Why do you still use 9X

[JustinStacey.x]

Well lets look at reality. We live in a capitalist society. A society that is dependent on products being sold and replace by

uneeded newer products. Without this continues chain of buying and selling we cannot have the toys we like to play with.

Thanks to this capitalism, we have to buy these new products to suite the needs of our work lives. Buyers, sellers, fixers, users, presentors, of the sorts needs to upgrade to suite the needs of there dou-do brained employers or employees who no matter what will ask for the newer version.

Yeah, that's called progress. If progress wasn't forced, and competition wasn't forced (like Microsoft) we would all still be stuck in the stone age. If people still used methods of living that they 'preferred', humans wouldn't have evolved to the state we are in today, period. Some kind of progress needs to be forced otherwise we would literally be stuck in a loop. Progress and saying goodbye to defunct products while seeing in new products is part of life. by all means document the past and keep a record of it (This is why I like urban exploration, for instance) but don't dwell on it forever. Retrocomputing is *not* always suitable for present-day mission critical computing.

If they did then we all would still be using DOS to watch DVD and playing high-tech ( AKA high end ) games on the

Amiga or Win1.0.

Exactly my point! If everyone was still using DOS because it was all what we preferred, we'd think it was all that and wouldn't be making the same amount of progress that we do nowadays. We wouldn't know there was potential for anything better, and any possibilities brought to us by newer computer technology (such as medical breakthroughs and ways of tackling crime) wouldn't be/have been possible. If you like retrocomputing, fine, I am cool with that. I even partake in it somewhat myself, and most of my computers are at least 5 years old. But it is *not* a means to an end, and I wish people could see this. Technology is always improving, and if the whole world remained stuck in the past waiting for the Langoliers, this world would be a very stagnant one.

Edited August 4, 2009 by JustinStacey.x

[John305]

"herbalist" I've been an ASAP member for the last 4+ years. In that time, I've battled and removed more malicious code than most users will ever see, most of it from XP. Do you think maybe that is because no ones uses 98 anymore and that 90 % of pc's have xp. It’s a fact the more people using software more errors show up. I guess you have not had many calls to repair win 98 pc's. As for old dos games I started on dos 5 and don’t really want to play those games when I can play far cry 2. Technology changes every month we are supposed to be able to pass these new changes on to users so they know what is available whether it’s a free av solution or new hardware and yes I am sorry to say they cant buy a pc running win 98 well really I am glad lol. A nt based os you have to reboot hmm like once every month and some go a lot longer than that, win 98 about every 3 hours.

[GrofLuigi]

This thread has evolved to "I don't use 9x and neither should you".

Somebody could at least change the thread title...

GL

[JustinStacey.x]

This thread has evolved to "I don't use 9x and neither should you".

Somebody could at least change the thread title...

GL

Not at all. It's evolved into a debate between two types of people: Those who think Windows 9x is secure, and those who know it isn't. I couldn't give a rats a** who uses Windows 9x, or who drives their car upside down. What does bug me is ill informed facts. Windows 9x is nowhere near as secure or robust as NT. PERIOD.

[Sl@y3D for my n@me]

This thread has evolved to "I don't use 9x and neither should you".

Somebody could at least change the thread title...

GL

I agree. All I see here is a bunch of NT users claiming that NT is far better than 9x, and that all 9x users use that because they are stubborn, misinformed or delusional about how well their OS works.

I used 98SE from 1999 to around 2007, and I can say with conviction that I had no problems with it, at all. I certainly didn't get hacked, I didn't have viruses. What are these random 3 hour reboots you talk about? I certainly didn't have them, and the primary function of my PC was gaming. I did see the blue screen of death, but very rarely, perhaps once a month at most. Same as my experiences with XP and Vista.

