[HN Gopher] Windows XP Activation: Game Over
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Windows XP Activation: Game Over
Author : sysadm1n
Score : 110 points
Date : 2023-05-18 19:42 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (tinyapps.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (tinyapps.org)
| ungruntled wrote:
| I've been using Windows XP VMs without activation, or even a
| prompt to activate. I didn't know they even needed activation.
| Does anyone know what activation is needed for?
| cellularmitosis wrote:
| I actually just ran into this the other weekend. After a
| certain amount of time (30 days?), Windows will prompt you to
| activate, and if you don't, it kicks you to the login screen.
| EscapeFromNY wrote:
| Normally Windows XP would lock you out completely after a while
| if you don't activate. But there are a lot of exceptions, like
| volume license keys, certain OEM install discs, certain VM
| images released by MS, and _ahem_ unofficial ISOs with things
| like AntiWPA slipstreamed into the install.
| RulerOf wrote:
| If you ever worked in IT during the XP era, you got your hands
| on a private Volume License Key. XP VLKs bypassed activation,
| and they were the piracy tool of choice until Microsoft started
| blacklisting them[1].
|
| 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volume_licensing#Leaked_keys
| stuff4ben wrote:
| I installed so many Windows XP systems back in the day
| (manually of course) that I memorized the product key.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| > I've been using Windows XP VMs without activation, or even a
| prompt to activate.
|
| If you go into properties, does it show XP isn't activated?
| IIRC, early XP releases didn't nag from the tray. I've also
| seen some Dell installs that auto activated after pulling the
| key from BIOS.
| ungruntled wrote:
| It says it's activated. I think this is because I was using
| one of those Windows XP compatibility isos that Microsoft
| made available for download a long time ago (as far as I
| remember).
| rejectfinite wrote:
| I Remoted/Teamviewered into a Windows XP laptop a few years ago
| form my Windows 10 work PC. And WOW the XP machine was so fast.
| They installed XP on a new-ish Intel i3 and 4GB RAM for some
| reason, probably old software. And the UI just flew, so smooth,
| even over Teamviewer.
|
| They wanted it on corp wifi however... that was a no-go
| roschdal wrote:
| This is why the world needs Linux.
| pseudosavant wrote:
| I would bet $50 that it is easier to install Windows XP with an
| activation 'hack' than it would be to install most Linux
| distros from 2001. We are talking RedHat Linux 7 (not RHEL)
| running a Linux 2.2 kernel.
|
| Most Linux 'reviews' back then were basically a review on how
| easy (or more likely, hard) it is to install. Most distros
| installers faired pretty poorly back then. I succeeded in
| getting RedHat 7 installed, but could never get Slackware or
| SUSE to successfully install.
| cellularmitosis wrote:
| WinLinux 2000 (the first distro I ever installed) was a
| pretty painless experience. It installed as a Windows "app"
| which rebooted into Linux, and used UMSDOS to share a single
| filesystem.
| klodolph wrote:
| If you're comparing RedHat Linux 7 against Windows XP, you're
| thinking in terms of the release date of XP. Windows XP was
| not very good when it came out, and it wasn't until it got
| the service packs.
|
| So if you're going to start with something like Windows XP
| service pack 3, meaning that you were someone who didn't jump
| straight to Vista (I'll be a Vista apologist, but people were
| being reasonable when they didn't jump from XP), at that
| point, you're comparing it to Linux distros of 2008. That
| would be something like Fedora 8, Ubuntu 8, or Debian 4. This
| was the GNOME 2 era and it was a pretty damn smooth
| experience.
|
| If you're thinking a bit deeper in terms of user experience
| for the early, early 2000s, then you would probably put
| FreeBSD high up on your list rather than treating Linux as an
| assumption.
| bombcar wrote:
| IIRC Linux installed pretty well, as long as you were
| dedicating the whole drive to it.
|
| It was dual booting that would get you every time.
| asveikau wrote:
| Linux 2.4 released in January 2001.
|
| I remember circa 2004 I set up my non technical brother with
| one of the earliest versions of Ubuntu, after he kept getting
| malware on XP, and he didn't have difficulty with it. I was
| kind of surprised how easy it was. I was a debian and OpenBSD
| user at the time.
| activiation wrote:
| I used to install Slackware with a bunch of floppies... I
| think it was easier then Arch today (although I can do both)
| em-bee wrote:
| if you have been installing linux since the early floppy
| days, sure, by 2000 it was easy. i was there too and i
| don't remember any problems either. but those new to linux
| at the time were likely having more difficulties than us
| grumpy old geeks.
