Windows XP Professional x64 Edition

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Windows XP Professional x64 Edition
Windows XP Professional x64 Edition logo and wordmark.png
Windows XP Pro x64.png
Screenshot of Windows XP Professional x64 Edition running the Luna visual style, showing the start menu and the "About Windows" window
Developer Microsoft
OS family Windows NT
Working stateNo longer supported
Source model
Initial releaseApril 25, 2005;19 years ago (2005-04-25) [1]
Final release Service Pack 2 with May 14, 2019 security update (5.2.3790.6787) / April 19, 2019;5 years ago (2019-04-19) [2]
Kernel type Hybrid kernel
Default
user interface
Graphical user interface
License Proprietary commercial software
Official website Windows XP Professional x64 Edition overview (archived at Wayback Machine)
Support status
Mainstream support ended on April 14, 2009. [3]
Extended support ended on April 8, 2014. [3]

Microsoft Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is an edition of Windows XP for x86-64 personal computers. It was released on April 25, 2005, around the same time as with the x86-64 versions of Windows Server 2003. It is designed to use the expanded 64-bit memory address space provided by the x86-64 architecture. [1]

Contents

The primary benefit of moving to 64-bit is the increase in the maximum allocatable random-access memory (RAM). 32-bit editions of Windows XP are limited to a total of 4 gigabytes. Although the theoretical memory limit of a 64-bit computer is about 16 exabytes (17.1 billion gigabytes), Windows XP x64 is limited to 128 GB of physical memory and 16 terabytes of virtual memory. [4]

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition uses the same kernel and code tree as Windows Server 2003 [5] and is serviced by the same service packs. [6] However, it includes client features of Windows XP such as System Restore, Windows Messenger, Fast User Switching, Welcome Screen, Security Center and games, which Windows Server 2003 does not have.

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is not to be confused with Windows XP 64-Bit Edition as the latter was designed for Itanium architecture. [7] [8] During the initial development phases, Windows XP Professional x64 Edition was named Windows XP 64-Bit Edition for 64-Bit Extended Systems [9] and later as Windows XP 64-Bit Edition for Extended Systems.

Advantages

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition offers a number of benefits/advantages over the main 32-bit x86 versions of Windows XP:

Hardware

End user

Core

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is based on the Windows Server 2003 kernel and codebase, which is newer than 32-bit Windows XP (by about two years) and has improvements to enhance scalability. [18] It also introduces Kernel Patch Protection (also known as PatchGuard) to improve security by helping to eliminate rootkits. [19]

Disadvantages/limitations

There are some limitations which apply to Windows XP Professional x64 Edition:

Software compatibility

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition uses a technology named Windows-on-Windows 64-bit (WoW64), which permits the execution of 32-bit software. It was first used in Windows XP 64-bit Edition (for Itanium architecture). Later, it was adopted for x64 editions of Windows XP and Windows Server 2003.

Since the x86-64 architecture includes hardware-level support for 32-bit instructions, WoW64 simply switches the process between 32- and 64-bit modes. As a result, x86-64 architecture microprocessors suffer no performance loss when executing 32-bit Windows applications. On the Itanium architecture, WoW64 was required to translate 32-bit x86 instructions into their 64-bit Itanium equivalents—which in some cases were implemented in quite different ways—so that the processor could execute them. All 32-bit processes are shown with *32 in the task manager, while 64-bit processes have no extra text present.

Although 32-bit applications can be run transparently, the mixing of the two types of code within the same process is not allowed. A 64-bit program cannot use a 32-bit dynamic-link library (DLL) and similarly a 32-bit program cannot use a 64-bit DLL. This may lead to the need for library developers to provide both 32-bit and 64-bit binary versions of their libraries. Specifically, 32-bit shell extensions for Windows Explorer fail to work with 64-bit Windows Explorer. Windows XP x64 Edition ships with both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows Explorer. [21] The 32-bit version can become the default Windows Shell. [25] Windows XP x64 Edition also includes both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Internet Explorer 6, so that users can still use browser extensions or ActiveX controls that are not available in 64-bit versions.

