'm surprised they went with Windows rather than with one of the ultra-lightweight GNU/Linux distros intended for use on antique computers. Puppy Linux, or some

I'm surprised they went with Windows rather than with one of the ultra-lightweight GNU/Linux distros intended for use on antique computers. Puppy Linux, or something similar. Windows XP is presumably full of security vulnerabilities.

musicale 3y ago
I can't imagine connecting a Windows XP machine to the internet and/or running any network-connected software such as a web browser or email client. It would be interesting to see how long it takes for a brand new (but "fully patched") Windows XP machine to be taken over by malware after connecting to the internet. Bonus if it's behind a stateful firewall that blocks incoming traffic by default.
- userbinator 3y ago
  It would be interesting to see how long it takes for a brand new (but "fully patched") Windows XP machine to be taken over by malware after connecting to the internet. The answer is "forever", if you're behind a NAT.
  - musicale 3y ago
    What if you use a web browser?
paulryanrogers 3y ago
I tried Linuxes on old PCs in the late oughts. Yet they were usable only for a narrow sliver of technical users. Puppy also ran as root and had a super janky collection of inconsistent apps.
- MaxBarraclough 3y ago
  Perhaps Xubuntu [0] or Lubuntu [1] would be better go-to lightweight distros. These days with the web having taken over much of what people use desktop computers for, I think Xubuntu + Firefox should go a long way even for a non-technical user. Admittedly I have little experience helping non-technical people use desktop Linux. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xubuntu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xubuntu [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lubuntu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lubuntu
  - paulryanrogers 3y ago
    Tried those too. They pass for users who don't want Netflix or have specific apps they cannot part with. And sadly Wine would be too slow.
    - musicale 3y ago
      > They pass for users who don't want Netflix or have specific apps they cannot part with That sounds pretty good actually. Is Netflix only an issue for 32-bit systems since Widevine was discontinued for them?
      - paulryanrogers 3y ago
        It's more that streaming services, even Netflix, stutter. The hardware doesn't have decoders built-in, or they only have Windows drivers, or the resolution is too much to handle. So the owners go back to EOL Windows versions or throw it in the trash and buy new, disposably priced machines.
lproven 3y ago
I did a similar exercise recently and wrote it up: https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/24/dangerous_pleasures_win_xp_in_23/ https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/24/dangerous_pleasures_w... Win XP is considerably smaller and more responsive than the lightest of lightest-weight modern distros. XP was released over 2 decades ago now, and Linux has bloated up vastly in that time. About the only Linux that can even compare is a hand-rolled config of Alpine, and even so, while Alpine on a well-specced 15YO 64-bit machine can compare with XP64, XP remains lighter and more responsive. On a 32-bit machine, it's game over: XP32 is dramatically lighter and quicker.
- musicale 3y ago
  How long did it last before being compromised?
  - lproven 3y ago
    Testing took a few days and it remained fine in that time. It was of course behind a firewall the whole time. Also, the first thing I did was install an alternative browser. So long as you don't let any MS client app talk to the Internet, it's not _that_ bad. I started with an old version of SeaMonkey, installed from USB, and then bootstrapped to newer browsers from there. There are current 3rd party antivirus and firewall apps, and even with antivirus, XP is _startlingly_ fast compared to even Win7, and 7 is faster than 8 which is faster than 10 which is faster than 11.
- musicale 3y ago
  NetBSD (and perhaps other BSDs) still supports 32-bit I believe. Should be capable of running a modern web browser (Firefox, etc.) as well, though performance may be an issue depending on the hardware.
  - lproven 3y ago
    This is true, but incomplete, and more saliently, misses the point. [1] Yes, all the original 3 BSDs support x86-32. But they're not all: quite a few Linux distros still do, including Debian, Alpine, Void, and a number of other lesser-known ones. It's not entirely a legacy platform just yet. [2] The point, though, is not whether they support 32-bit or not. The point is, do they run acceptably well on ~15+ year old hardware? This is not about bitness. Linux supports 32-bit, XP supports 64-bit. That is tangential to the discussion. 64-bit x86 systems have been around for 2 decades now. The real point is that up until about 20y ago, OSes were considerably smaller and quicker than now. Since then all the mainstream ones have got much bigger and much slower with little to show for it. This is not immediately apparent because hardware has got faster. Not all hardware: CPUs haven't improved much. Raw single-core CPU performance scaling fell off a cliff in about 2007 and it will never recover. That everyone ignores this is one of the big lies of the industry. But RAM has got much bigger and faster, and disk drives even more so thanks to SSDs and new interfaces for them. SATA is about as old as x86-64. (Assuming a fresh clean OS -- any OS), put an SSD into a Core 2 Duo, and watch boot times fall through the floor. It's amazing. But install a Linux from the 2020s on that machine and watch it become a slug. Try Windows 7, generally agreed as a good version, on a Core 2 Duo and watch it struggle. Then nuke it and put XP64 on it, and watch the same hardware become fast. I didn't believe it when people told me. So I tried it myself. It's astounding.

