The Slacker Dreads MS Windows Service Packs

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Back in the dark ages of my computering life. I used an operating system known as Microsoft Windows®. I still occasionally play around in Windows these days.

I have (had, the drive failed on me recently) an XP Pro installation on my desktop system for playing games only. It’s crippled… no networking installed at all. I also have an installation of Win 7 on my laptop. It’s just for fun and education. I’m the family computer nerd, so everyone comes to me for help. They don’t run Linux… yet. MUAHAHAHA! Anyway, I have to stay comfortable with how MS products work so I can still be helpful to the unfortunate souls still using that OS.

As some of you who know me may remember, the camel that broke the straw’s back for me with MS Windows was the fact that I had numerous catastrophic system failures due to corrupted installations of various Service Packs on XP back in ‘06. The last one may have actually been a faulty Seagate hard drive, to be fair to MS. However, the last one was the last one for me. I went to Linux full time within a few days of that event.

Now, here comes a new Service Pack (#1) for my Win 7 installation. UH-OH! I’m very gun shy about Service Packs, folks. This time, though, the OS is not my primary computer tool, so what’s the worry. If it boogers up, I can just reinstall. No great loss… just more minutes of my life sucked out of existence by Microsoft. Anyway, I decided to go for it yesterday. The install was fast and painless. And best of all… the system rebooted into a working Win 7 OS. Cool, huh?

Kudos to MS. They may have finally gotten something right with this new Win 7. So, just what was Vista? XP’s Millennium Edition? Oh, wait… Vista was the beta, of course. I wonder how many folks actually paid $300 to beta test for MS on that one. All that testing paid off. Thanks beta folks!

OK, I’m outta’ here…

~Eric

NOTE: All derogatory comments regarding Microsoft and the Windows® operating system are absolutely true… er, I mean are absolutely in jest. jk, as Generation Text likes to say. Can you imagine what Evolution is going to make their childrens’ childrens’ childrens’ thumbs look like? Heh!

*The above is reprinted with permission from me from my Nocturnal Slacker blog at Lockergnome.com