I think, my colleague was not the only one who perceived Microsoft’s back-and-forth behavior this way. It just makes an unprofessional impression if a company has to withdraw a new product because of technical issues. Some commentators wondered if Microsoft doesn’t test Windows service packs with their own products.

You might remember that when Vista SP1 was released, we had exactly the same situation. Microsoft was forced to postpone its public release because there were incompatibilities with a couple of device drivers from important hardware vendors. Like with the recent incident, only a very small minority of Microsoft customers were affected by those incompatibilities.

I have been complaining a lot before about Microsoft’s information policy regarding service pack release dates. However, I’m beginning to have doubts if those complaints were really justified. I am also seeing now a connection to the slow Vista adoption. The often unfair media coverage might be one explanation. But I think the real reason is that the whole Windows ecosystem is much more complex than it was six years ago when Windows XP was released. There are now so many dependencies between Windows and the rest of the software and hardware industry that even the release of an absolutely harmless service pack for a very mature operating system becomes a real challenge for the biggest software company in town.

There are quite a few analysts who have criticized that Windows Vista is too fat. But I don’t think that this is the real problem. These accusations were also quite popular when Windows 2000/XP came out. I still hear all those voices saying that it doesn’t make sense to unite the consumer version of Windows (95/98/ME) with the corporate edition (Windows NT) because the whole thing will just get too bloated. How can an operating system good for gaming also be an option for the corporate network? All these complaints are long forgotten and Windows XP is everybody’s darling now.

No, I don’t think that Windows is too bloated. The only thing that is too bloated is the whole Windows market. This is the real and the only reason for the slow Vista adoption. Journalists started bashing Vista only after the first adoption numbers were released. That made them feel safe and secured them lots of applause from the early adopters who had to fight with incompatibilities. The reason why those incompatibilities were so problematic is simply because it takes much more time than ever until this giant Windows ecosystem can digest a new operating system version or even a tiny service pack such as XP SP3. And this is the real problem because it makes radical changes (some call them innovations) very difficult. The most interesting question certainly is what can Microsoft do against this bloated Windows market? I must admit, I have no answer to this one.

• Microsoft Management Summit 2012 – What you missed (4)
• Will Windows 8 be a mess or a success? Vista or Windows 95 successor? (14)
• The evolution of Microsoft certification (2)
• What does the ‘R2′ mean in Windows Server 2008 R2? (1)
• Windows 8: The PC is dead, long live the PC (5)

Well, it wasn’t. Then I read that Microsoft’s release date acrobats changed their mind again and published XP SP3 for Technet and MSDN customers. So I logged on with our MSDN account. Guess what? No Windows XP SP3 far and wide. And now I read in this Computerworld article that it will only be available in June for volume licensing customers. So what now? Please, let me know if you were able to spot SP3 on MSDN or Technet.

It is not that I can’t wait to get my hands on this service pack. I already said before that Windows XP SP3 is a real yawner. XP is a dying operating system, so nobody expected revolutionary new features. What I find disturbing is this sloppy, unprofessional attitude. Sorry, if I am repeating myself here. But I am not the only one. Take this Computerworld article where a Microsoft customer is cited:

“Well, that’s just damned ridiculous,” said “Jacobyte666,” who identified himself as a “disgruntled Volume License and TechNet Beta Plus subscriber.”

“I really think [Microsoft] have ‘jumped the shark’ in the last year or so what with the Vista SP1 debacle and now this,” Jacobyte666 went on to say. “I work at a large education site and we’re seeing increasing numbers of Macs being used by IT support staff, teaching staff and students … is it any wonder?”

I just read that Apple sold 2.1 million Macs in the second quarter of 2008, 51% more than last year’s quarter. I do not think that Mac OS X is a better choice. From a technical point of view there is no real alternative to the Windows platform. There is no doubt about that. But it is quite obvious to me that Microsoft has a serious marketing problem. It is this unprofessional behavior which fosters the negative perception of Windows in general.

So my humble advice for Microsoft would be: Publish your release date time table as early as possible as a proper press release instead of giving non-committal information on a Technet forum. The media wouldn’t be forced to speculate about release dates and could just report about the technical advantages of the Microsoft platform.

• Microsoft Management Summit 2012 – What you missed (4)
• Will Windows 8 be a mess or a success? Vista or Windows 95 successor? (14)
• The evolution of Microsoft certification (2)
• What does the ‘R2′ mean in Windows Server 2008 R2? (1)
• Windows 8: The PC is dead, long live the PC (5)

Neowin doesn’t say anything about its source. Usually, such information comes from employees who don’t belong to the HRDC (Holy Release Date Circle). I didn’t count the number of release dates that were published for Vistas SP1 this way. So I am not yet convinced that this information about XP SP3 is really correct.

