Windows XP Sunset

Rip · Post by **Rip** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 4:40 pm

Blackhawk wrote:I'm not a writer anymore. I don't really need Office - I may just make the switch to Open Office.

On the other hand, reading the installation instructions for Open Office on Linux is making my head spin.

Windows: Double click the .exe, accept.

Ubuntu: Just type in...

sudo apt-get remove --purge libreoffice* libexttextcat-data* && sudo apt-get autoremove

cd /tmp

wget

tar -xvf Apache_OpenOffice*.tar.gz

sudo dpkg -i en-US/DEBS/*.deb

sudo dpkg -i en-US/DEBS/desktop-integration/*.deb
Is it seriously like this to install everything in Linux? If so, I'm seriously doubting installing it.

Using a desktop there are easier app ways of doing it. Linux geeks being gearheads are prone to using command prompts to do everything so that is what you find the most instructions for. No reason to panic.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 5:37 pm

The problem is that every time I seek a solution to a problem, the answers are entirely in code.

/edit - for instance, I have Mint installed now. The menus are blank and while I have sound, it only comes out of one speaker for my 2.1 speaker setup.

Trying to update my ATI drivers. This gives me a .run file, which apparently doesn't actually run. Everything I've seen on what to do with it involves lines and lines of code, which, when entered, just give errors.

hitbyambulance · Post by **hitbyambulance** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 5:41 pm

Blackhawk, those are unnecessary instructions. Ubuntu (and Mint, i'm pretty sure) comes with LibreOffice by default, so you can just use that. (it's a fork from OpenOffice.)

also, you don't need to deal with the command line for most popular applications - you can get them installed through the Ubuntu Software Center.

i use Linux on a daily basis - PM me if you have further questions. what is the hardware you're installing on?

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 5:47 pm

hitbyambulance wrote:what is the hardware you're installing on?

From memory (as I have no clue how to check now)

Pentium 4
2 GB RAM
Soundblaster Audigy 2
ATI X300 video card

hitbyambulance · Post by **hitbyambulance** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 5:51 pm

Blackhawk wrote:
hitbyambulance wrote:what is the hardware you're installing on?
From memory (as I have no clue how to check now)

Pentium 4
2 GB RAM
Soundblaster Audigy 2
ATI X300 video card

i forget - is it a self-built machine or a branded box?

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 5:58 pm

A little of each. It is a Dell that was given to me, for which I swapped a few parts.

hitbyambulance · Post by **hitbyambulance** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 6:02 pm

you're probably going to have to disable visual effects for that video card - should solve the 'slow refresh' issue. actually, start up in 'GNOME fallback' mode - that will be a necessity for your old machine.

ACTUALLY... install Lubuntu instead of Ubuntu. that will work much better.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Lubuntu

Anonymous Bosch · Post by **Anonymous Bosch** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 6:05 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote:The nice thing right now is that you don't have a whole lot of time or data invested. You can reformat freely and try out various distros.

A nicer thing is that many distros are available as live CDs/DVDs or a live USB flash drive. A 'live' disc means that it's a complete bootable operating system which can run in your system's memory, rather than loading from a hard disk drive (but if booting from a live disc, the disc itself is read-only). So if you'd like to try a different distro, you don't even need to reformat and install. Booting from a live disc will not typically perform quite as well as installing the OS to your hard drive. But it does let you get the feel of various distros without needing to reformat and install it or making any changes to your system.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 6:12 pm

hitbyambulance wrote:you're probably going to have to disable visual effects for that video card - should solve the 'slow refresh' issue. actually, start up in 'GNOME fallback' mode - that will be a necessity for your old machine.

ACTUALLY... install Lubuntu instead of Ubuntu. that will work much better.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Lubuntu

I'm not on Ubuntu. I'm using Mint now.

The rest - how do I disable visual effects? My menus are all blank, so I can't brows for settings.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 6:22 pm

Hell, I can't even figure out how to reboot this thing without having access to the menus.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Wed Mar 19, 2014 6:43 pm

I hate sounding like somebody's grandfather, but at this point I just need a working machine. I'm going to reinstall XP for now, and just write off my only free day in a three week period.

