Meet the dark side of Windows XP
David Coursey,
Executive Editor, AnchorDesk
Monday, October 22, 2001

I have spent six months using, thinking about, studying, and answering
your questions about Windows XP.

My overall conclusions are positive, but there are some issues that
either need to be resolved or that potential users may not know about or
understand.

So today, at the very beginning of a week of Windows XP mania (at least
as much as Microsoft can generate), I want to introduce you to what I
think of as the "dark side" of Microsoft's new OS.

Here are the specific areas that concern me.

Licensing and cost. If you want to install XP on two computers, you must
buy two copies of the OS. Three computers, three copies, etc. No longer
will you be able to buy one upgrade disk and use it to upgrade all your
computers.

Microsoft points out that this practice was never legal, anyway, but now
they are doing their best to make it impossible. Microsoft does plan to
offer 10 to 15 percent discounts for multiple purchases, but for many
customers that won't reduce the sting very much. I feel like I have said
this a zillion times, but every day I get a few more e-mails asking
about whether you really have to buy a copy for every machine. Yes!
(Office XP allows two copies, by the way.)

Activation. If you buy a new computer with XP pre-installed, you will
probably never be asked to activate the new machine or reactivate it
when you, for some reason, need to reinstall the operating system.
Upgraders, however, will be asked to activate the software either
automatically over the Internet or via telephone. Then, if the software
sees too many changes in your hardware--and thinks you might have moved
the OS to a new machine--it will force you to reactivate, which may
involve a telephone call to Microsoft.

Just the existence of this scheme torques many people, a sentiment of
which Microsoft is well aware. They say they have tried to make this as
easy and painless as possible and will be very reasonable when people
call to reactivate. We'll see.

Firewall woes. Microsoft touts a number of new networking features that
may not work very well for many users until changes can be made. The
video instant messaging and remote support (screen sharing) features
won't make it though any of my home firewalls. Yes, the firewalls
themselves are often to blame--but no matter what's at fault, these
conflicts limit the immediate usefulness of some new features. Will it
be fixed? Probably, but over time.

Wireless troubles. I have had problems with wireless (802.11b)
networking support with XP. Microsoft has done a great deal to make XP
an easy OS to network. And the company's wireless networking support
makes it easy to connect to a wireless access point.

But that won't be a reality for most people until the hardware
manufacturers get caught up. And that may take a while. Even my 3Com
card, which XP includes drivers for, won't install properly for some
reason. Wireless buyers beware! One co-worker warns that he has yet to
get a Linksys wireless router to work with his Dell portable running XP,
although it worked fine with Windows 9x.

Drivers. There are many devices for which XP drivers do not (yet) exist.
That will be a problem for some people. In other cases, "mini" drivers
exist--like the one for my HP printer/scanner/copier/fax--that support
only the most basic features (printing, in this case). While Microsoft
has more drivers ready at release for this OS than any I've ever used
before, some people will not be able to use XP until new drivers appear.


Applications compatibility. Microsoft feels pretty confident that almost
all current best-selling apps will run on XP. But some older ones won't,
and that will create problems for some users. One reader found that
business apps ran fine, but his children's two favorite games didn't.

Home vs. pro. I am a tad concerned about whether some "home" users will
think they actually need the "pro" version, a $100 additional expense
per machine. Time will tell how Microsoft educates people so they make
the proper choices.

Memory. If you are upgrading an older machine and have less than 256MB
of RAM, be sure to buy some memory. But since memory isn't expensive
right now, this isn't the issue it would have been a few years ago. I am
running XP very nicely on a 450MHz Micron Pentium II with 256MB of RAM.

Passport. One of our execs in the ZDNet Reviews group feels Microsoft
tries to use XP to steamroll people into signing up for a .Net Passport,
which has been a subject of much controversy. My recommendation: Take
the Passport, but DON'T sign up for a Hotmail account. I get more porno
spam on that service than any other, and whenever a message arrives, a
notification box appears in the lower right-hand corner of the screen
(annoying). Avoid this by getting a passport.com account rather than a
hotmail.com account.