Sometimes it seems to me that Microsoft doesn’t even have such an “internal schedule” for the release of anything. If there was such a schedule why wouldn’t they just publish it? Because they fear they won’t be able to keep it? Yes, large software projects are very difficult to schedule. There is no doubt about it.

However, my guess about Microsoft’s way to plan release dates is more like this: Mr. Ballmer or someone else from the HRDC gets up after a peaceful night, looks out of the window, enjoys the morning sun, and while stretching he says to himself: “Today is a good day to release a service pack”. Okay, maybe he will read the latest bug statistics about the release candidate that came in last night while drinking his morning coffee to reconfirm his earlier assessment. But if the sun is still shining while he drives to his office, he probably won’t change his mind anyway.

Well, that is the only explanation I have for the fact that Microsoft announces the release date on the very same day they release the service pack. Do you have a better one? You know from internal sources that Mr. Ballmer prefers chamomile tea instead of coffee? Let me know…

• Microsoft Management Summit 2012 – What you missed (4)
• Will Windows 8 be a mess or a success? Vista or Windows 95 successor? (14)
• The evolution of Microsoft certification (2)
• What does the ‘R2′ mean in Windows Server 2008 R2? (1)
• Windows 8: The PC is dead, long live the PC (5)

This service pack is certainly of far less importance than Vista SP1. XP is already very stable and secure since service pack 2. Many won’t really care about the new features such as NAP support or the changes about WGA.

The only purpose of this SP is to simplify deployment of new Windows XP installations. I recently started a Windows XP test machine that wasn’t online since I installed SP2. I didn’t watch the update process all the time, but it must have taken some hours until all patches were downloaded and installed.

I don’t know if SP3 will have any effect on Vista adoption, but one thing is for sure, Microsoft won’t invest much anymore in XP. And I must admit that one reason I would like to get rid of XP is because I am getting bored of it. After I installed SP3, I was thinking of what I could I try now, but there is literally nothing.

Yeah, I am also underwhelmed by this service pack. Of course, that is not really a reason to move to Vista. So I can understand people well who say that XP does everything they need. If only it isn’t so boring. No software compatibility issues, no driver problems, no performance tweaking, not even a little worm that could keep us busy. It is really a pity that XP works so well. I guess that is what it makes it such a bore. Don’t you think so?

• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)
• Windows XP SP3 release date: April 21 – How does Microsoft plan release dates? (4)
• Windows XP SP3 release date? (4)

The news sites are all linking to a blog that published the rumors first. I am calling it rumors because the basis of this information is a bit flimsy. There are just two product change requests mentioning those dates. You might wonder why one should even bother about such doubtful sources?

Actually, I am not blogging about the release dates, but about the news sites. Why do they pounce upon any news regarding release dates of important Microsoft products? Well, the answer is easy. They know that their readers are craving for such information. And you do, too, otherwise you wouldn’t have read this post.

Sometimes I think that this is part of Microsoft’s marketing strategy. The more rumors there are, the more publicity they get. The fact that most of us learned about the Vista SP1 RTM on the very same day that OEMs and system partners received their copies of Vista SP1 proves this assessment. I am quite sure the release date of the RTM was known long before internally.

They come out with such information in pieces so the media have enough time to push out their speculations. Almost all news sites have stories now about customers complaining that Vista SP1 will be available for download only 6 weeks later. These discussions are very valuable for Microsoft’s marketing because it shows the high demand for this service pack. And if everyone wants this SP, it proves that the world is just about to embrace Vista.

This is a bit annoying for those who need such information to plan their work. Perhaps such behavior is forgivable if it’s about the release date of the next Xbox. But for business related products, I would expect a more professional attitude.

• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)
• Windows XP SP3 release date: April 21 – How does Microsoft plan release dates? (4)
• Windows XP SP3 RC2 public download – how boring (6)

I find it a bit strange that false release dates about Microsoft products are published, often. Usually, the authors claim to have this information from Microsoft insiders. Are they just inventing those release dates or are even Microsoft employees sometimes confused about them? The fact that McClaws, a Microsoft employee, mentioned the false ship date in his blog, is an indication for the latter. When he removed this post, I already suspected that it was just a hoax.

Since Service Pack 1 for Vista will probably be released together with Windows Server 2008, I suppose, it will also be available only at the end of February. I think there is a fair chance that Windows XP SP3 will come out around the same time.