| jdwithit wrote:
| I vaguely remember trying to install Gentoo back in the early
| 2000s. It took more than 24 hours and eventually failed with
| an inscrutable C compilation failure in some random package.
| That was quite the eye opening experience. Certainly gave me
| an appreciation for the relative polish of Red Hat and other
| packaged distros, despite their warts.
| dtx1 wrote:
| Yeah but Suse linux existed
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| And CentOS 4.5 (okay that was 2007 but we had both OS
| running at the same time - mostly because we weren't
| getting anywhere near Vista [2006]).
| rootsudo wrote:
| Mandrake was pretty easy, and even SCO UNIX (not GNU/Linux)
| had an release - grub worked, fat32/fat16 partitioning was
| possible and there was previous NTFS windows releases, NT
| 3.5/4 and 2000 that facilitated it.
|
| They all had GUI interactive installers, and had floppy
| boot disks to boot (too!)
| optymizer wrote:
| You couldn't get Slackware or SuSE to install ... ever? or
| recently?
| em-bee wrote:
| that is missing the point.
|
| people want to use windows XP in order to run old software
| that doesn't run on newer systems. (or because they are
| nostalgic, but those are not helped with linux, so we can
| ignore them)
|
| a modern linux distribution is way more likely to run old
| linux and windows software than a modern windows version.
|
| hence that's why the world needs linux, because it doesn't
| have the problems that windows upgrades have.
|
| you may argue that new linux distributions don't have old
| libraries either, which is true, but getting older libraries
| to install and run is way easier than on windows. and it's
| possible to put an old linux binary (even one for which there
| is no source) into an environment and make it workable on a
| modern linux distribution, and with things like flatpak it is
| also possible to make such an environment easily installable
| for a non-technical end user. getting old windows binaries to
| run is even easier because that's exactly how wine works.
| thsksbd wrote:
| [dead]
| phatbyte wrote:
| Never had problems installing any major Linux dist, but 15
| years ago I still remember the boring and time consuming on
| patching the kernel with custom patches so that my wi-fi card
| or gfx card could work.
|
| I stopped trying to use Linux as a desktop OS since then. But
| recently I tried for fun installing Ubuntu and everything
| just worked out of the box.
|
| I still feel Linux is too fragmented, too many package
| managers, too many UI managers etc...but that's part of the
| beauty of it I guess.
| omoikane wrote:
| I recall installing linux wasn't the difficult part, it's
| getting your peripherals to work after that.
| danjoredd wrote:
| I love Linux as much as the next nerd...but Linux was notorious
| in the early 2000s. Also this is about using Windows XP for the
| sake of using Windows XP.
| rejectfinite wrote:
| This is about using Windows XP because it is Windows XP. Maybe
| we like it.
| haunter wrote:
| >MAS (hosted on their own platform)
|
| MAS is awesome. Anyways MS doesn't care about private piracy.
| They rather have you pirate Windows than leave the platform and
| use another OS. This is my conspiracy theory about WSL too (which
| is an actual nice software but still).
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| I've used it to quickly auth XP VMs that were needed to run
| ancient Navision clients. It works as advertised.
|
| I had to whitelist the directory in Windows Security because it
| makes MSAV grumpy and then uploads it's grumpiness home.
| gymbeaux wrote:
| It's not a conspiracy theory. It's well-known that Microsoft's
| "M$ <3 Linux" campaign is propaganda. It's classic anti-
| competitive Microsoft behavior that started with IE in the 90s.
| sterlind wrote:
| (Disclaimer: I work at MS, but not on WSL, opinions are my
| own.)
|
| I don't see how WSL is embrace-extend-extinguish. Embrace,
| yes. Extend? No. There's basically nothing that only runs on
| WSL and not real Linux. Only QoL integrations with the
| Windows shell like X11/Wayland and Explorer integration. The
| point of WSL is backend dev. If WSL were on an EEE path,
| you'd expect to see MS adding Windows-only integrations, and
| encouraging people to run WSL server instances. Instead, MS
| has never positioned WSL for prod use, and instead cautions
| _against_ using it for non-dev activities. Even internally,
| we don 't use WSL to host Linux stuff. We use CBL-Mariner
| instead [1], which is completely FOSS.
|
| The whole point of WSL was that Windows lost to Linux for
| backend. Unlike Ballmer, Satya didn't want to waste resources
| fighting a losing battle, so he pivoted the company towards
| Azure and dev tooling and away from Windows Server. And that
| succeeded, and it's why we're not irrelevant like IBM - we
| ditched our mainframes, as it were.