I love the idea of Linux, but the more I see and the more I read, the more I feel like it wasn't designed for the typical end user. It was designed for IT folks and techheads. It gives the user a ton of power and control (at the cost of user-friendliness), but most people don't need that level of power and control.

hentzau · Post by **hentzau** » Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:04 am

Apparently they're going through and doing a printer refresh at work, because the printer near me just disappeared overnight on Tuesday. I had someone come by yesterday looking for the printer, and when they couldn't find it, asked me if I knew where it was. I told them that it ran on Windows XP and that it needed to be replaced. They actually believed me.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Thu Mar 20, 2014 9:17 am

hentzau wrote:Apparently they're going through and doing a printer refresh at work, because the printer near me just disappeared overnight on Tuesday. I had someone come by yesterday looking for the printer, and when they couldn't find it, asked me if I knew where it was. I told them that it ran on Windows XP and that it needed to be replaced. They actually believed me.

Don't tease the normals. It's not nice.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Thu Apr 03, 2014 10:12 am

Microsoft just took an extra step to disable MSE on XP.

Despite them continuing to release updates and definitions for MSE until next year, they have, as of this morning, set MSE to permanently show an amber warning and 'potentially unprotected' status on XP because the OS is out of date.

This essentially kills MSE, as it is now impossible to tell when there is an actual issue. It is like a smoke alarm that goes off 24/7 - you can't tell when there is an actual fire anymore.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Fri Apr 04, 2014 5:45 pm

Well, they replaced the boss's laptop with a desktop...running XP.

And they installed Office 2007...without Excel. How is that even possible? PPT, Word, Outlook, Access...but no Excel.

Yeah, we'll be ready for sunset. Of the tequilla variety.

Rip · Post by **Rip** » Fri Apr 04, 2014 6:30 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote:Well, they replaced the boss's laptop with a desktop...running XP.

And they installed Office 2007...without Excel. How is that even possible? PPT, Word, Outlook, Access...but no Excel.

Yeah, we'll be ready for sunset. Of the tequilla variety.

Wow, I can fathom people dragging ass to replace an XP system, but what kind of idiot actually installs an XP system at this point.

Anonymous Bosch · Post by **Anonymous Bosch** » Fri Apr 04, 2014 8:04 pm

Blackhawk wrote:Microsoft just took an extra step to disable MSE on XP.

Despite them continuing to release updates and definitions for MSE until next year, they have, as of this morning, set MSE to permanently show an amber warning and 'potentially unprotected' status on XP because the OS is out of date.

This essentially kills MSE, as it is now impossible to tell when there is an actual issue. It is like a smoke alarm that goes off 24/7 - you can't tell when there is an actual fire anymore.

FWIW, Leo Laporte offers some worthy advice on keeping Windows XP secure after the April deadline:

Leo Laporte (AKA The Tech Guy) wrote:
Install Windows XP's final update.

Use Windows XP as a "limited user."
By default, user accounts in Windows are "administrator," meaning the user can install programs and make system changes. Downgrading the account will prevent programs that may be malicious from getting access to the system.

That second item is a fairly simple precaution that can significantly reduce the malware-vulnerability of the typical XP system. Alas, running as a Limited User in XP does tend to be a bit more hassle than in Windows 7 or 8, though; e.g. here's a KB list of programs that may not function properly when logged on as a Limited User in XP (many of which are older games). However, you can usually work around such problematic behaviour by granting Administrative access to individual programs by the following steps in the aforementioned KB list. So if your system's configuration rarely changes, it's definitely worth considering running as a Limited User, as that would offer MUCH better protection against malware than MSE.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Fri Apr 04, 2014 8:59 pm

I still plan on upgrading my bedroom system to 7 as soon as I can find a spare $100 (which may be a while, especially given a surprise medical bill today.) One of the systems will be on my LAN, but (if I can figure out how) will be blocked from the internet, as it is only used to watch pre-downloaded videos with the family and for the occasional Minecraft session on the LAN.

The last machine is still going to be a problem, but between limiting the account (already done), switching to a different antivirus, and continuing to practice safe browsing, there isn't a whole lot I can do for it.

