You’d think the smell alone would put people off, alas not. Microsoft has been killing Windows XP for years and years. For reasons indecipherable by living, thinking minds, Redmond’s zombie wranglers just won’t put Windows XP down, send it to its eternal rest.
Beta News and ZDNet have confirmed a simple registry hack allows continued Windows XP security update through April 9, 2019.
For better and worse, here’s the Windows XP registry hack…
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\WPA\PosReady]
“Installed”=dword:00000001
Run it by double-clicking in Windows Explorer. After this is done, if you run Windows Update, it will find several updates.
ZDNet et al add that this specific hack works only on 32-bit systems, but a 64-bit workaround is available, which may have been Williams’s source for the 32-bit hack.
Is there a catch? Of course there is a catch. While Microsoft acknowledges the hack and that continued updated do provide “some” protection to Windows XP systems, there are gaps:
We recently became aware of a hack that purportedly aims to provide security updates to Windows XP customers. The security updates that could be installed are intended for Windows Embedded and Windows Server 2003 customers and do not fully protect Windows XP customers. Windows XP customers also run a significant risk of functionality issues with their machines if they install these updates, as they are not tested against Windows XP. The best way for Windows XP customers to protect their systems is to upgrade to a more modern operating system, like Windows 7 or Windows 8.1.
And, if you get bitten by a Windows XP machine, make sure apply this hack before sunrise on the following or you, too, will become a zombie…
What’s your take?