2. PCLinuxOS   http://www.pclinuxos.com/

3. Code Weavers http://www.codeweavers.com/products/cxoffice/  To run Windoows in Linux

4. Xandros         http://www.xandros.com/index.html.en

5. FreeBSD        http://www.freebsd.org/

6. Linux Central  http://www.linuxcentral.com/  Several versions here ! 

7. Puppy             http://www.puppy.com

8. For Gammers   http://www.transgaming.com/

Wind River Carrier-Grade Linux Goes To Space 
( means Windows gets NOTHING Evil laugh here :-) ) 
 http://www.spacemart.com/reports/_ 
 

Well I've had 2 cases of WGA deactivating XP Pro

Admittedly one case involved 2,500 Workstations on a Volume License and 
the other was an OEM version of XP Pro that I had turned the Updates off,  on.

In the single computer case the owner of a small business had died so I removed 
the ADSL Internet and setup a Dial up just in case the wife needed to send 
something from the business to the Tax Department or something similar. 
Currently I'm supporting that computer for at least another 4 years & 
1 month at the very least.

Now as the Live Update wanted to hog all of the bandwidth I turned it off 
and told the wife to only visit the Windows Update site when I came around 
once every couple of months or so. After having the Windows Live Update 
turned off for 3 months the computer was shut down with a Pirate Software 
warning. The cure according to M$ was a Repair Install as when the computer 
was shut down it killed off both the Keyboard and Mouse so it was hopeless to 
attempt to get in even in Safe Mode you got the same Display though without 
the Video Drivers the display was lousy.

Then 3 days latter the one Government Department that I used to do work for 
had the same thing happen. Apparently the WUS Server had been pulled off 
line and wasn't picking up any Windows Updates and with XP pro and SP2 
the same thing happened. WGA shut down the computer without any possibility 
of reactivating killing both the Mouse & Keyboard and showing a very nice Pirate 
Software Message again.

The second time I knew exactly what was required but I also realised that I needed 
a new Product Key from M$ as well so that Government Department had to wait 
8 days for M$ to supply a new Product Key then we could start to do a repair 
install on all the computers which had by this time been so altered that using 
an image was no longer possible with all the hardware changes that had been 
allowed over the 3 years since the original install.

But that was important as that Department lost any Unsaved Data and at least 
8 days use of their computers all because WGA decided that because there 
where no Windows Updates applied all the computers had to be Pirate. Well 
at least there was some insane sort of reasoning behind this as it was a Volume 
License and all the computers had the same Product Key so they must have 
been Pirates Right? :D

Here in AU M$ ran a test with the available free downloads where you could 
chose to allow WGA to make sure that you had Genuine Product or override
this and just download the software which where all plug ins or something 
similar. Because 33% of people didn't allow WGA to confirm that the product 
that they where downloading to was Genuine M$ read that as 33% of all 
Windows XP being used in AU where Pirate Copies.

Now from personal experience there where several drops of 5 or 6 downloads 
spread over 6 months so I would Verify the first with WGA and ignore the 
attempted verification of the remaining downloads as it wasted a lot of time 
going through the motions so I must be part of that 33% of Pirate Product. 

Of course after this was changed to needing WGA to verify all of these downloads 
M$ didn't make any measurements of a Drop in Downloads so they didn't 
perform a real Scientific Test they just pushed out something that made their 
case in the best light possible for them and with 33% of software being marked 
as Pirate they now have a great reason to attempt to justify their 
Draconian Anti Piracy Practises.

Col

by HAL 9000  | 06/03/07

the link to the post as it was put on TR