Greg S Trouw

OK, sometimes Microsoft software has a tendency to get a little "too smart for it's own good". AKA if MS Word goes to auto-correct the spelling of someone's last name; producing some documentation (this happened to me once), putting some pseudo code into the document, and it gripes about C++ not being English, etc...... Plug and Pray has also sometimes gotten a reputation for that. But now with this, there is one case. Unless Microsoft has changed the Explorer shortcut since previous versions, there is a short cut to disable autorun on a CD that is being inserted in the computer. It is to to hold down the shift key while inserting the CD. The thing is, it takes the CD drive a little time to recognize the disk, and if you let up on the shift key too soon, it might still auto-play (in the past, it has). But......with these new filter keys, it interupts this, thinking one is accidently holding down on the keyboard or something......but in reality one is using this shortcut while inserting a CD to tell it "Do not use autorun on this disk". To send this "feature" back to school, and inform it when one is using this shortcut to circumvent another auto-..... feature one doesn't want to use then?

Sorry, there are multiple servers here and it took time for the servers to update. I had done a chmod 744 from within my acct on the AIX servers to give you all read access.....but even though an ls -l showed the attributes as RWXR..R.. the web server didn't update. Try loading the page again, I was able to get it after a short delay.

It isn't sticky keys, and I didn't keep pressing it. I held it down while inserting CD. Ironically if done without inserting a CD it didn't do this.......but **** + insert CD has always been a Windows Explorer shortcut. BTW, I do not yet have image editing software installed on my computer (just reinstalled Windows XP), so for the time being, the screen capture is a bitmap. Sorry about that to any dialup users. As soon as I get more software installed, I'll convert it to a .jpg

I should also mention that I took my Prophet II GTS out last June and gave it to a friend. However.........I did have winXP since beta 1, and on the earlier builds did run in 3D mode and didn't see this prob. Now however, I'm using a Prophet 4500 (Kyro2) and the D2 3D performance not having been to my liking, I switched to 2D. In 2D mode, I do not see this problem with the released build. Needless to say, the lattest XP drivers for the Kyro2 are giving me other problems, such as general instability and some blue screens (more so in the 8.x series of drivers that immediately preceded the 9.0031 driver set).....has resulted in my deciding to buy a new gfx card. I can tollerate many things......but crashes, lockups, blue screens, and general instability, forget it. If I wanted to deal with them, I would not have gotten NT 4 in 1996 and said my good byes to win95 as much as possible back then. Because ATI is reportedly having many driver problems, that leaves a GeForce 3 or Titanium. Perhaps after I upgrade the video (and hopefuly say good bye to crashes) I'll have some more info. I do play Diablo II (xpack now) rather regularly.

OK, through the entire beta this has been, well rather annoying. How does one disable auto-insert notification and drive inventorying in Windows XP. In Windows 2000, there was an option to do this in the "Computer Management Council" under removable storage. The options to disable auto-insert notification and drive inventorying are gone. Needless to say, one of my CD drives is a 5 disk changer (Nakamichi MJ-5.16 si/SCSI internal) and it has ALWAYS taken rather poorly to all this auto-insert notification, drive inventorying, auto-play, etc.......) The problem is that the OS thinks it's 5 seperate CD-Rom drives, the OS thinks wrongly. It is 1 CD changer, and everytime it goes to inventory the drives, the changer starts cycling, and cycling. This is annoying. In Windows 2000 one could disable this drive inventorying and auto-insert notification stuff from here. In NT 4 there were registry entries which one could modify with regedt32, though don't remember if they worked in win2k anymore or not. In Windows XP, with Microsoft having removed the options, now what? Auto-insert notification is OK on the DVD and standard CD Rom drive, but on the changer I don't want it operable and cycling my changer a lot.

What has Microsoft done with the command prompt? I STILL like to use a command line interface at times for things, and though MS is merging both Windows families in winXP (though even 9x had a DOS prompt), the entry on my start menu for the command prompt present in win2k, and winXP up through RC1 seems gone. It's no longer in the start menu under all programs/ Accessories, and I can't seem to get it somewhere else. How is one to launch the command prompt in winXP Pro final build? Don't tell me MS removed the command prompt, some people still use it for some things. I want access to the command prompt window again.