|
| 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CBL-Mariner
| zadintuvas1 wrote:
| Do you remember that DirectX loves Linux announcement?
| jchw wrote:
| > There's basically nothing that only runs on WSL and not
| real Linux.
|
| Not going to weigh in on the other aspects of this but I
| think this is untrue nowadays. Direct3D off-screen
| rendering and DirectML are supported in WSL2 and while
| there are several Direct3D implementations that run on
| Linux, I don't think there has been an attempt at DirectML
| yet, and neither are ever going to be possible using
| official drivers and official DirectX like you can on
| Windows with WSL2.
| [deleted]
| tracker1 wrote:
| I think a lot of it is the writing on the wall... long term,
| it's software as a service model that will be their recurring
| revenue streams. I'm not sure what they're making in terms of
| just Windows licensing, but can guess that M365 is probably
| as much or more per year.
|
| In the past 6-7 years most of the applications I've worked
| on, even those using Visual Studio, C#, etc. Have been
| tested/deployed on Linux more than Windows.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| I think it's the same reason why they don't care about the
| various KMS emulation servers for Windows 10/11 - some of these
| are even open source.
| josephcsible wrote:
| If Microsoft would rather have people pirate Windows than use
| another OS, then why did they add product activation at all?
| rejectfinite wrote:
| Companies using it need to pay.
|
| Home users are whatever.
| tracker1 wrote:
| I'm pretty sure the reason for the forever upgrades since
| Win7 is more because it costs them less to have fewer
| variations of windows in the wild than to stay closer to
| evergreen.
| Lammy wrote:
| It was justification for an OS that has the capability to
| phone home over a network, and now twenty years later we have
| Windows OSes that log and report everything down to the
| minute details of what you do in the calculator. Xbox was the
| same thing: justification for developing code-signature
| enforcement, hardware attestation, remote key revocation,
| etc. We would have opposed those things if they came from the
| world of general-purpose computing, so instead they were
| developed on an appliance platform where media """needs""" to
| be protected from the user, then it metastasized over to our
| computers two generations later once it was battle-tested.
| bydo wrote:
| Because they'd still _prefer_ you purchase it, or maybe a
| later version.
|
| In Windows 10, if you don't activate, all that happens is
| that it displays "Unregistered" in the corner and refuses to
| let you change the desktop wallpaper (and you can even get
| around that by rearming the "trial").
| [deleted]
| rationalist wrote:
| Make sure businesses pay?
| josephcsible wrote:
| Didn't the basic product key requirement in Windows 95 take
| care of that?
| rationalist wrote:
| Not if they keep reusing the same key for multiple
| installs?
| dist-epoch wrote:
| You can buy $10 legit keys. You can also get "free" keys from
| a student friend (academic license, ...)
|
| > Kinguin's merchants acquire the codes from wholesalers who
| have surplus copies of Windows they don't need. "It's not a
| gray market. It would be like buying Adidas or Puma or Nike
| from a discounter, from TJ Maxx," Jordan said. "There are no
| legal issues with buying it from us. It's just another
| marketplace."
|
| https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/get-windows-10-free-
| or-...
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > You can buy $10 legit keys
|
| These keys may activate just fine, but they are not "legit"
| in any case. Most turn out to be acquired in illicit ways
| (MSDN licenses, ...), and a couple years ago here in
| Germany this led to massive amounts of criminal cases [1].
|
| [1] https://www.borncity.com/blog/2021/03/05/betrug-mit-
| office-w...
| devnullbrain wrote:
| Price discrimination
| tommek4077 wrote:
| Why the hassle and not just FCKGW-.......?
| kotaKat wrote:
| FCKGW was blacklisted VERY early on with Windows Genuine
| Advantage updates and later service-pack-integrated media would
| block that key in the installer, even.
| tinglymintyfrsh wrote:
| Worth noting Microsoft product keys are/were tied to the channel
| they were sold through, and the difference being 2-3 files on
| install media.
|
| PS: VLK XP doesn't suffer this problem.
|
| Edit: Nice utility to extract product keys from a live system.
| https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/product_cd_key_viewer.html
| EMIRELADERO wrote:
| Shame that it's a closed-source tool. I hope somebody reverse-
| engineers it and releases a web version.
| WarOnPrivacy wrote:
| For a use case of a new XP install, I have clients with DVR
| systems, with a webui that only works in IE.