Rip · Post by **Rip** » Fri Apr 04, 2014 11:33 pm

Blackhawk wrote:I still plan on upgrading my bedroom system to 7 as soon as I can find a spare $100 (which may be a while, especially given a surprise medical bill today.) One of the systems will be on my LAN, but (if I can figure out how) will be blocked from the internet, as it is only used to watch pre-downloaded videos with the family and for the occasional Minecraft session on the LAN.

The last machine is still going to be a problem, but between limiting the account (already done), switching to a different antivirus, and continuing to practice safe browsing, there isn't a whole lot I can do for it.

Just use a static IP and don't enter a gateway address. Best and easiest way to have full local LAN access without internet access.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Fri Apr 04, 2014 11:34 pm

I don't think I'm going to scrape together enough scratch for a good replacement laptop ($800-ish). Probably ought to be looking for an adequate one (sub $500) instead.

Anyone got any off-the-cuff recommendations for a good deal on a win7 machine right now? It's primarily a business machine to run quickbooks, ms office, etc. I'd like to press it into gaming service on rare occasions if I can.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Sat Apr 05, 2014 1:45 am

Rip wrote:
Blackhawk wrote:I still plan on upgrading my bedroom system to 7 as soon as I can find a spare $100 (which may be a while, especially given a surprise medical bill today.) One of the systems will be on my LAN, but (if I can figure out how) will be blocked from the internet, as it is only used to watch pre-downloaded videos with the family and for the occasional Minecraft session on the LAN.

The last machine is still going to be a problem, but between limiting the account (already done), switching to a different antivirus, and continuing to practice safe browsing, there isn't a whole lot I can do for it.
Just use a static IP and don't enter a gateway address. Best and easiest way to have full local LAN access without internet access.

Thanks. I think I even know how to pull that one off.

hitbyambulance · Post by **hitbyambulance** » Sun Apr 06, 2014 1:19 am

Kraken wrote:Anyone got any off-the-cuff recommendations for a good deal on a win7 machine right now? It's primarily a business machine to run quickbooks, ms office, etc. I'd like to press it into gaming service on rare occasions if I can.

Dell refurbished! you'll get much more machine for the money.

gilraen · Post by **gilraen** » Sun Apr 06, 2014 1:26 am

hitbyambulance wrote:
Kraken wrote:Anyone got any off-the-cuff recommendations for a good deal on a win7 machine right now? It's primarily a business machine to run quickbooks, ms office, etc. I'd like to press it into gaming service on rare occasions if I can.
Dell refurbished! you'll get much more machine for the money.

You can check TigerDirect for refurbished Win 7 machines - a lot of Dell and HP ones to choose from (since they usually come from corporate leases so there's bucketloads of them in the market).

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Sun Apr 06, 2014 2:38 am

gilraen wrote:
hitbyambulance wrote:
Kraken wrote:Anyone got any off-the-cuff recommendations for a good deal on a win7 machine right now? It's primarily a business machine to run quickbooks, ms office, etc. I'd like to press it into gaming service on rare occasions if I can.
Dell refurbished! you'll get much more machine for the money.
You can check TigerDirect for refurbished Win 7 machines - a lot of Dell and HP ones to choose from (since they usually come from corporate leases so there's bucketloads of them in the market).

I will try Tiger. I spent half an hour on the Dell Outlet site a few days ago...Dell's coupon game makes it a nightmare to shop. I finally found a Latitude at $1239 that should have triggered a coupon for $500 off any Latitude over $1235. The code was on the Outlet's main page. But it came up invalid with no explanation. The coupon excluded "new" machines...maybe refurbs count as "new"?

After spending that much time finding a qualifying machine only to be told that it didn't qualify for unspecified reasons, I gave up and left. You really can't buy a Dell without a coupon code and they really make it a pain in the ass.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Sun Apr 06, 2014 3:18 am

I'll miss XP. It was a great system. I've liked them all except 3.1 and Win95. I was a DOS gamer in the early 90's. Windows just took up memory and slowed me down. We found ways to not load Windows and that saved me a ton of resources. I disliked 95 for a few reasons but mainly because it killed off my beloved DOS gaming. Then I went to 98 then 98 SE which was a beast. Then on to Win ME which worked pretty much fine for me and not others...pretty much. Then Win XP now Win 7....I skipped Vista and will skip Win 8.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Mon Apr 07, 2014 4:23 pm

Spent a couple of hours last night shopping Dell Outlet, Tiger, Newegg, Best Buy, Staples, and one or two other places looking for a Dell, HP, or Lenovo laptop with Win7 and at least 6 GB RAM.