I have not dealt with the 80-pin SCSI hard drives........I always ordered the 68-pin variety. For my hard drives currently, I have an Adaptec SCSI card 29160 which is an upgrade from the Adaptec 2940u2w SCSI card I had. Basically, when I needed more HD space, I was looking on adding a second 37.6 GB HD (my first Cheetah a 9.1 GB). The cost of an Ultra 160 37.6 GB Seagate Cheetah was about $560 (and on Pricewatch the adapter was less then $200).....and of course ordered online, no sales tax. A 37.6 GB Ultra2 Seagate Cheetah was over $800.....I wasn't about to pay more to keep my current SCSI adapter, so bought both the adapter and the Ultra160 drive. (Latter on I found that the U160 drive could run on a u2w adapter, but oh well.) My 2 HDs are a 9.1 GB Seagate Cheetah (mine's actually an engineering sample, from the second batch of 1,000.....as my old computer was built just before these drives went to the general market), model# ST39102LW. The new HD is a 37.6 GB Seagate Cheetah for Ultra160 SCSI, model# ST 336704LW. In the case with these, and to my knowledge with any internal LVD SCSI drive, there is no termination jumper on the drive itself. The termination is provided using a special LVD SCSI cable (the active terminator is on the end of the cable). Now, these cables are rather pricey (I needed a longer one when I added the second HD, and the cable was $70. One either neads a twisted or laminated SCSI cable. If one uses a SE SCSI cable, the drive will be forced back into SE "legacy" SCSI mode (detecting this), and won't use LVD signaling anymore. If you get a proper LVD SCSI cable, the terminator is on the end of the cable. You are talking an internal drive, right?

Hmm.......this is odd then My start menu does not have it Well, this install has had some problems due to them gfx drivers.....and, bad enough to convince me to buy a new gfx card.....and I do not want a hardware config with bad drivers counting. Quite frankly I do NOT want to have to deal with activation anyway, and am extremely opposed to this entire system. But definitely, I will not activate any system with device driver probs. As a win2k user, and a winNT 4.0 user, I'm not used to having to deal with regular blue screens, and I don't think any user should ever have to get accustomed to it. With 3 days left to activation, I'm toasting this install soon anyway. Maybe after I get a new gfx card, and rid of these drivers and their probs, but even then I really, really do NOT WANT to have to activate. Perhaps something did get royally screwed up during one of these blue screens then.

MSDN subscribers get both the Pro and the Home CDs shipped via UPS, and the subscription cost (before anyone says bah, you got it for free....the yearly MSDN subscription cost is not free, and now.....is actually going up again) doesn't change regardless of which we use. Ironically however (or perhaps there is no XP server) with win2k we got both Server and Advanced Server, but now, there's just Home and Pro. We did get win64 (yes even in beta 1, there was winXP for Itanium), but it's of little use to me, unless they come out with a version for the AMD Hammer next year (as a Hammer I would upgrade to, but an Itanium, to run all my software in x86 emulation mode, no thx).

But it is not there. Under Start/All Programs/ Accessories, there is NO command prompt listing, hehe...... There was in all the betas and release candidates, though under the final........ (which I had since beta 1 as an MSDN subscriber), was there in win2k final, and all the way back to, I had win2k since beta 3, and it was there in NT 4, but now......it's gone, hehe Either it wasn't there from the final build (did Microsoft hide this or something), or something got jacked up during one of the crashes, where, well.......to make a long story short....... I got a Hercules Prophet 4500 back in the days of Release Candidate 1, did a fresh install with the then lattest win2k drivers for the Kyro2 and all was fine. Now, I got the final retail build almost a month ago (via MSDN subscription), do a fresh install with it, and the then lattest winXP drivers, and constant crashes, lockups, blue screen STOPs, etc 5-6 times a day. Even with the lattest drivers (the 9.x drivers) from either Hercules's site or from PVR's site, it's not so frequent, but...... One easy blue screen to replicate with these, go to run chkdsk during boot time (aka do a chkdsk /f on the boot partition) and let it schedule it for next boot, reboot, let it run, and after it will bluescreen complaining about pvr.sys. How things went from no crashes on the Release Candidate with pre-XP specific drivers (older win2k drivers) to blue screens with Power VRs XP specific drivers on the final build.....well that's kinda backwards. Did Microsoft remove this from the start menu (thx Microsoft, hehe), or did it get goofed up when the new XP gfx drivers were going into lala land, with XP saying the computer is being shut down to prevent further damage to the computer, and then invariably every time complaining about PVR's XP gfx drivers?

