[geeks] Windows XP, and activation

[Lionel Peterson]

>From: Mike Hebel <nimitz at nimitzbrood.com>
>Date: 2006/11/06 Mon AM 09:53:12 CST
>To: The Geeks List <geeks at sunhelp.org>
>Subject: Re: [geeks] Windows XP, and activation

>Thus spake Chad McAuley:

<snip>

>> Yep, that's pretty much exactly what WSUS (which we use here at $work)
>> does.  Every day at a scheduled time it checks with Windows Update (or
>> Microsoft Update or whatever the hell it's called now).  Then you can set
>> how (and if) updates are approved.  You can automatically approve for
>> installation or just detection, and for either case you can filter by

Microsoft Update updates al MS products on your machine, Windows Update ONLY updates the OS components. They are different products, but MS encourages you to use Microsoft Update, as it is more comprehensive.

>Is there a solution like this for companies that don't have 2003 yet? 
>We're a Win2k server location at the moment and I've got a mix of Win2k
>and XP to patch but Automatic Updates have proven problematic at best.

Yes - my best info indicates that WSUS runs on Win Server 2000 or 2003 (32-bit mode only), and it supports clients that are Server 2003, Server 2000 (SP3 or greater), and Win XP (SP1 or greater).

This is from a MS training book, so I'd defer to the MS website for more accurate/complete information...

Lionel