Windows SteadyState isn't in a steady state'”Hurry up, it's withdrawn year end 2010

Tony Austin
Saturday, 25 December 2010 08:38

Business IT - Security

Microsoft giveth and Microsoft taketh away. After handing out the pre-Christmas 2010 gift of Microsoft Security Essentials 2.0 they're doing the exactly opposite with Windows SteadyState which will not be available for download after 31 December this year. This puts Windows XP and Windows Vista users of this handy management tool for shared computers into a bind '” but it doesn't affect Windows 7 users because they can't use it anyway!

Windows SteadyState is not a tool that I've never had a need to use. It's intended for an environment where computers are shared, such as schools, Internet and gaming cafés, libraries, and community centers.

It eases the computer management burden on owners, teachers, or other non-technical personnel tasked with managing shared/public computers on top of their many other job responsibilities.

As explained by Microsoft on the Windows SteadyState 2.5 download page:

Managing shared computers can be difficult, technically challenging, time-consuming, and expensive. And what's more, without system restrictions and protections, users can inadvertently change the desktop appearance, reconfigure system settings, and introduce unwanted software, viruses, and other harmful programs. Repairing damaged shared computers can require significant time and effort.

Windows SteadyState provides a more effective way to help defend shared computers from changes by untrusted users and unwanted software installations. It can also help safeguard system resources.

User privacy is also an issue for shared computer environments. Shared computers often use shared user accounts that make Internet history, saved documents, and cached Web pages available to subsequent users.

All very true, but there's some bad news for current users:

Windows SteadyState will continue to be available for download through December 31, 2010. Support for Windows SteadyState will continue to be available through the Microsoft Knowledge Base portal through June 30, 2011. This announcement does not affect your right to continue to use Windows SteadyState.

So hurry up, you've only got a week left to download SteadyState, if you haven't yet got it and want to use it on your 'genuine' copy of Windows XP or Windows Vista.

But what about users of Windows 7?

PLEASE READ ON '¦