This is their suggested scheme. They'll allow 4 upgrades (CPU counts as 2 however) within an as of yet unspecified amount of time....based on 10 IDs they follow. A snapshot is taken at time of activation and compared. This whole scheme is a bunch of BS and uneeded. 1. If they wanted to see whether it was the same computer or different, then forget taking a snapshot at time of activation, forget comparing to a snapshot taken at this time....and forget taking the rather dictatorial approach which ends up controlling how many upgrades a person is allowed to make within a given amount of time. I can only hope that 2 things result: a. Customers get perturbed when inability to upgrade due to activation restrictions ticks them off because they demand better levels of performance with new next gen programs. The burden then is placed on Microsoft to provide miraculous levels of software optomization to make old hardware one can't currently upgrade (too many already) deliver next gen performance. People start becoming extremely voicterous about the amount of bloatware MS provides, and starts counting wasted CPU cycles to the extreme....and if MS doesn't give satisfaction....they get some seriously negative PR and a new unshackeable reputation as a result. This, how much additional memory, disk space, and every other computer resource this and that new feature takes is scrutinized....because new restrictions don't allow one to make the upgrades that would make these insignificant. If MS releases bloatware (all the former jokes about Wintel...and how one releases new faster hardware to run all next gen software, and the other releases software to make one have to upgrade, etc) and then puts any restrictions on allowed upgrades.....getting some negative feedback and reputation is well deserved. b. Hardware companies feel the pressure as people can't, under liscence sell as much hardware. This results in a slump in PC sales among Microsoft's partners, who get together and decide to put pressure on Microsoft to cease activities which could have some negative consequences on hardware sales. Perhaps, if feasible, stop putting hardware IDs in their products, and making it impossible for an OS to ID them, so as to make any kind of hardware profile at all. Perhaps also tell Microsoft, they will only return to putting identifiers in their hardware, only after any system such as WPA has been removed....with the incidental negative effects it could have on hardware sales. ---------------------------------- Anyway, if all that was really involved was seeing if it was the same machine or not...the following would work. 1. Each time the machine boots, take get the hardware profile info 2. Compare it to the info retreived at the time of the *last* boot, not time of activation. 3. At shutdown, save the config retrieved from hardware at time of boot, so that it can be used for the next comparison. It is the number of upgrades BETWEEN reboots that is significant, not that from some time of activation, however far back.

OK guys, this was a post I made in reply on a thread about winXK beta 2 and why we are having to wait longer for it (not showing up on subscriber downloads) over at microsoft.public.msdn.general Thing is, many want to get to testing their apps for compatibility and get on with providing software support, but we're having to wait for CDs likely, unlike in the past where we could download, because of this copy protection thing it would seem. Not like software support isn't of benefit however. This reply would not post...other posts would, and to get it to post, I had to leave out my opinions on copy protection specifically. Well, I'm still hoping that it was a network error and nothing more, but I attempted a few times when other things showed up including from myself but not it), same result... This sets the stage for my copied post in the attached message...context it was given in. I do think discussion of copy protection and what people think of it, people's feedback is reasonable, so am posting what I had to say about copy protection over here. [This message has been edited by Greg S Trouw (edited 27 March 2001).]

Actually, I hate to tell ya, but with RH7 as opposed to other distros of Linux (and also RH 6.2 and earlier) there is a slight issue (potentially) if you need to recompile some stuff, such as the kernel, XF, etc.... You see they use a newer version of gcc (I think it is), and much of the Linux code out there isn't exactly compatible with it....won't compile. That might be one slight problem for you. I used Red Hat to version 6.2, and well now am using Mandrake 7.2 (multi-boot here)...it's largely based off the RH distro, but well doesn't pose this issue.

Practically every file I have downloaded from Microsoft's servers in the past are not bootable. There is one exception to this (well haven't downloaded it, but it's there). You see, with MSDN shipments this year, they stopped shipping bootable CD Roms. This years included non-bootable winNT 4 and win2k CDs (and I don't think the Whistler beta 1 CDs they shipped us are bootable eother). People complained, so there is a bootable win2k ISO image they uploaded..... Your download, if it's consistent with about 99.9% of them I've seen on their servers is *not* bootable.