Man, was that ever a depressing couple of hours.

Best deal I found was an Inspiron at Staples for $550. Not a fabulous rig but it should meet my business needs for a few years, anyway, and still be capable of some lightweight gaming. I will probably pull the trigger on that tomorrow unless somebody throws a red flag.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Mon Apr 07, 2014 4:34 pm

It's a win8 machine and a refurb but you can deal with it. Integrated graphics though.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Apr 07, 2014 4:46 pm

Kraken wrote:Spent a couple of hours last night shopping Dell Outlet, Tiger, Newegg, Best Buy, Staples, and one or two other places looking for a Dell, HP, or Lenovo laptop with Win7 and at least 6 GB RAM.

Man, was that ever a depressing couple of hours.

Best deal I found was an Inspiron at Staples for $550. Not a fabulous rig but it should meet my business needs for a few years, anyway, and still be capable of some lightweight gaming. I will probably pull the trigger on that tomorrow unless somebody throws a red flag.

Inspiron laptops are absolute garbage in my experience and I sure wouldn't count on having one for a few years. I have 5 of them around the 17R came out sitting on a shelf here and every one was PoS.

For a laptop, I don't think you can beat the bang for the buck in a Lenovo as long as you are looking at their "specials."

My experience with the ideapads and thinkpads has been mostly good when is comes reliability. However the one machine that we had break was misery. The warranty was depot only and they had them machine for over three weeks and didn't fix it. I imagine all depot warranties are pretty bad but this was sheer misery. But one machine out of 20 or more needing a warranty repair over the last nearly three years isn't bad at all for lap reliability.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Mon Apr 07, 2014 4:48 pm

I skipped right over the laptop part, oops.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Mon Apr 07, 2014 6:24 pm

coopasonic wrote:It's a win8 machine and a refurb but you can deal with it. Integrated graphics though.

From the tech specs:

Laptop Operating System Windows 7
Laptop Refurbished No

Integrated graphics is no biggie as it won't do much gaming.

LordMortis wrote:
Inspiron laptops are absolute garbage in my experience and I sure wouldn't count on having one for a few years. I have 5 of them around the 17R came out sitting on a shelf here and every one was PoS.

For a laptop, I don't think you can beat the bang for the buck in a Lenovo as long as you are looking at their "specials."

My wife has a long happy history with Inspirons, although she always manages to destroy them, usually violently, within 2-3 years. I also have a very long and satisfactory history with Dells. My current Vostro is going on 6 years old, although I never liked it very much and wouldn't buy another one.

All of the Lenovos I saw were either 2 GB RAM Win8 machines or way out of my price range ($800 max, $500 preferred). If I could find a Lenovo with 6+ GB and Win7 for under $800 I'd probably snap that up.

LordMortis · Post by **LordMortis** » Mon Apr 07, 2014 6:52 pm

Kraken wrote:
coopasonic wrote:It's a win8 machine and a refurb but you can deal with it. Integrated graphics though.
From the tech specs:

Laptop Operating System Windows 7
Laptop Refurbished No

Integrated graphics is no biggie as it won't do much gaming.

LordMortis wrote:
Inspiron laptops are absolute garbage in my experience and I sure wouldn't count on having one for a few years. I have 5 of them around the 17R came out sitting on a shelf here and every one was PoS.

For a laptop, I don't think you can beat the bang for the buck in a Lenovo as long as you are looking at their "specials."

My wife has a long happy history with Inspirons, although she always manages to destroy them, usually violently, within 2-3 years. I also have a very long and satisfactory history with Dells. My current Vostro is going on 6 years old, although I never liked it very much and wouldn't buy another one.

All of the Lenovos I saw were either 2 GB RAM Win8 machines or way out of my price range ($800 max, $500 preferred). If I could find a Lenovo with 6+ GB and Win7 for under $800 I'd probably snap that up.

