Mooney Posted July 17, 2006 Posted July 17, 2006 Well, I recently discovered that developers hate Windows XP sp 1 now, what with PCSX2 running better on sp2 and the WMP 11 beta as well, I just had the thought of upgrading. But, I've heard it can be... evil. So could someone tell me about this Windows Firewall thang and what I should do in order to keep using Bittorrent, P2P, and online gaming?
Robert Posted July 17, 2006 Posted July 17, 2006 Firstly there's the Security Center which is a pain in the ass. But since it's a service you can turn it off. The firewall prevents all incoming connections except for what you allow. It doesn't prevent outgoing though. It works by allowing any communication from the executables you allow to contact the outside world. The evil thing with sp2 is that it only allows 10 simultaneous TCP streams at one time. This can impact multiple torrents. There's a simple patch to fix it though.
Mooney Posted July 17, 2006 Author Posted July 17, 2006 Thanks for the link! Now, before I upgrade: About a year ago when my Mom was getting help from tech support to install our SBC Yahoo! DSL, he told her NOT to upgrade to sp2. Did he know what he was talking about? Or was he just stupid? Is there anything else I should know about sp2?
Agozer Posted July 17, 2006 Posted July 17, 2006 he told her NOT to upgrade to sp2. Did he know what he was talking about? Or was he just stupid? Is there anything else I should know about sp2? Which is why I haven't upgraded either. I don't really know where this uneasiness stems from but I know that a couple of my friends had to reinstall the OS because SP2 flocked their system sideways.
Weirdy Posted July 17, 2006 Posted July 17, 2006 I've never had any problems at all with sp2. In fact, I recommend upgrading for compatability sake (so that programs won't biitch about it in the near future).
Mooney Posted July 17, 2006 Author Posted July 17, 2006 (edited) I recommend upgrading for compatability sake (so that programs won't biitch about it in the near future).<{POST_SNAPBACK}>That's why I considered it in the first place. I dunno... I think I'm gonna take the risk and just DO IT. ...Maybe I'll back up my entire hard drive first. Edited July 17, 2006 by Mooney
Agozer Posted July 17, 2006 Posted July 17, 2006 I recommend upgrading for compatability sake (so that programs won't biitch about it in the near future).That's why I considered it in the first place. I dunno... I think I'm gonna take the risk and just DO IT. ...Maybe I'll back up my entire hard drive first. Nah, just make a recovery spot so you can rollback any changes that SP2 made. I'll probably upgrade sometime as well, but certainly not yet. Do tell me how it went after you've done it.
ken_cinder Posted July 17, 2006 Posted July 17, 2006 Same here, SP2 is fine as long as you disable the security center, and set that damn DEP thing to disabled in your Boot.ini (For those who want to do so, put this in your Boot.ini line for XP BEFORE the fastdetect option.....) /noexecute=AlwaysOff
Weirdy Posted July 17, 2006 Posted July 17, 2006 so on my boot.ini, I would change [operating systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect to [operating systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition" /noexecute=AlwaysOff /fastdetect ?
ken_cinder Posted July 18, 2006 Posted July 18, 2006 Yes, though I'm not sure if XP Home offers DEP. Check under System > Advanced and see if theres a "Data Execution Prevention" tab there.DEP is supposed to disallow non binary data execution, but given the ammount of scripted stuff (Even in some games, especially ones using Java engines.......Chrome comes to mind) it's more of a hinderance than anything, especially when you don't have a CPU with hardware DEP.
James Posted July 18, 2006 Posted July 18, 2006 Yes, though I'm not sure if XP Home offers DEP. Check under System > Advanced and see if theres a "Data Execution Prevention" tab there.DEP is supposed to disallow non binary data execution, but given the ammount of scripted stuff (Even in some games, especially ones using Java engines.......Chrome comes to mind) it's more of a hinderance than anything, especially when you don't have a CPU with hardware DEP.<{POST_SNAPBACK}> It was never a problem for me until I upgraded my mother board and CPU . I had to turn off DEP because it would cause problems just by opening a folder with video files in it . For peoples info http://support.microsoft.com/kb/875352
Mooney Posted July 18, 2006 Author Posted July 18, 2006 Thanks for the link, James. I'll remember to do that when I upgrade.
Shibathedog Posted July 19, 2006 Posted July 19, 2006 yeah once i turned off the firewall/security center/TCP/IP limit SP2 was fine for me, most apps have been upgraded to fully support it by now
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