Exactly! Thank you very much Microsoft for comming up with a scheme that burns your legit/paying customers more then the people you allegedly want to go against!!!! (That said, you get the CD at the end of the beta test period, don't ya? You've payed, in other ways. The time to debug, track down porbs, and report back to them, hehe) But on accounts of both being a user, as well as someone who has had to manage networks before (more then 1 or 2 computers on them, hehe).... Well with the network, can you imagine the poor sap who has a corporate liscence (there are a few options such as liscence packs or a universal liscence....that allows one to install their MS software onto up to any number of comptuers they have, but costs around $8 million/year), who might have to manage/be responsible for 30,000-60,000 computers in some companies.... Umm....if some hardware in one of these things goes down, and a company can not afford downtime (costing businesses like $1,000/hour in lost productivity....), one has got to be able to just replace failing hardware. They can't wait for Microsoft to approve of things....with the bosses breathing down one's neck...and if it's bad for the company continually....the possibility of getting fired for it. An hour or so on the phone to Microsoft, waiting in the wait queue is a big deal if one of the corporations critical servers goes down (remember winXP server as well as pro and home user edition...) and now lots and lots of employees can't do their jobs and complains to their bosses, because.....

Well if it isn't a bootable image, you should make the boot floppies, insert them into the floppy and begin install. I would recommend backing up your data also and what can not be reinstalled, just in case for whatever reason the beta doesn't work out on your computer, and also....because personally I would do a fresh install. If you format the drive for that, you got to be able to recover.

Oh, I'm a professional, not a universal subscriber, so with my Office 2k set...the one I bought (this one I did purchase on my own, same as other customers), I do have to enter a key. The MS Office people in this thread are talking about however is Office XP (the sucessor to Office 2k). Universal subscribers have access to the beta for the next version of Office. They're apperently doing it there also.

This is total nonsence. They tried this crap with those in the official beta program, and from the sound of the previous respondent they don't have it. So now, MS turns around and then tries to pull this crap on their third party developers and because of this, we can't get ahold of the thing. So now, people who develop, be it the device drivers or the applications can't get down to the business of testing their code for compatibility and making non-compatible product, comptable. This is nuts. How are customers supposed to get increased compatibility with drivers and programs, if because of this the programmers who are responsible for these drivers and apps can't get the OS to test on? This is in addition yes, to this whole issue of copy protection and what it is doing to the consumer. This is rediculous. As you're saying, it's legit customers who are paying the price....the pirates will be more then happy to make and use hacks.....