I find Dells to generally be solid machines but my luck with Inspiron laptops, all 17" models from around 3 years ago, has been exactly non existent. All purchased at different times. All junk. OTOH, I've found the Latitudes be solid but considerably more expensive (or less packed with technology, depending on how you look at it)

Windows 7 on a lenovo for $500 is a non starter, though. I think you have to go with a Thinkpad to get Windows 7. You should be able to get a good T440 model with 8 gigs ram for under $1000 but that's not close enough to your $800 ceiling.

I also see they don't list the T440s as shipping with Windows 7. I know that's wrong because I am currently ordering 2-4 of them a month with 7 pro on them.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Mon Apr 07, 2014 9:28 pm

LordMortis wrote:
Kraken wrote:
coopasonic wrote:It's a win8 machine and a refurb but you can deal with it. Integrated graphics though.
From the tech specs:

Laptop Operating System Windows 7
Laptop Refurbished No

Integrated graphics is no biggie as it won't do much gaming.

LordMortis wrote:
Inspiron laptops are absolute garbage in my experience and I sure wouldn't count on having one for a few years. I have 5 of them around the 17R came out sitting on a shelf here and every one was PoS.

For a laptop, I don't think you can beat the bang for the buck in a Lenovo as long as you are looking at their "specials."

My wife has a long happy history with Inspirons, although she always manages to destroy them, usually violently, within 2-3 years. I also have a very long and satisfactory history with Dells. My current Vostro is going on 6 years old, although I never liked it very much and wouldn't buy another one.

All of the Lenovos I saw were either 2 GB RAM Win8 machines or way out of my price range ($800 max, $500 preferred). If I could find a Lenovo with 6+ GB and Win7 for under $800 I'd probably snap that up.
I find Dells to generally be solid machines but my luck with Inspiron laptops, all 17" models from around 3 years ago, has been exactly non existent. All purchased at different times. All junk. OTOH, I've found the Latitudes be solid but considerably more expensive (or less packed with technology, depending on how you look at it)

Windows 7 on a lenovo for $500 is a non starter, though. I think you have to go with a Thinkpad to get Windows 7. You should be able to get a good T440 model with 8 gigs ram for under $1000 but that's not close enough to your $800 ceiling.

I also see they don't list the T440s as shipping with Windows 7. I know that's wrong because I am currently ordering 2-4 of them a month with 7 pro on them.

My wife's Inspirons have all been 15" and problem-free (except for one that arrived with a corrupted Windows partition, but Dell very quickly sent a tech to our house with a new hard drive). My BIL bought one on her recommendation and he loves it. Maybe Dell is dumping crap in their corporate channel where they know there are IT people to cope with it?

Latitudes and Lenovos are both outside my price range, sadly. If MS hadn't put the WinXP gun to my head I'd wait a few months and buy a better machine, but the increasingly dire warnings of calamity have persuaded me that I had better act soon. I'm going to need some new software as well, starting with finding a way around Quickbooks' $250 retail price, so the new machine isn't going to come online overnight.

As it is I'm going to either have to go halfsies with Curio City on this expense or let Kraken Enterprises carry it on a credit card for a few months and pay it off gradually. Credit card interest is ordinarily against my religion but MS might make a blasphemer out of me.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 8:57 am

Kraken wrote:
coopasonic wrote:It's a win8 machine and a refurb but you can deal with it. Integrated graphics though.
From the tech specs:

Laptop Operating System Windows 7
Laptop Refurbished No

Integrated graphics is no biggie as it won't do much gaming.

Can you believe there was a link to completely different machine in there as an alternate suggestion and I forgot the url tags?

Zarathud · Post by **Zarathud** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 10:48 am

This is why you have a home business -- Curio City can absorb the expense pre-tax.

Anonymous Bosch · Post by **Anonymous Bosch** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 11:51 am

Kraken wrote:Spent a couple of hours last night shopping Dell Outlet, Tiger, Newegg, Best Buy, Staples, and one or two other places looking for a Dell, HP, or Lenovo laptop with Win7 and at least 6 GB RAM.