Only 64-bit drivers are supported in Windows XP x64 Edition, but 32-bit codecs are supported as long as the media player that uses them is 32-bit. [20]

Installation of programs

By default, 64-bit (x86-64) Windows programs are installed onto their own folders under C:\Program Files, while 32-bit (x86/IA-32) Windows programs are installed onto their own folders under C:\Program Files (x86).

Removed features

Some features are not included at all on Windows XP Professional x64 Edition. Most of them were inherited from Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (the version that Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is based on) which included some changes from Windows XP Service Pack 2 for x86:

Service packs

The RTM version of Windows XP Professional x64 Edition was built from the Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 codebase. [5] Because Windows XP Professional x64 Edition comes from a different codebase than 32-bit Windows XP, its service packs are also developed separately. [31] For the same reason, Service Pack 2 for Windows XP x64 Edition, released on March 13, 2007, is not the same as Service Pack 2 for 32-bit versions of Windows XP. [31] In fact, due to the earlier release date of the 32-bit version, many of the key features introduced by Service Pack 2 for 32-bit (x86) editions of Windows XP were already present in the RTM version of its x64 counterpart. [5] Service Pack 2 is the last released service pack for Windows XP Professional x64 Edition.

Upgrade

A machine running Windows XP Professional x64 Edition cannot be directly upgraded to Windows Vista because the 64-bit Vista DVD mistakenly recognizes XP x64 as a 32-bit system. Windows XP x64 does qualify the customer to use an upgrade copy of Windows Vista or Windows 7, however it must be installed as a clean install. Despite this, there is a workaround available via third-party tools to make upgrading from XP x64 to Windows Vista possible. [32]

The last version of Microsoft Office to be officially compatible with Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is Office 2007, however Office 2010 can be unofficially installed by disguising the Windows version using Application Verifier. The last version of Internet Explorer compatible with Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is Internet Explorer 8.

Support lifecycle

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition follows the same support lifecycles as with all other versions of Windows XP. On April 14, 2009, Windows XP Professional x64 Edition's mainstream support expired and the extended support phase began. During the extended support phase, Microsoft continued to provide security updates; however, free technical support, warranty claims, and design changes are no longer being offered. [33] Extended support lasted until April 8, 2014, in line with all other Windows XP editions. [33] After this date, no more security patches or support information are offered.

Although Windows XP Professional x64 Edition is unsupported, Microsoft released an emergency security patch in May 2017 for the OS as well as other unsupported versions of Windows (including Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista and Windows 7 RTM without a service pack), to address a vulnerability that was being leveraged by the WannaCry ransomware attack. [34] [35] In May 2019, an emergency patch was released to address a critical code execution vulnerability in Remote Desktop Services which can be exploited in a similar way as the WannaCry vulnerability. [36] [37]

Microsoft announced in July 2019 that the Microsoft Internet Games services on Windows XP and Windows Me would end on July 31, 2019 (and for Windows 7 on January 22, 2020). [38] Others, such as Steam, had done the same, ending support for Windows XP and Windows Vista in January 2019. [39]

In 2020, Microsoft announced that it would disable the Windows Update service for SHA-1 endpoints. Since Windows XP Professional x64 Edition did not get an update for SHA-2, Windows Update Services are no longer available on the OS as of late July 2020. [40] However, as of April 2021, the old updates for Windows XP Professional x64 Edition are still available on the Microsoft Update Catalog. [41]

Windows XP Professional x64 Edition

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References

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Further reading

  1. "Benefits of Microsoft Windows x64 Editions". Microsoft Corporation. February 8, 2006. Retrieved January 12, 2011.
  2. Da Costa, Andre (April 25, 2006). "Microsoft Windows XP x64 Edition: Year in Review". ActiveWin.com. Retrieved January 12, 2011.
  3. "List of updates in Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 (Revision 15.2)". Microsoft Support. Microsoft Corporation. February 27, 2009. Retrieved January 12, 2011.