One fundamental problem I see here in this thread is that a lot of people are talking about NT and 9x from a techys point of view. What kind of average user would know how to lock down their systems? Let's not take someone dumb, who would install anything from anywhere, but someone who knows a little about internet security and phishing, all that good stuff. If I asked him about group policy, what would he say? What about local security policy? No? Firewall, he probably would understand, but wouldn't know how to install one.

Windows NT systems have been made infamous for their remote security breaches. The release of Windows 2000 was plagued by things like Code Red, countless other malwares all targeting 2000. XP could be hacked in, what, a few minutes at one point, with SP1. Now, I must admit that they have cleaned up their acts nicely with SP2, with new security technologies and a basic firewall built-in. What is my point?

9x wasn't susceptible to these online threats. Before anyone complains about security through obscurity, 98 was the dominant operating system of the day. Now, 9x continues on today with no widely publicised remote hacking attempts, without requiring a Service Pack 2. Yes, I understand that Outlook Express and Internet Explorer have been subject to many security issues, but they required running executable code or opening an e-mail, or some such activity. I won't justify those apps, they're horrible.

Now understand that I am not bashing NT security today. With proper configuration and patching, NT systems can be just as secure as any 9x system out there. Quite equally, 9x systems have the potential to get hacked -- just not by default. NT systems have a larger, professional set of internet features. It's a tradeoff between security and functionality.

And yes, I am very well aware how easy it is to double click an executable on 9x and have your computer teeming with crap. With admin access, you could do that to any version of Windows. That's how it works, easy third party application support.

Thank you for reading, and NT users, please don't take this as me bashing you. If it's misinformed, do inform me.

[cannie]

Thank you for reading, and NT users, please don't take this as me bashing you. If it's misinformed, do inform me.

Since long ago I use both and I can assure you that this way you enjoy all the advantages of each of them two, increased by a rockhard security coming from the possibility of an instant repair of any damage.

But most computer users don't have the slightest idea of what they have in their hands, and that's the greatest asset for the computing industry.

Edited August 4, 2009 by cannie

[JustinStacey.x]

I agree. All I see here is a bunch of NT users claiming that NT is far better than 9x.

If better means more secure by design, more stable, not as leaky as a bottomless ship with resources and with a hybrid tamperproof kernel not based on the monolithic architecture, then yes, a lot of us here are saying NT is 'better' than 9x.

What are these random 3 hour reboots you talk about? I certainly didn't have them, and the primary function of my PC was gaming. I did see the blue screen of death, but very rarely, perhaps once a month at most. Same as my experiences with XP and Vista.

Something's not right. Windows shouldn't crash that often. One thing I could *never* get to work in Windows 98 was standby. The PC would never wake up. Nor would it ever work in a stable manner until I removed IE and its shell. Completely. It would simply leak itself out of addressable resources within hours. I'd do my usual, stay up until 2 or 3 in the morning, leave a crapload of programs open on my desktop, and fall asleep. I'd wake up in the morning to find a screenfull of MSN IMs. Which had consequently ran the machine out of GDI resources and f*cked it. So I had to force reboot. Or, I could just avoid all 98s crap and install 95, one of the best OSes of its time made by MS. But alas, with 95 came p*** poor USB support or none at all, and rubbish application support. Some apps just worked better on 98.

One fundamental problem I see here in this thread is that a lot of people are talking about NT and 9x from a techys point of view. What kind of average user would know how to lock down their systems? Let's not take someone dumb, who would install anything from anywhere, but someone who knows a little about internet security and phishing, all that good stuff. If I asked him about group policy, what would he say? What about local security policy? No? Firewall, he probably would understand, but wouldn't know how to install one.

Lol. What kind of average driver knows how to control the car like a pro? Not many. Does this mean the car is inadequate? Of course it doesn't. The design is there, the possibilities are there. How it is used/setup does not fundamentally change anything. Windows 9x has a flat memory model with absolutely no segregation of system, kernel, and user. This does not equal security. This can not equal security. This is an oxymoron to security. It is nothing but consumer based basic design principle. Oh wait. It's bad design. All of the major OSes of its day were. Linux at that stage was still being born and Windows and Mac OS were both single user systems with no security whatsoever. Anything else was either a lucky find but incompatible with everything or unintelligible unless you had a degree in *NIX commands.

