14 DAY TRIAL // Windows XP was officially released to manufacturing 16 years ago today, before Microsoft announced general availability on October 25, 2001.
Work on Windows XP actually started during the ‘90s, when Microsoft developed Neptune, an internal operating system based on the Windows NT kernel and specifically addressed as consumers, with the Redmond-based software giant planning to offer a substantial upgrade over the previous versions, not only in terms of graphical user interface, but also features and usability.
Windows XP was, is, and without a doubt will continue to be for at least a few more years one of the most widely-used operating systems, as statistics indicate that despite no longer receiving support and security patches, it’s still powering an important number of systems out there.
Windows XP received 3 different service packs during its lifetime, the last of which, intuitively called Service Pack 3, landed on April 21, 2008. The operating system eventually reached end of support on April 8, 2014, with Microsoft urging everyone to move to newer versions of Windows to remain protected. Sales of Windows XP licenses to OEMs stopped on June 30, 2008, while PCs running the OS remained available until late October.
Still the fourth top desktop OS
Windows XP is right now the fourth most popular Windows version on the market after Windows 7, 10, and 8.1. It has bigger market share than the latest version of macOS and Linux combined.
NetMarketShare puts Windows XP at 6.10 percent market share, a decline from 6.94 percent the month before, but up from 5.66 percent in May this year.
Despite the obvious risks of running a Windows version that no longer receives support, Windows XP continues to be shockingly popular these days, especially because it runs well on old hardware where installing Windows 10 is not possible.
Furthermore, Windows XP is powering a long list of hardware operated by authorities across the world, and the chances are it’ll remain in use for a while due to the complex nature of performing a network-wide upgrade to a newer Windows version.
On the other hand, Windows XP is slowly but surely losing developer support, so many of the applications that are being updated these days are no longer running on this OS version. At the same time, with cyberattacks targeting vulnerabilities in all Windows versions, users are left with no other option than to upgrade their machines or employ other security systems to remain protected.
