XP SP2 install not trouble-free
Looks like XP SP2 is definitely better but proving quite troublesome for many people to install. I’ve read quite a few reports of installations failures and total system screw-ups on different mailing-lists and newsgroups, and this eweek article gives a nice summary of the problems so far:
In Weblog postings and interviews with eWEEK.com, users have reported everything from unproblematic installs to complete system failures. In between, difficulties varied from confusing user interface changes to broken applications to performance slowdowns. Many said SP2′s features improved their confidence in the platform’s security; others said they continue to be surprised by minor issues
The thing that surprised me most was the ability of other firewall vendors such as McAfee and ZoneAlarm to turn off the XP firewall when they are installed. I understand why they would need to do this, as running 2 potentially conflicting firewalls at the same time is probably not a good idea, I do hope these third-party products provide suitable notification and warning of their actions.
I myself am actually a bit glad that these kinks will be worked out or at least solutions will have been posted for most problems by the time Microsoft releases the non-OEM home user version of SP2.
On another random note, though and totally unrelated to SP2, Pizza Hut in London sucks! And I really mean it, I almost lost it today trying to order a simple delivery from them. The person on the other end couldn’t understand my address, had problems with my postcode, the final price was wrong …. I’ll just end it there, I hope they get better