Windows NT systems have been made infamous for their remote security breaches. The release of Windows 2000 was plagued by things like Code Red, countless other malwares all targeting 2000. XP could be hacked in, what, a few minutes at one point, with SP1. Now, I must admit that they have cleaned up their acts nicely with SP2, with new security technologies and a basic firewall built-in. What is my point?

And Windows 9x systems have been made infamous for the fact that they crash constantly, randomly need rebooted due to resource leakage or becoming unstable for no apparent reason. Some members of this forum will state that Windows 98/ME can be made very stable with some tweaks and I too can testify to this as I have used 98lite and IEradicator in the past. You have to tweak 98 to make it stable, which is acceptable by the 9x community, but its unnacceptable to them the fact that you have to tweak NT to take advantage of its security? How ironic.

Now understand that I am not bashing NT security today. With proper configuration and patching, NT systems can be just as secure as any 9x system out there. Quite equally, 9x systems have the potential to get hacked -- just not by default. NT systems have a larger, professional set of internet features. It's a tradeoff between security and functionality.

Lol lol. Lol lol lol lol.

If it's misinformed, do inform me.

See above.

Edited August 4, 2009 by JustinStacey.x

[puntoMX]

So not to go off the bat and how culture is destroyed by this so called lust for technolgy ( lust for means of living, MONEY ) I will explain why I still use 9X.

No one will really stop you to move to your own farm and grow the vegetables to stay alive and pump water out of the ground your self. One investment you make and you can live from it your whole life IF you know how to handle it . This can be done at age 4 and up...

[BenoitRen]

The NT lovers aren't listening, like usual, just regurgitating their points. I invite them to check older threads, in which the Win9x users have successfully rebutted their points many times.

And Windows 9x systems have been made infamous for the fact that they crash constantly, randomly need rebooted due to resource leakage or becoming unstable for no apparent reason.

Which was mostly due to the forced integration of IE.

It's easy to say "says you", but it's easy to get past local security in NT. There are backdoors, and Microsoft knows about them. But they won't patch them until they're publicly exposed, as usual. A good friend of mine used to be in a hacker group, and can get admin status in ANY NT computer in a matter of seconds. No joke.

[JustinStacey.x]

The NT lovers aren't listening, like usual, just regurgitating their points.

It's really the only way to get the message through is to rinse and repeat.

Which was mostly due to the forced integration of IE.

IE was also 'forcefully integrated' just as much if not moreso in Windows 2000 and XP systems, but they didn't suffer a fraction of the laughable stability outcome of 98. OHWAIT. 2000 and XP are NT based. Snap.

It's easy to say "says you", but it's easy to get past local security in NT. There are backdoors, and Microsoft knows about them. But they won't patch them until they're publicly exposed, as usual. A good friend of mine used to be in a hacker group, and can get admin status in ANY NT computer in a matter of seconds. No joke.

Wait -- some of you guys are arguing that NT remote security sucks, now you're saying local security does too?

I'd invite you (or anyone) over to sunny Scotland to come to my Windows computer right now at the 'Press CTRL-ALT-DEL' screen to hack into it 'in a matter of seconds' and gain admin rights. I'll get the kettle on. Given all my user accounts are password protected, good luck with that. What did one have to do to elude the 'security' of a password protected account in 98? Right, press the escape key.

[GrofLuigi]

I'd invite you (or anyone) over to sunny Scotland to come to my Windows computer right now at the 'Press CTRL-ALT-DEL' screen to hack into it 'in a matter of seconds' and gain admin rights. I'll get the kettle on. Given all my user accounts are password protected, good luck with that. What did one have to do to elude the 'security' of a password protected account in 98? Right, press the escape key.