|
| However, IE mode in Edge comes with 1) an unremovable banner
| warning you to stop using IE mode and 2) an automatic 6 month
| expiration of sites you put in the IE Mode whitelist (supposedly
| overrulable by a GPO - but it's commonly broken).
|
| It turned out to be less trouble to spin up an XP VM and make IE
| available to network users as a Remote App.
| scq wrote:
| There are still ways to use the IE engine on current Windows,
| aside from Edge's IE mode. Namely, there's the WebBrowser
| ActiveX control, which uses the IE engine on all Windows
| versions.
|
| Easily embeddable in a .NET app:
| https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/desktop/winforms/co...
| hsbauauvhabzb wrote:
| You could drop a reverse proxy infront which rewrites the user
| agent, this will probably fox many of the issues.
|
| I'd be cautious about using a DVR for any sensitive situation
| if it's unmaintained if the Dvr is used in sensitive scenarios.
| There would be a significant amount of reputational damage if
| it's ever hacked, particularly if ugly workarounds are used to
| bypass software being totally EOL'd.
| xupybd wrote:
| This will be a big win for industrial machines. I work with some
| that required Win XP to run very old and niche cards that
| interface with CNC machines.
|
| You can run newer computers but they only just work and cost way
| more than they're worth.
|
| It's a real shame you end up in a situation where it's cheaper to
| replace a machine than keep it going just because the software is
| so hard to get working on a new PC and PC hardware has a limited
| life. It's effectively bricking a 6 meter CNC machine. That is a
| lot of machine.
| willcipriano wrote:
| > Microsoft will see fit to release an official XP activation
| tool for posterity.
|
| Free Idea for Microsoft: Windows XP PCs but like those mini
| consoles[0] that have been released recently. Could be preloaded
| with games from the era and intended to be used offline so
| patches don't matter.
|
| [0]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Classic
| rootsudo wrote:
| Ah, yes, link the example that was considered a failure and had
| bestbuy and other big block retailers sell them for $15-20 less
| than 6 months after release. (Maybe 3 months?)
|
| I bought quite a few of them when they were slashed back in
| 2019. $15, free shipping, quite a value. The scene is largely
| ran by 2 redditors now.
| rejectfinite wrote:
| >Could be preloaded with games from the era
|
| So, only Microsoft published ones then. You realise that right?
|
| You can buy and play Windows XP era games on Steam and run them
| just great on Windows 10/11.
|
| FEAR is a great one, released in 2005, still looks and plays
| amazing. https://store.steampowered.com/app/21090/FEAR/
|
| So I have no idea what you mean :)
| nibbleshifter wrote:
| I've been meaning to replay FEAR sometime. Thanks for the
| reminder!
| MrFoof wrote:
| _> You can buy and play Windows XP era games on Steam and run
| them just great on Windows 10/11._
|
| Or older (pre-Steam) games in a virtual machine.
|
| Hyper-V comes with Pro versions of Windows. VMWare has a
| Player that is also free _(plus there 's full Workstation)_.
| There's also VirtualBox, which sometimes is _the_ packaged
| solution for very old titles sold on platforms like GOG.
| Never mind the solutions for Mac OS, Linux and BSD.
|
| Recently my jam is going back to 1994 and playing a game from
| the Windows 3.1/Windows 95 transition era, rife with 16-bit
| libraries -- Mordor: The Depths of Dejenol. A game in which
| it was likely a lot of older folks here _played the crap out
| of the demo_ , but never bought the game because it involved
| sending a check in the mail -- and because even the demo
| could provide hundreds of hours of enjoyment. Though you can
| legitimately buy it online from its current IP owner for
| about $10 _(more if you want a boxed copy!)_ , and it's just
| as fun as I remember it 30 years ago.
|
| And setting it up in a virtual machine? Very straightforward,
| save for digging up some third-party audio library the game
| wanted. I actually just have a 40GB Windows XP VM I just
| maintain with all my old games from DOS and Windows 3.1
| through 2002 or so. I can move it between hypervisors,
| between host OSes, etc. Just works. All my old games always
| ready to go.
| toasteros wrote:
| I am not aware of any titles on GOG that are packaged with
| vortualbox, do you have any examples?
| stonemetal12 wrote:
| I am pretty sure they meant DosBox. GOG is pretty well
| known for using that to support older games.
| dimgl wrote:
| Unfortunately, while it does run on Windows 11, there's a bit
| of light modding you'll have to do in order to get it to be
| stable.
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