MSN. Another colleague commented: "XP has more hooks than my
grandfather's fishing hat--all leading to MSN. Whether it's (a push for)
Windows Media Player, Windows Messenger, Passport, or Internet Explorer
6's answer to 404 pages, XP drives a lot of traffic to XP. Those hits
are good for selling ads and selling stuff to consumers. Is this an OS,
or a rip-off version of AOL? Sometimes, XP makes you wonder." (AOL does
pretty much the same thing.)

No MP3 support. If you want to encode files in MP3 format, you must buy
a third-party plug-in for Windows Media Player or some other third-party
software. Why? Microsoft wanted to promote its own Windows Media format,
which is just fine if your player supports it, and didn't want to pay
royalties on millions of copies of XP that would never actually use an
MP3 encoder.

Firewall. I don't use the Microsoft-provided firewall but I have heard
complaints that it doesn't do a particularly good job of firewalling.
Granted, these complaints come from interested parties (like
competitors), but if I were to rely on the free MS firewall I'd want to
read up on it first. Like everything else Microsoft, it will doubtless
be high on hackers' target lists.

AVOIDING THESE ISSUES: Microsoft is making available a free Upgrade
Advisor application that will check to see if your system can be
upgraded to Windows XP Professional. I don't think this poses a problem
for those upgrading to the Home edition. The software--which should also
be available free from retailers--runs a version of the actual XP
install program and checks for incompatibilities, then returns a
sometimes long list of them. You get to decide which apps and devices
need updating to run under the new OS and which you are willing to do
without.

I must tell you that I have been able to generate nothing incredibly
damning about Windows XP. Nevertheless, some of these issues will
probably delay some people from installing it until new drivers appear,
and so forth. The pricing and activation issues are as much political as
technical, and you must make your own decisions there.

You might think the XP team at Microsoft would be unhappy that I spent a
day talking about what I see as the problems with their new baby. To the
contrary, Microsoft is pretty up-front about addressing all these
issues--and if I uncover some they are hiding, I'll report them too.

I VETTED THIS LIST with some very smart people around here and they
couldn't add very much to it--until just before deadline, when I
received an e-mail from a trusted friend detailing his fairly unhappy
eXPeriences so far.

Some of this stuff is specific to his situation and some of it is more
general, but I will include it here in the interests of full
disclosure--with the comment that this isn't typical of the general
feedback I've received.



"David, I would call the dark side more like a black hole. My initial
enthusiasm for the benefits of XP over Windows 9.x and Me has waned
after continued use.

"Yesterday, I got e-mail from a reader with a 15-month-old HP Pavilion
8760c PC. After downloading and running Microsoft's XP compatibility
checker, he found there were no drivers for virtually all of the
integrated components; we're talking basic stuff like video and audio. I
forwarded his message to HP PR, which in part responded, 'We learned
that due to a motherboard issue, this particular model cannot be
upgraded to Windows XP.' Last I checked, Microsoft claimed any PC bought
from holiday 1999 onwards could run Windows XP.

"XP also packs all kinds of cute little gotchas that will keep the
support lines humming with calls. During testing, I ran into what I
thought was a sound-card driver problem on a Gateway home PC. Later on,
when I upgraded a nearly identical system to XP, the sound card wouldn't
work. After troubleshooting, I figured out that the speakers, and not
the sound card, caused the problem. Whoever heard of a problem getting
speakers to work? You just plug them in. Turns out the Boston Acoustic
speakers were digital, and a special box must be checked in the sound
settings to enable the digital speakers."
Thinking about my friend's last comments, I just got a new XP notebook
with dead speakers. Hmmmmm...

ALL THIS WEEK I will be trying to get you up to speed for the XP launch.
Tomorrow and Wednesday, I will update the answers to readers' most-asked
questions about XP. I will distill everything I know about XP into an
essential guide for Thursday's launch, and on Friday I will report on
the launch event itself, including my interviews with very senior MS
executives.

I will also be on CNET Radio talking about XP at 7:45 a.m. PT every day,
do my usual radio hour show at noon on Friday, and be on-air in-between
as well. You may even catch me on CNET Broadband during the week.

So it will be XP until we are all really sick of it this
week--especially regular readers who may miss their usual dose of my
ranting--but there will be so many new and occasional readers arriving
to check out the new OS that I want to do my best to help them get off
to a good start.


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