Windows XP Service Pack 2 - Basic information about SP2

The development of the XP successor "Vista has come to a temporary standstill: Group Vice President Jim Allchin has now finally set the priorities of the development teams for XP-SP2 in recent months. With Service Pack 2, Microsoft wants to bravely face up to current viruses, security gaps and hackers. Despite the postponements of Windows Server 2003 SP1, Vista and of course SP2 itself, this represents a decisive step in the security prestige duel between Windows and Linux. Until now, Windows XP has never been more secure: The clear "Security Center, the brand new firewall, the pop-up blocker, the sensible IE add-on management and the latest memory protection technologies are only part of this security springboard.

In this article, Windows-Tweaks shows you what you can expect with Service Pack 2:

Data Execution Prevention (DEP) - protection against buffering

The so-called DEP technology protects your computer by preventing the execution of unauthorized files such as viruses or worms. With the help of the processor, it sets a process to non-executable if there is no explicitly executable code behind it. Most viruses or other malware programs copy themselves into these memory areas and start them from there. If an attempt is nevertheless made to start executable data here, the CPU promptly intervenes and prevents the respective (dangerous) application from starting by setting an "exception in memory". AMD calls this proprietary technology "No-execute (NX)" - it will be used to a greater extent in 64-bit processors, as considerably more areas of the kernel are protected here compared to the pure 32-bit environment

E-mail protection and new Internet Explorer techniques

Despite being treated as the "black sheep of Microsoft", Outlook Express now has some interesting new features on the long road to SP2. It now automatically converts HTML e-mails, whose invisible e-mail headers can contain dangerous scripts, into "text-only" messages and protects the user of the electronic mailbox from sensitive data espionage, crashes or data loss. Start OE and test this digital sophistication for yourself: Under "Extras/Options.../Read and "Send you will find corresponding "text-only options. Via "View/Message in HTML" you can view the original message directly in its original format (with images, formatting etc.) if the source is secure. Another interesting feature is the protection against external HTML code and images, which you will find in the options under "Security. Spam providers are spitting in your soup: they send you e-mails with references to external data. As soon as your computer downloads this data within an e-mail, a disastrous verification takes place on the spam server. The notorious manufacturer sends your address, since it exists and you request it, to other providers. The flood of spam is then virtually unstoppable and in no time at all provides you with an open mail barn door, which dubious advertising tacticians cleverly use as a dubious source of income. Fortunately, SP2 ruthlessly nips the proliferation of spam mails and the annoying dial-up to download external data in the bud.

Internet Explorer has also been significantly improved in many areas. It now has a sophisticated "Publisher Check", which verifies the safe origin of a file. It displays manufacturer information for critical and high-risk files (.exe, .zip) as soon as they are downloaded or opened as an attachment (OE). Programs with non-certified code are thus presented with a (small but annoying) stumbling block - it is only a question of the famous game of cat and mouse until these certifications are cracked. Directly related to this is the web browser add-on management of Internet Explorer. With this little helper, the user can at least fundamentally save himself from the spyware threat: In IE, click on "Extras/Manage add-ons.... This essential tool provides the user with backstage maps to the Internet Explorer spyware meeting place. Up to now, every dubious piece of software has managed to nestle into the system unnoticed, to cause mischief and to eke out a hidden existence. The Internet Explorer "Crash Detection" is firmly fused with the add-on management. It recognizes crashes caused by IE extensions (usually developed by third-party manufacturers) and provides the user with corresponding insights. Open the add-on manager as described above and view the list. You can use the selection menu to choose between currently used add-ons (i.e. those loaded in every instance of IE) and all installed add-ons; it is usually possible to remove one or the other. Spyware not only transmits statistics about your Internet routine or personal data to a server, but also plays a major role in IE crashes or "page not found" browser errors, thanks to poor programming. You can click on an object in the administration and "Activate" or "Deactivate" it if it seems strange to you. If you do not know what an add-on stands for, "www.google.de will certainly help you by entering the corresponding name.
Caution: Many software manufacturers rely on Internet Explorer as the basis for their applications, which is why you should exercise caution when deactivating certain components.

