Still booting after all these years: The people stuck using ancient Windows computers

Comments

• Kolanaki@pawb.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  If not for DX10 and above not even existing on it, afaik, I’d still be using XP.

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  • BombOmOm@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    especially if you wanted to play Halo on PC

    I still giggle that after years and years of Halo 3+ being a console exclusive, and Halo 2 sucking on Windows for years*, the entire Halo collection now has a Gold rating on Linux. I have very specific memories of being annoyed for years that the most prestigious Microsoft game doesn’t work on a Microsoft gaming platform (Windows).

    *God damn does Game for Windows Live suck

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• oxf@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  At my old workplace, there was numerous XP machines still going. They were running old machine equipment, and basically served as a controller for the entire machine.

  As it turns out, it was cheaper to keep these XP stations, instead of buying a completely new Hydrolic press, or whatever it was running, which cost several hundred of thousands of dollars.

  One day one of these computers stopped working, and we immediately tried to get the software to work on a brand new W10 replacement. Took us a week of drivers hell, until we eventually went to the basement, found an exact replica, and swapped the HDD over.

  The company, making these heavy machineries, went bankrupt in the early 2000s, and there was literally no way of getting the software to run on anything besides that original box.

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  • imetators@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    At one of my old works we had a SMT machine allegedly built in 2012 which was running on XP. Worked flawlessly 🤷

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  • undrwater@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    I’d like a law that software / hardware companies who file for bankruptcies must release the source / files for their tech to an open source repository.

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    • Broken@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      I like that idea bit it’ll never fly. That software is an asset. A bankrupt company needs every asset to be sold to cover as much percentage of their debt to their vendors as possible. I’ve been in a company that went bankrupt and I’ve been the vendor of a company that went bankrupt. Being the vendor was the harder experience.

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    • guy_threepwood@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      If you are a big company there are often ESCROW agreements for things like this. I have encountered the “data dumps” from time to time and whilst it’s “better” it’s not ideal. Half finished documentarian, virtual machines of mis-configured OS installs… it’s almost as if it was just a straight copy of the development environment as it was just as they made the final version of the software…

      But it’s better than nothing.

      Main issue I can see with this forcing open source would be libraries and frameworks licensed from others who would likely still be in business and wouldn’t agree to those parts becoming open sourced. See also WinAMP theregister.com/…/opensourcing_of_winamp_goes_bad…

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    • shalafi@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      That idea often comes up in these discussions and I’ve never really had an argument against. Best I got is that parts of that software may have moved to more modern stuff that was purchased by another company. But that’s a damned thin excuse not to implement this.

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  • stoy@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    I set up a 32 bit Windows 7 VM so my dad could keep using his old drawing program that was built for Windows 3.11.

    It was the last version of Windows to support 3.11 compabillity.

    Works well.

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    • jaybone@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      lol what drawing program?

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    • jdnewmil@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      Just a note: Windows software for controlling hardware is highly likely to assume a)direct access to the hardware (sometimes mediated thorough ancient APIs and assuming the existence of defunct expansion slots) and b) assume meatspace time can be counted using OS timing ticks (which get stretched out as modern VMs timeshare with other processes underneath the virtulized hardware). It is awfully tough to replace them sometimes.

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  • muusemuuse@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    There are third parties that create new software for old industrial machines for this exact reason.

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  • IsoKiero@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    There’s still things like that on my workplace today. I think there’s some older, rarely used CNC with Win98 on the controller. We just keep spares around when they break, but that’s cheaper than replacing the whole machinery. Also there’s some XP stations running software for an industrial machine which would cost quarter of a million to replace. Some of those need access to network drives and such but they live in a strictly isolated VLAN.

    And, as far as I’ve told at least, there was no option at any point to upgrade just the computers on those things. It’s always the whole assembly line or whatever they’re connected to. There’s not many companies willing to throw hundreds of thousands every 3-5 years to replace equipment which working just fine.

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    • Lost_My_Mind@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      there’s some older, rarely used CNC

      Me over here with a dirty mind 100% positive that I’m not using “CNC” the same way you are. I don’t know what your way means, but my way is more fun.

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  • catloaf@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Yup. Take backups, have spares, and keep it off the Internet and it’ll work just fine.

    Pro tip, you can get IDE to CF adapters if you want to put an SSD in those old machines to really see them fly.

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    • cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      You can get industrial grade CF cards that use SLC memory. They have much better write endurance than normal CF cards.

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  • BombOmOm@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Yeah, and as long as these things never touch the internet, there really isn’t an issue.

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• einlander@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  The dot net framework was ported to Windows 95/98 so they can use more software now.

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• Pistcow@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  Mail sorter for a company I worked for uses Windows 3.1.

  My parents ancient HP from 1997, I sold the motherboard with popped capacitors for $250. I informed the buyer of the condition and he said he didn’t care, he’d fix it, but they needed it for some legacy hardware their company functioned on.

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  • lupusblackfur@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    😂 🤣

    Similarly, my Dad ran his medical office on Win98 until he died (2011).

    Of course, he had no support for OS or the medical office software other than himself (and me).

    Had a supplier of inexpensive old machines/parts.

    All cause he refused to pay the $5k required to upgrade the medical office software that ran on those machines. 🤷‍♂️

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    • vaionko@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      My dad’s company still runs software from 2002 for recording sales and sending bills. Runs fine on Windows 10 surprisingly

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• Fiivemacs@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  Stuck or preferred choice?

  Trapped using software they needed to buy once, vs rent?

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  • Cocodapuf@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    I’m a bit depressed that I finally need to upgrade my last windows 7 machine. It looks like it’s 10 for me now :-(

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    • LorIps@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      www.fedoraproject.org linuxmint.com archlinux.org www.debian.org elementary.io system76.com/pop/

      There are many safe open source options. If you need help there are ample resources available. If you want to you can also DM me.

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  • LorIps@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Yes, stuck. There are enourmous problems with different institutions having to use ancient PCs because the software doesn’t work on modern ones, be they electron microscopes, hospitals or industrial machinery, causing e.g. enourmous security issues. This is one of the most important reasons why FOSS and why making FOSS software mandatory in government contracts is so important.

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