Of course those of us MSDN subscribers still can't get the thing (sounds like them trying to push that product activation/copy protection on us....and not having the thing for d/l....) argh, product activation :-( (have the dang thing with my Office 2k CD) Problem is, many want to get on with the business of testing their apps for winXP compatibility, and if needed, making their apps winXP compatible, but due to paranoia at Redmond, are being held back from getting down to business. As some have said about this: ""MSDN" <msdn@nospam.microsoft.com> wrote in <eG#gAKzsAHA.1960@tkmsftngp04>: > Windows XP beta 2 and subsequent releases require a unique Product Key > to be activated during installation. Therefore beta 2 will not > immediately be available for download, however it will be posted to > MSDN Subscriber Downloads as soon as physical shipments have commenced > to ensure that a Product Key is available during its installation. > > A mechanism for distributing product keys electronically is scheduled > to be available in time for the final release of Windows XP. OK, no offence, but product keys are going to be required for the Windows XP final versions for MSDN subscribers? If so, that's got to be the stupidest idea I've ever seen come out of Microsoft. Programmers and testers are going to spend more time on the phone revoking and receiving new product keys than actually installing the product!" "My previous company has been a MSDN subscriber for about 3 years now, and when I left, I signed up myself. The day I have to call MS to activate software is the day I download Redhat Linux and install it instead. Have you seen what some Linux guys are getting paid these days...hmmm Cary Fields MCSE W2K" "Gotta tell ya MS, you are really blowing this. We didnt pay $2K per year to call you back for permission to test yoursoftware. Have all the people with common sense left already? I know that if this sticks, there is no way that I will renew my subscription in May. We waited forever for Visio Enterprise, when some hotshot could have posted it in a day, Now you want to treat the people who protect your marketshare like second-class citizens, because of a few immoral *******s. Dont bite off your nose to spite your face. We pay the freight to get the code EARLY, so that we can test it for our clients or companies. Linux is looking better all the time, boys and girls." ""John" <johnd@removethisforspam.engagenet.com> wrote in message news:e3elbtc3e8c6uu83o99of4o15hsrmud1ks@4ax.com... > Any chance on putting it up early anyway, with the understanding that > we'd have to reinstall it in within the 15 day periods until the keys > arrive via mail or other route? I'd rather get a head start on the > work I have to do with it without a key and have to reinstall soon, > since odds are none of the installs I do will exceed the 15 day limit > anyway for several weeks at least. > > John I agree. Those who know they need it, and can accept a 15 day timeout should be able to download it. /Carl" "Let me see if I've got this correct. I will need to wait until I recieve my physical shipment which will contain my Product Key before I can download the Product from MSDN? Won't I HAVE the Product in the next shipment? This is just another example of how MSDN is becoming less valuable as a tool for developers. Corporate Preview Customers will probably get their WinXP Product before it is available to us. Add the Activation Issue and we have another example. Add to that MSDN's inability to provide a "mechanism for distributing product keys electronically" BEFORE instead of after the fact and we have yet another example. It is apparent that we are NOT considered imporetant to Microsoft, we are just another revenue stream that only has a voice when we call to renew our subscription. For those of you at MSDN that don't understand this - The Downloads are only valuable to us in order to get the product NOW instead of WAITING for our shipments." "How will this effect organisations that have multiple MSDN Universal licenses but only a limited number of disk sets? Will they have to wait until product keys are available on-line before we can use the beta? At which time the final release will be available anyway. Or will it be possible to use a single key for the whole organisation and activate multiple installations? If it's not possible to generate product keys on-line, I think it's time for a gesture of good will from MSDN to its __customers__. Would it be possible to either e-mail or snail-mail Office XP and Windows XP keys to the valued members of the developer community immediately? One mail per MSDN Universal license, not one per disk-set. Jonathan" "Let's see... how long will this take.... Beta 2 was just confirmed yesterday (or close to it)... everything has to be shipped off to manufacturing.... the media has to be printed up.... the documentation has to be done... it all has to be gathered together.... then shipped to the appropriate customers....which translates into what? A month? Two? I want to thank MS for their wonderful support for the developer community..... Some Gomer who wants to "play" with the new releases via the Preview Program will have their software long before people who actually need to test their apps...... Thanks again Microsoft for your continued support." "I am due to re-new my subscription, but I am beginning to think its not worth it. TechNet subscribers seem to get a better deal. Over the last 12 months I think the service levels have gone right down, I know we get the nice new boxes but TechNet get a nice case to and its cheaper I don't know that I can justify the costs, the cheaper way for beta products is to buy preview editions Ian" The list goes on. These are people who want the thing, so as to be able to get down to the business of testing their software for winXP compatibility and make whatever changes are necessary so as to make their software compatible. This move is preventing people from being able to do this. MICROSOFT, YO LISTEN UP. WHEN APPLICATION PROGRAMMERS AS WELL AS DEVICE DRIVER PROGRAMERS CAN TEST THEIR CODE AND MAKE THEIR PRODUCTS COMPATIBLE EARLY ON....IT HELPS YOUR CUSTOMERS WHO WANT TO UPGRADE, AND YOU AS WELL. As someone said...lets get past this paranoia and down to business. You have an OS to get out, and programmers have apps compatibility testing to do, as well as the business of needing to make necessary changes to their software, when the software is not compatible.