Windows XP Media Center Edition and Tablet PC with SP2 ?

Users of the first edition of Windows Media Center Edition (version 2003) are lucky, because installing Service Pack 2 gives them a complete upgrade to the benefits of MCE 2004. An improved and more stable interface, the new Media Guide, recognition of third-party add-ons and support for widescreen display devices are just a small list of the interesting new features. Tablet PCs will also benefit from the latest version (codenamed "Lonestar"), which is expected to boost sales of tablet PCs, which are still sluggish at the moment, with significantly better font recognition. Conclusion: Users of MCE/TPC technologies in particular will benefit from Microsoft's XP-SP2.

Behind the scenes: The security center

One of the "most central innovations that are being flooded on board with Windows XP Service Pack 2 is the "Security Center". This convenient monitoring software nests itself in the Control Panel and uses Microsoft's WMI interface (Windows Management Instrumentation), which is an extension of the WDM, the Windows driver model, to query the status of various security aspects of the system. WMI offers applications or drivers the possibility of direct integration and interaction with Windows so that information and notifications can be issued: In the future, many third-party manufacturers of firewalls and anti-virus solutions will connect to the Security Center via WMI. According to Microsoft, the Center will then be able to check, for example, whether the current virus definition is up to date or whether real-time virus protection is actively working in the background.

Windows XP SP2 for pirates

"We expect that almost all Windows XP users with original or illegal versions will have access to the SP2 security technologies," said Gary Schare, security director at Microsoft. This announcement was a positive one, as in the past hundreds of thousands of owners of illegal copies were to be excluded from the benefits of Service Pack 2. Build 2180 (the final version of SP2) will, after a long internal Microsoft back-and-forth, open up to pirates and should prevent the spread of threats such as Sasser or myDoom via these illegal versions. Only the product keys that have already been banned by Microsoft for Service Pack 1 will continue to be blocked. However, pirates have already found new keys with which SP2 will definitely work.

Windows Update V5 - Increased focus on updates

What used to be dismissed by many users as an unpopular Windows by-product could turn out to be the most popular feature. Windows Update will no longer install simple (but critical) updates for Windows; V5 is now also able to prioritize based on current threats and give these patches the priority they deserve - even before less important updates find their way into the system! The brand new BITS 2.0 (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) has now stepped up several notches in terms of intelligence. It completes the download of the update (which can be dynamically adjusted in terms of speed) much faster, as only the updated bytes are transferred for newer versions of a file that has already been downloaded.
You can find out about http://v5.windowsupdate.microsoft.com of the quality of the brand new Windows Update V5 page: SP2 is already available here as a (customizable) download and reduces waiting times, as on average only 100 MB (depending on the system) of changed files are transferred.

The first contact: Service Pack 2 and the online world

The "Internet Connection Firewall (ICF) has now been renamed the "Windows Firewall and, in the course of this name change, offers a number of new ways to make TCP/IP (v4 and v6) transactions, i.e. contact with the Internet, more secure. The firewall prevents incoming and outgoing connections by blocking ports individually. The latest version of the Service Pack 2 firewall also offers BootTime security, which effectively protects your computer from worms, hackers or other lurking dangers as soon as it boots up - previously, the firewall service only became active in the final stages of the Windows startup process, which turned your PC into an open barn door for a short period of time.
The new firewall now offers command line support via which it can be configured at lightning speed thanks to "netsh - but a new, simple user interface is also available to Windows users in the "Control Panel. You can use this firewall management to (de)activate the essential online protection, set exceptions for certain programs or decide which connection you want to use the firewall for. The following tips are your key to the firewall: We will show you ways to avoid unnecessary restrictions on the Internet, even with SP2 protection in place.

We hope that we have given you a basic insight into the new features of Service Pack 2. For more information, see Frequently Asked Questions - Windows XP Service Pack 2 Question & Answer .

NOTE FOR NEW PUBLICATION: This article was produced by Sandro Villinger and comes from the Windows Tweaks archive, which has been built up since the late 1990s.