If escape is allowed, then using the keyboard is.

If CTRL-ALT-DEL is allowed, maybe someone could press it twice (reboot needed).

Now only if a way was found to pop a CD in, game over.

GL

[JustinStacey.x]

See... We're just getting into semantics here. My next argument would be that a bios/hard drive level password stops boot CDs from being used to tinker with the machine. The next argument could then involve flashing the BIOS to remove this layer of protection... but it's all beyond the scope of the argument since boot CDs are used outwith the Operating System and are nothing to do with them therefore it is moot. We are talking about security WITHIN the OS... this is starting to head in the direction of PC security and will ultimately boil down to 'lets all switch our PCs off, bury them 6 feet under the ground, and let's all go home'.

Post edited to remove some comments that could be perceived as aggressive: I want to keep this as friendly as possible.

Edited August 4, 2009 by JustinStacey.x

[CoffeeFiend]

The NT lovers aren't listening, like usual, just regurgitating their points. I invite them to check older threads, in which the Win9x users have successfully rebutted their points many times.

The Win9x lovers aren't listening, like usual, just regurgitating their non-points. I invite them to check older posts in this very thread, in which the Win9x users have successfully rebutted their non-points many times.

If it's that easy to find such infos that proves us wrong, you're also welcome to copy/paste them here. So far those "points" Win9x'ers have made have been for the most part delusional nonsense (the latest bit being that "With proper configuration and patching, NT systems can be just as secure as any 9x system out there." that JustinStacey.x already quoted - I laughed out loud)

Now only if a way was found to pop a CD in, game over.

Not if you use EFS or BitLocker. It's no help at all then. Yep, only game over for Win9x. Oh wait, you didn't even need to pop in a CD for that. And BTW, double ctrl-alt-del doesn't actually do anything in Vista/Win7 either (don't have a XP box anymore, can't check for sure)

[GrofLuigi]

Now only if a way was found to pop a CD in, game over.

Not if you use EFS or BitLocker. It's no help at all then. Yep, only game over for Win9x. Oh wait, you didn't even need to pop in a CD for that.

I hope you're sure that Bitlocker won't lock you out just as easily as me. Actually, I expect you to be sure, but I would never use such a thing myself. (Not really an argument, I know. ) I really don't want to repeat all over again the terms like "out of the box" and "average user", but if you insist, we can create a poll on how many ppl use Bitlocker/EFS in real life.

And BTW, double ctrl-alt-del doesn't actually do anything in Vista/Win7 either (don't have a XP box anymore, can't check for sure)

Reverse here, but I hope there is a way to restart Vista/Win7 with a keyboard.

And (most) bios passwords can be reset by pulling the battery out. There were also some lists circulating of the built-in passwords. Anyway, that hypothetical PC is becoming more of a locked down machine than an average one, so I think the OS doesn't matter any more. Hell, you could zip your files with a really long password and be done with it. What I wanted to say, the constant escalation in this thread doesn't lead to anything constructive and nobody is gonna change his mind, so what's the point? I think most of the users of this board with more than 10 posts have good knowledge of pros and cons of both (generations of) operating systems, so there's no education either.

GL

[herbalist]

I'd invite you (or anyone) over to sunny Scotland to come to my Windows computer right now at the 'Press CTRL-ALT-DEL' screen to hack into it 'in a matter of seconds' and gain admin rights. I'll get the kettle on. Given all my user accounts are password protected, good luck with that. What did one have to do to elude the 'security' of a password protected account in 98? Right, press the escape key.

The escape key bypass can be removed with a simple registry change.

REGEDIT4
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Network\Logon]
"MustBeValidated"=hex:01,00,00,00

I could issue that same challenge for my FE box. Without the login password, the only way in would be to reset the BIOS. For that, you'll have to open the case. Safe mode boot is disabled. It doesn't look for a floppy or CD at bootup.

Same old default settings issues.