Finally, as to making a special distrabution...if this is to throw copy protection at us, whereas the beta testers can download a version without it...then maybe I don't want to have to wait longer for a version just to throw this into the mix. Just let us download their version in the time being and let us work with it for now. The work developers do is no less vital for MS, and as to making us wait for this given reason....oh boy could I go into a rant about the whole thing. The copy protection on my Office 2k CD is a royal pain in the a**, have to reinstall or whatever, do upgrades, whatever and I have to call for permission to install something I already purchased and hence have a liscence too. And that isn't even to mention the guy on the phone one day who accused me of piracy because Office 2k was supposedly on another computer, because: 1. I had a new mobo and processor (albeit it was the same exact hard drive mind you) 2. I previously installed Office 2k on a beta/RC build of win2k, but now had the retail release this time around (different OS CD) I had to go into some biga** justification and explenation as to how I'm not a pirate but someone who beta tested win2k and upgraded my computer. After that he did admit both of these could cause their computers to assume that and did give me the key, but in my opinion: 1. Accusing people who are beta testing MS's OSes for them and giving them vital feedback or services, that help them when it comes to the selling of that OS latter on (be it because they could better track down and elliminate bugs, or because of greater software support) is a real slap in the face. People who test/look at their betas are doing it for free (or we pay subscription costs)...we don't make money for the time involved or the service offered. For this, a recompensation of "You got a different OS you're trying to load this software on....you're a pirate"...does the phrase kicking the gift horse in the mouth come to mind? 2. Consumer grade software should NOT be tied to a specific peice of hardware...and I in no way support any attempts to do this. If you look closely at Microsoft's EULA, the consumer is given the right under that EULA to transfer the software (as many copies as they have liscences...in case of liscence packs or multiple liscences) up to the number of computers they are entitled to install it on (1 with many shrink wrapped programs, albeit additional liscences can be purchased which is what many net admins do), and I think it's 10 with workstation class software as specified by the MSDN liscence agreement (OK, didn't look at it since last year...so maybe they changed this). Anyway, by tying this to a specific computer with their instillation and confirmation code, what they are doing in the name of anti-piracy is making it MORE DIFFICULT FOR LEGAL USERS to exercise this extended right, as spelled out in back and white in the EULA itself...AND YET, real pirates, by use of hacks or other mechanisms will undoubtedly find a way around. It is questionable whether it will stop real hard core pirates, and yet the typical user gets what? And what are those of us waiting on this to test our programs with the new OS, programs that would encourage consumers to want to upgrade by making use of the thing getting due to this? When a piece of software is not distributed with a new PC, it is even more questionable to try to tie it to that thing...oh new computer, instillation code different sorta thing.... 3. People have the right to upgrade their computers without having to buy a new one...and many people, be they power users, hard core gamers, computer engineers and developers, etc do just this...rather then just go out and buy a new one. People should not be given grief trying to installl/activate/use their OS and software just because they upgrade their computers (some people more frequently then others), nor should they have to buy all new software every time they upgrade. 4. With the Office 2k confirmation code...as I remember, even if *not* upgrading or changing to a different OS, the code eventually expires, so installed much, much latter on, a new confirmation code was needed anyway. Please do not even get me started with "be more patient as MS refuses to get this thing out to us now, because they're trying to get things with copy protection....which I am against as it is.... I could start a whole thread on my thoughts about their copy protection scheme and what it is forcing even legal and liscenced users to go through, as well as developers who develop the software that gives them the software compatibility Windows enjoys, all because of PARANOIA.

OK, when booting Whistler on my Athlon 700 I've been getting this STOP 0x0000001E Unhandled K_mode exception (albeit not my PII 400). Further, win2k Server has absolutely no such problem, so it isn't like I have any hardware win2k supports or whatever. Previously this would only occur once, from a warm reboot (but not a cold boot), and only once, hit reset and things started OK. Things have gotten a bit worse, occuring 2 times in a row sometimes, and when I installed UT it started occuring everytime until I restored "Last Known Good Config". It's rather flakey, but non-existent in win2k. Anyone else seen this bug?

The differences between personal and pro...probably won't be anymore significant then those between Workstation and Server. Note, I'm taking this from info that applies to NT 4, but expect it to be similar in win2k and Whistler...unless I find a reference that says otherwise. But essentially they are all the same exact OS. "Many people wonder what exactly the differences are between Windows NT Workstation, Windows NT Server, and Windows NT Server, Enterprise Edition. First, Windows NT Server behaves differently than Windows NT Workstation does--Windows NT Server is optimized to be a high-performance network server platform, whereas Windows NT Workstation, although it has server capabilities, is optimized for interactive desktop use. ...Although Windows NT Server and Windows NT Server, Enterprise Edition, contain significant added functionality over Windows NT Workstation, the majority of the files in all three products are identical, including such core components as the executive, kernel, device drivers, utilities, and libraries. However, a number of these components operate differently depending on which edition is running. How does Windows NT know which product is running? At boot time, the registry is queried and the result is stored in the system global variable MmProductType. One element of this information is in the registry key HKLM \ System \ CurrentControlSet \ Control \ ProductOptions. Changing this information is a violation of the software liscence." "Inside Windows NT" second edition (39-41) Basically, other then some additional services like IIS and the like (there is some addition), the differences basically come down to registry settings. But the OS is identical.