musicale 3y ago

I can't imagine connecting a Windows XP machine to the internet and/or running any network-connected software such as a web browser or email client. It would be interesting to see how long it takes for a brand new (but "fully patched") Windows XP machine to be taken over by malware after connecting to the internet. Bonus if it's behind a stateful firewall that blocks incoming traffic by default.

userbinator 3y ago
It would be interesting to see how long it takes for a brand new (but "fully patched") Windows XP machine to be taken over by malware after connecting to the internet. The answer is "forever", if you're behind a NAT.
- musicale 3y ago
  What if you use a web browser?

paulryanrogers 3y ago

I tried Linuxes on old PCs in the late oughts. Yet they were usable only for a narrow sliver of technical users. Puppy also ran as root and had a super janky collection of inconsistent apps.

MaxBarraclough 3y ago
Perhaps Xubuntu [0] or Lubuntu [1] would be better go-to lightweight distros. These days with the web having taken over much of what people use desktop computers for, I think Xubuntu + Firefox should go a long way even for a non-technical user. Admittedly I have little experience helping non-technical people use desktop Linux. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xubuntu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xubuntu [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lubuntu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lubuntu
- paulryanrogers 3y ago
  Tried those too. They pass for users who don't want Netflix or have specific apps they cannot part with. And sadly Wine would be too slow.
  - musicale 3y ago
    > They pass for users who don't want Netflix or have specific apps they cannot part with That sounds pretty good actually. Is Netflix only an issue for 32-bit systems since Widevine was discontinued for them?
    - paulryanrogers 3y ago
      It's more that streaming services, even Netflix, stutter. The hardware doesn't have decoders built-in, or they only have Windows drivers, or the resolution is too much to handle. So the owners go back to EOL Windows versions or throw it in the trash and buy new, disposably priced machines.

lproven 3y ago

I did a similar exercise recently and wrote it up: https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/24/dangerous_pleasures_win_xp_in_23/ https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/24/dangerous_pleasures_w... Win XP is considerably smaller and more responsive than the lightest of lightest-weight modern distros. XP was released over 2 decades ago now, and Linux has bloated up vastly in that time. About the only Linux that can even compare is a hand-rolled config of Alpine, and even so, while Alpine on a well-specced 15YO 64-bit machine can compare with XP64, XP remains lighter and more responsive. On a 32-bit machine, it's game over: XP32 is dramatically lighter and quicker.

musicale 3y ago
How long did it last before being compromised?
- lproven 3y ago
  Testing took a few days and it remained fine in that time. It was of course behind a firewall the whole time. Also, the first thing I did was install an alternative browser. So long as you don't let any MS client app talk to the Internet, it's not _that_ bad. I started with an old version of SeaMonkey, installed from USB, and then bootstrapped to newer browsers from there. There are current 3rd party antivirus and firewall apps, and even with antivirus, XP is _startlingly_ fast compared to even Win7, and 7 is faster than 8 which is faster than 10 which is faster than 11.
musicale 3y ago
NetBSD (and perhaps other BSDs) still supports 32-bit I believe. Should be capable of running a modern web browser (Firefox, etc.) as well, though performance may be an issue depending on the hardware.
- lproven 3y ago
  This is true, but incomplete, and more saliently, misses the point. [1] Yes, all the original 3 BSDs support x86-32. But they're not all: quite a few Linux distros still do, including Debian, Alpine, Void, and a number of other lesser-known ones. It's not entirely a legacy platform just yet. [2] The point, though, is not whether they support 32-bit or not. The point is, do they run acceptably well on ~15+ year old hardware? This is not about bitness. Linux supports 32-bit, XP supports 64-bit. That is tangential to the discussion. 64-bit x86 systems have been around for 2 decades now. The real point is that up until about 20y ago, OSes were considerably smaller and quicker than now. Since then all the mainstream ones have got much bigger and much slower with little to show for it. This is not immediately apparent because hardware has got faster. Not all hardware: CPUs haven't improved much. Raw single-core CPU performance scaling fell off a cliff in about 2007 and it will never recover. That everyone ignores this is one of the big lies of the industry. But RAM has got much bigger and faster, and disk drives even more so thanks to SSDs and new interfaces for them. SATA is about as old as x86-64. (Assuming a fresh clean OS -- any OS), put an SSD into a Core 2 Duo, and watch boot times fall through the floor. It's amazing. But install a Linux from the 2020s on that machine and watch it become a slug. Try Windows 7, generally agreed as a good version, on a Core 2 Duo and watch it struggle. Then nuke it and put XP64 on it, and watch the same hardware become fast. I didn't believe it when people told me. So I tried it myself. It's astounding.