Windows 2000 Update Rollup Released

By David Worthington | Published June 28, 2005, 8:24 PM

Two days before it ends mainstream support of the OS, Microsoft has provided its Windows 2000 customers with a parting gift: the long-awaited post Service Pack 4 Update Rollup. The Update Rollup contains every security related fix issued since SP4, along with several non-security related sustained support updates.

The rollup was announced last November and underwent beta testing starting January 2005 until its recent release to manufacturing. A public release was originally projected to arrive in April.

Most of the patches found within the Update Rollup have already been released as standalone updates and hot fixes. This will be the last upgrade to Windows 2000 through mainstream support channels barring any unexpected action; there will be no Service Pack 5 for Windows 2000.

"Microsoft basically squeezed out one last big consolidated update, instead of a Service Pack 5," commented Jupiter Research senior analyst Joe Wilcox. "I don't expect the support change to much affect Windows 2000 business adoption, if past operating systems are any indication. Windows NT 4 Server support ended at the close of 2004 and still more than a third of the largest enterprises use the software."

Wilcox noted, however, that Microsoft plans to offer Windows 2000 security updates for about another five years.

More information about the Update Rollup is available on the Microsoft Support Web site and the download may be obtained from FileForum.

Comments

After messing around with Win XP for several years I finally installed Win2000 a few months back and I love it!! It is the most stable of Windows I have ever used. Has anybody noticed that you dont have much trouble with spyware with W2K versus WinXP? Could it be that MS made WinXP vulnerable to spyware so they could get into the anti-spyware business? They made poor Martha Stewart do jail time and they make Bill Gates a hero. Licenses plates made by Bill Gates anybody?

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No offense intended or anything, but could it just be that you now know better how to avoid spyware? From the spyware/malware standpoint both OS's are pretty much susceptible to the same things. SP2 changed that for XP, however, since it made it harder to install ActiveX controls via the web. But without SP2 both OS's should be pretty much the same for malware.

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Good point. Plus the fact there are so many anti-spyware programs that are worthless. Finding the right ones seem to be the fix now.

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Microsoft's Support Page for the update says, and I quote:
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Notes
Update Rollup for Windows 2000 does not contain updates for individual Windows components not included with a clean slipstream install of Windows 2000 SP4. If there are components previously installed or updated on the system, the individual security updates must be downloaded separately from Windows Update.

Examples include the following:

• MS03-011 - Flaw in Microsoft VM Could Enable System Compromise (KB816093) - The Microsoft VM is not included in SP4 natively. However the VM may be resident on systems which were updated to SP4 from a prior SP or installed by a third party software package.

• Internet Explorer 6 and Outlook Express 6 – Internet Explorer 5.01 was originally included with Windows 2000. Service Packs for Windows 2000 only service this original version. Microsoft recommends that you install Internet Explorer 6 SP1 and the current cumulative Internet Explorer security updates on Windows 2000 computers for maximum security.
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http://support.microsoft...px?scid=kb;en-us;891861

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Goodbye Win2k. You served your purpose well. I thought this was an excellent version of Windows.

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agreed. 2000 was an incredible OS. Its stability on such a wide range of hardware was amazing. It had its fair share of security problems but it is still my favourite OS.

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Definatly. Just a shame MS didn't make SP5 to finish off.

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It doesn't quite "contains every security related fix issued since SP4". I installed it tonight on a clean install of Win2k w/ SP4. After I installed it, I rebooted it and went to Windows Update. I had 13 Windows updates listed, so I guess MS missed a few.

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That is interesting. What were the updates missed? Since IE 6 is an addition and includes MSXML technologies, I wonder if some were left out due to incompatibilities with earlier versions of IE.

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It is easy to figure out. Microsoft included all the updates published up to the 30th of April 2005 only. I guess they needed some time to prepare the update. They published the update in more than 30 languages in the same day. Usually it looks like that: English first, and after a month or so the rest of languages.

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When you say you installed the rollup on a clean install of 2000, presumably you also had SP4 installed first as well?

EDIT:
Ahh my bad. lol

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Quote: "I installed it tonight on a clean install of Win2k w/ SP4."

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Thanks for pointing that out AlanRivaldo!

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Answer: If you have Windows 2000, THEN YOU INSTALL SP4, and then add SRP 1, you have to update. Why? MSJAVA. (that sun lawsuit aginst msjava, remember?) MS is allowed to patch the critical updates for existing msjava but cannot distribute msjava itself. Starting with SLIPSTREAMED SP2 msjava went bye-bye, but SP2-SP4 does not UNINSTALL msjava either.

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Guess you didn't bother to read about it...

"This update rollup contains a list of security-related updates produced for Windows 2000 between the release of Windows 2000 SP4 and April 30, 2005. April 30, 2005 is the date when the contents for Update Rollup 1 were locked down for final testing by Microsoft, external beta testing sites, and customer sites."

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