• Microsoft Exam 70-640 – DNS Zones – Overview (2)
• Windows Server 2008 Foundation – Why Microsoft’s licensing policy is outdated (3)
• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)

• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)
• Windows XP SP3 release date: April 21 – How does Microsoft plan release dates? (4)
• Windows XP SP3 RC2 public download – how boring (6)

It is not just that the amount of information on this tiny paper about XP SP3 is much less than the five documents about Vista SP1. You can also read this between the lines:

Windows XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) includes all previously released Windows XP updates, including security updates and hotfixes. It also includes select out-of-band releases, and a small number of new enhancements, which do not significantly change customers’ experience with the operating system.

The number of new features is indeed negligible. The support for Network Access Protection (NAP) is the only noteworthy enhancement. Microsoft is forced to add this feature because NAP in Windows Server 2008 would be useless otherwise. Network access control only makes sense if all computers in your network support it.

It is obvious that Microsoft has no more interest in enhancing XP. I suppose, they already regret improving the security in XP with Service Pack 2. Those customers who say that XP is enough for running Word and Internet Explorer would probably have a different opinion if they read on a weekly basis about its serious security holes. It seems Windows security is not really a topic anymore. The fact that Vista offers much better security than XP SP2 is often not even mentioned in discussions about the better OS.

So Microsoft’s only option is to dry out XP. In the future, new features will only be added to Vista and not to XP, anymore. This will become more obvious when Windows Server 2008 comes out. Many new features in Windows Server 2008 make sense only if you have Vista in your network.

• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)
• Windows XP SP3 release date: April 21 – How does Microsoft plan release dates? (4)
• Windows XP SP3 RC2 public download – how boring (6)

All you have to do is run WindowsXPSP3Hack.cmd. It will add some registry keys which will make Windows Update believe that you are a member of the private beta program. Then, you launch Windows Update (via Windows help) to download Windows XP SP3.

I had to install two other updates before the service pack showed up. I think, it has about 70MB. Download was pretty fast in the beginning, but it then it got stuck, somehow. Installation was not a big deal. Unfortunately, I couldn’t really make out this performance boost afterwards.

I found this nice trick at Silozopedia. By the way, there is a similar hack for Windows Vista SP1.

• What you have to know about Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 (0)
• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)
• Windows XP SP3 release date: April 21 – How does Microsoft plan release dates? (4)

I don’t know if 10% could be called a “performance boost”. I am pretty sure that you won’t be able tell the difference during normal PC work. What I find more interesting, however, is that they used the same machine from their Vista SP1 performance test.

I have been criticizing before that it doesn’t make much sense to test the performance of Vista on a machine with less than 2GB RAM. Some readers have raised doubts about my assessment. So I want take this chance to clarify my point.

Imagine someone tried to find out if Service Pack 1 for Windows XP improved the speed or not. The “researcher” has a laptop in his “research lab” which runs just fine with Windows NT 4.0. It has 128MB RAM which is more than enough for NT. Since he would like to know if he could run XP on this laptop after SP1 has been released he runs his test on this machine.

I think you don’t have to understand much about Windows to predict the result of this test. Of course, XP will get hardly off the ground with 128MB RAM and no service pack in the world could change this. There were about 5 years between the release of Windows NT 4.0 and Windows XP and Microsoft needed the same time to develop Windows Vista.

So the situation is exactly the same. If you really want to know if a service pack is helpful for the performance of an OS or not, then you have to use adequate hardware for your test.

• Troubleshoot slow logon – Part 2: The 3-headed monster (0)
• Troubleshoot slow logon – Part 1: Profile size (0)
• How to disable the Shutdown Event Tracker in Windows Server 2008 R2 (1)
• FREE: Smart Defrag – A defragmentation tool (9)
• FREE: NovaBench – Free benchmark software (1)

• Service Pack 3 will be the last SP for Windows XP.
• As usual this SP can be installed on a fresh Windows XP without installing prior service packs first.
• Why did Microsoft wait for over three years to release SP3? Simply because everyone was working on Vista.
• New features: Network Access Protection (NAP) support, product key-less install option, a new kernel module for several different cryptographic algorithms, “black hole router” detection (router that incorrectly reports their network path information).
• Release date of Windows XP SP3: second quarter of 2008, or three months after the release of Windows Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008.

There is certainly nothing revolutionary in this service pack. Of course, Microsoft wants everyone to migrate to Vista now. They already made the mistake of adding too many new features with SP2. Thus, many think that an upgrade to Vista is not necessary just because of the improved security.

• What you have to know about Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 (0)
• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)
• Windows XP SP3 release date: April 21 – How does Microsoft plan release dates? (4)

• What you have to know about Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 (0)
• Tweets: Windows 7 video fake – Sysprep for Windows XP SP3 (0)
• The Windows XP SP3 confusion – Is Windows bloated or its market? (6)
• Is Windows XP SP3 available or not? (16)
• Windows XP SP3 release date: April 21 – How does Microsoft plan release dates? (4)