Man, was that ever a depressing couple of hours.

Best deal I found was an Inspiron at Staples for $550. Not a fabulous rig but it should meet my business needs for a few years, anyway, and still be capable of some lightweight gaming. I will probably pull the trigger on that tomorrow unless somebody throws a red flag.

If you're not averse to a refurb, here's a decent-looking MSI Windows 7 laptop for $799:

MSI Computer Corp. GP60 2OD-072US;9S7-16GD33-072 15.6-Inch Laptop

NVIDIA GeForce GT 740M 2G GDDR3

Windows 7 Home Premium

750 GB 7200 rpm Hard Drive

8 GB SO-DIMM

Intel Core i7-4700MQ 3.2 GHz (6 MB Cache)

If you're at all interested in gaming, an i7 processor with a decent video card and 8 GB of RAM seems like it'd be well worth the additional cost (in comparison with the $550 Dell Inspiron you were considering).

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 12:05 pm

Typically I only use my laptop for gaming when I'm on vacation, and then only sometimes. That works out to 0-5 days a year, so gaming is an afterthought at most. I think the MSI is overkill. Nice machine for $800 though -- thanks for running it down.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 12:09 pm

Zarathud wrote:This is why you have a home business -- Curio City can absorb the expense pre-tax.

Yeah, my business absorbs 90% of my office expenses, including consumables like ink, toner, and paper...my telephone...internet connection...all that stuff gets paid for pre-tax.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 7:28 pm

Blackhawk wrote:Microsoft just took an extra step to disable MSE on XP.

Despite them continuing to release updates and definitions for MSE until next year, they have, as of this morning, set MSE to permanently show an amber warning and 'potentially unprotected' status on XP because the OS is out of date.

This essentially kills MSE, as it is now impossible to tell when there is an actual issue. It is like a smoke alarm that goes off 24/7 - you can't tell when there is an actual fire anymore.

Well, they just upped it again. It now shows a permanent red alert - the same alert that indicates you have an active virus. I don't blame them for not supporting XP forever.

On the other hand, it is pretty shitty to say that you'll continue to support MSE on XP for another year and then effectively disable it anyway. I'll be replacing MSE on all of my machines - not just the XP machines - and will no longer recommend it to friends and family.

Hipolito · Post by **Hipolito** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 10:08 pm

I have a 2008-bought Windows XP PC that I don't use often, so instead of upgrading to Windows 7/8, I tried this Linux thing I've heard about.

I followed this article to make the system dual-boot to Linux Mint and Windows XP, since I might want to still use Windows XP for offline stuff. If you follow the article, warning: do not use ImgBurn! It will infect your PC with malware/adware/spyware/viruses/trojans/communism no matter how carefully you tiptoe through the installation process. I had to use Malwarebytes to recover from that.

There have been some hitches besides the above. It took a while to get sound working. I figured out that using headphones connected to the front ports on the case didn't work, so once I connected speakers to the rear ports, I got sound again. Yays.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Tue Apr 08, 2014 10:28 pm

Blackhawk wrote:
Blackhawk wrote:Microsoft just took an extra step to disable MSE on XP.

Despite them continuing to release updates and definitions for MSE until next year, they have, as of this morning, set MSE to permanently show an amber warning and 'potentially unprotected' status on XP because the OS is out of date.

This essentially kills MSE, as it is now impossible to tell when there is an actual issue. It is like a smoke alarm that goes off 24/7 - you can't tell when there is an actual fire anymore.
Well, they just upped it again. It now shows a permanent red alert - the same alert that indicates you have an active virus. I don't blame them for not supporting XP forever.

On the other hand, it is pretty shitty to say that you'll continue to support MSE on XP for another year and then effectively disable it anyway. I'll be replacing MSE on all of my machines - not just the XP machines - and will no longer recommend it to friends and family.

I reinstalled Avast on my XP machine this morning.

I read that some governments have contracted with MS to continue supporting their XP machines. MS is missing out on a revenue stream by not offering support subscriptions to everybody if they're going to keep a team on that job anyway. I'd pay them $10 a month to keep XP going until I can comfortably afford to replace it, and so would a lot of the other hundreds of millions of XP users out there.