Uh huh, sure. WMF exploit, multiple IE vulns, a lot of closed source code, making things only for windows. Active X, Direct X and IE are a few such examples.

Now you have MS applying patches for you even if you only say to download them.

You're not restricted to only using closed source.

Anything is hackable if you're given enough time. Just disable the stuff you think will break or whatever. Windows isn't that bad when you take the time to lock it down properly.

Wouldn't any *nix be the same? If you browse the internet as root and haven't setup your iptables wouldn't you be as equally silly?

__________________
admin @ mbworld.org

Until recently, windows gave you admin access by default. Next up, Rootkits. So nice of MS to allow those. How about a side of layered device drivers.

Even if you lock it down, it's still not as secure.

Until recently? When did it change that they forced you to create limited users?

BTW: What are layered device drivers?

__________________
admin @ mbworld.org

apple was my best computer switch... no more crashes... no virus... very stable... superb ilife tools.. apple rocksssss! just plug and play.

__________________
x5 3.0 (2001)

Haha, I remember a friend saying that Windows originally had the term 'Plug and Play' coined because on an Apple, it was expected to work when you plugged it in

__________________
admin @ mbworld.org

You’re just going to love this little gem that MS allows. This “feature” has been known about for quite sometime. Remember hearing about the Sony-BMG rootkit? Them masking the software was the big portion of the mess. The second part was that MS ALLOWS drivers to be layered. Take the CD-ROM for example, the driver is the interface between the hardware and the OS. You can add another driver in between. This is how Sony-BMG kept people from copying the CD, this driver sees all of the IO and it decides what can pass. This is also very inefficient. The best part about this whole thing, once it’s there, it CANNOT be removed. If you remove it, the device will fail to work.

Some companies used this in practical ways. One such company uses it to provide synchronization between servers. They also say they support OS X, Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, linux and Novell. All they talked about was how it worked in windows, not any other OS. Can you guess the reason? Only windows allows the driver to be stacked.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_rootkit

Still think windows is secure? No matter what you do, it’s inherently insecure.

Shall I go on about their chatty network protocols?

How about OS throughput? Take the same hardware and use UNIX and you will get lower latency and higher throughput.

I still think Windows is secure if you lock it down properly.

But man, is that some awesome stuff to read more about. Thanks for the information, can never go wrong knowing more!

You don't need to bring up network protocols, isn't it only until 1998 when they actually had the TCP/IP stack installed by default rather than IPX?

__________________
admin @ mbworld.org

I will have to disagree that windows is secure if properly locked down.

IPX is native to Novell and not the windows environment. IPX needs to be added to windows for it to support it. Even Novell has been moving away from it in favor of IP. IPX does have some advantages over IP though.

If you want some good reading, look at the piggyback timer, this is just one reason why windows has such poor networking performance. You might also want to look and see what the other OS's do as well.